Description

The historic estate of Mansfield Park has fallen into ruin. Franny Bertram, a descendant of some of Jane Austen’s most beloved characters, has turned a few rooms into a bed and breakfast and is trying to restore more of it, but she needs your help to find small antiques she can sell to fund the project.

Search the rooms of the mansion to find the valuable items and collector edition books before a hotel developer makes it up the walkway and inside the house. If she does, she’ll take over the mortgage and tear the mansion down. Then Franny’s dream will be no more. There is a secret passage which could help in the search, but you have to find it first.

You get to make choices in how you conduct your search. The item tiles are scattered throughout the rooms face down, and their location changes each time you play. With a list of what you need, you can roll the dice to move throughout the mansion, picking up items when you find them. Each time you look at an item in a room, whether you collect it or not, you’ll draw an action card which may take you to a different place, and that may change your strategy for your next turn. The action card may help the hotel developer move forward to the front door, and that puts the pressure on you and the other players to complete the search before she makes it inside.

Since you also need to put together a set of collectible books, all of which are piled in the attic, it’s your choice when to go there instead of rolling the dice. And then there is the location to the secret passage. Each player has cards that offer clues, but you’ll need to know who has what to narrow down the possibilities. If you are the first to work out where it is, you’ll be able to move freely throughout the house, but you’ll have to decide if it’s worth it to spend your turn on the search for it, or if your time is better spent in other choices. Players who are familiar with Jane Austen’s books will recognize characters and situations, but no knowledge of them is required to play. It’s all about the search!

—description from the designer