It's 5pm

It's 5pm Rulebook

Table of Contents

1. Overview

It's 5PM is a "tile placement x resource management" game in which players take turns placing cards to build a city and stroll around. After placing cards around the "home" at the edge of the city and the "city center", players explore the gradually building city on weekday mornings and evenings, Monday through Friday. Players head from the "home" to the "city center" in the morning, and return from the "city center" back to the "home" at night. The city has parks, bars, movie theaters, and board game cafes, etc. It's up to you to decide where to stop by and whose home to go back to.

2. Components

Cards to be placed in setup

The back side of the cards to be placed in the setup is different from that of the city cards.

4 home cards (1 blue, 1 green, 1 pink, 1 yellow). It is the starting point in "morning hours" and the destination in "evening hours".
1 city center card. A place to spend time and earn golds during "player's action". It is the destination in "morning hours" and the starting point in "evening hours".
8 initial city cards. Used for initial placement in "Setup". There are 2 cards each with a cafe and a bar, and 4 cards with a convenience store.

City cards

24 city cards. Each card has crossroads or curved roads and one or more different stores.

Goal cards

20 goal cards. Achieve the goal by visiting the stores in the order written on the card, either in "morning hours" or "evening hours", and gain additional Happiness at the end of the game. Happiness is gained at the end of the game.

Types of stores

Park, Cafe, Library, Convenience store, Gym, Shopping mall, Bar, Movie theater, Board game cafe.

Other components

4 meeples (1 blue, 1 green, 1 pink, 1 yellow).
8 time/gold markers (2 blue, 2 green, 2 pink, 2 yellow).
4 personal boards.
4 summary cards.
8 holiday tiles.
8 store tiles (Movie theater, Bar, Board game cafe, Library, Cafe, Shopping mall, Convenience store, Gym; 1 each).
1 day-of-week board.
1 starting player marker.
41 Happiness tokens (20x 1 Happiness, 10x 5 Happiness, 5x 10 Happiness, 4x 30 Happiness, 2x 50 Happiness).

3. Goal and End of the Game

While building the city, players stroll around the city in the "morning hours" and "evening hours" and collect Happiness by spending golds and time to visit the stores of their choice. The goal of the game is to be happy by exploring the city you live in. You have five days, Monday through Friday, and the winner is the player who has collected the most Happiness at the end of Friday.

4. Setup

Each player chooses one color and takes 1 home card, 1 meeple, and 2 time/gold markers of their color, 1 personal board, and 1 summary card. *When playing with 1-3 players, unchosen house card(s) will be used in step 6.
Place the time/gold markers at position 0 on the time track and position 3 on the gold track of the personal board.
Shuffle 8 store tiles face down, take them randomly one by one, and place them face up in order on the day-of-week board from Monday to Friday. Return the leftover store tiles back in the box as they will not be used in this game.
Shuffle 4 initial city cards (bar and cafe) and deal 1 card to each player randomly. Deal 1 initial city card (convenience store) to each player. Now each player has 2 initial city cards. Return any leftover cards back in the box.
Place the city center card face up at the center of the table.
Each player places their home card and 2 initial city cards face up in a row next to the city center card, according to the figure on the right. At this time, all cards must be placed as shown below depending on the number of players. All home cards should be placed so that their roofs face the city center.
Each player places the meeple on their home card.
Shuffle the city cards to make a face down deck. Each player draws 2 cards from the top of the deck and holds them in their hand so that the other players cannot see them.
Shuffle the goal cards face down and deal 5 cards to each player. Each player chooses 3 of them and puts them face up in front of them. Return the unchosen goal cards and the undistributed goal cards to the box as they will not be used in this game.
The person who has walked around the city most recently is the starting player. The starting player takes the starting player marker. *Alternatively, decide the starting player by any method.

Initial layout

Initial layout for 4 players, 3 players, and 2 players are shown in the figure (see "Setup" step 6).
Home cards chosen by the players; extra home card with no owner; initial city card with a bar or a cafe; initial city card with a convenience store; where cards can be placed during the game; city center card.
Figure caption: "3 cards placed by the green player" (3-player layout).
Extra home card with no owner: place the extra home cards next to the city center card.

5. Game Flow

The game progresses according to the following flow.

Replenish time for each day of the week.
Place city cards.
Place holiday tiles.
Player's actions:
1. Morning hours: leave home and head to the city center.
2. Earn golds in the city center.
3. Evening hours: leave the city center and go home.
4. Earn golds at home.
Prepare for the next day.

The above flow makes one day. The game starts on Monday and ends after 5 days until Friday have passed.

6. ① Replenish Time

Each player replenishes the time allotted for each day of the week. Check which day it is on the day-of-week board, and move the time marker to the position of the day on the time track on the personal board. Since it is Monday at the beginning of the game, move the time marker to position 9 on the time track.

Since the first day of the game is Monday, move the Time Marker to the place marked with "Mon".

7. ② Place City Cards

Starting with the starting player and proceeding clockwise, each player places 1 city card from their hand to the city.

The rules for placement are as follows:

Place your card so that at least one side of the card touches the already placed card.
Place your card in any orientation.
As shown in the figure below, place your card inside the grid so that the home cards are located at the far end.

In a 4-player game, all cards should be inside the 7x7 grid.

Where you cannot place cards yet in this state.
Where you can place cards.

As shown in the figure in "4. Setup ⑥", all cards should be inside the 7 x 5 grid in a 3-player game and the 5 x 5 grid in a 2-player game.

After placing a city card, the player draws 1 card from the deck. Each player always has 2 cards in hand. When all players have placed a card and drawn a card, move on to the next step "③ Place holiday tiles".

*Do not draw a card on Friday. After placing a card on Friday, you will have 1 card left in your hand. When playing with 1-3 players, the deck will not be empty.

8.3 Place Holiday Tiles

The store tiles on the day-of-week board represent regular holidays. Refer to the store tile that is closed today on the day-of-week board, and place the holiday tiles on top of the closed stores on all cards in the city. Stores with holiday tiles cannot be visited in the next step "④ Player's Actions". When all the tiles have been placed, move on to the next step.

Example for Monday: Today's store on the day-of-week board is the "bar", so place holiday tiles on all "bars" in the city.

9. ④ Player's Actions

Each player performs actions in the order of player's actions 1 to 4. Move your meeple while consuming time, travelling from home to the city center during "morning hours" and from the city center to home during "evening hours". While travelling, you can visit stores that are open on the way to earn Happiness tokens.

Stores with different business hours

There are three types of stores with different business hours.

Stores that are open only in the "morning hours".
Stores that are open both in the morning and evening.
Stores that are open only in the "evening hours".

Don't have enough time?

If you run out of time before reaching home in the "evening hours" and cannot move any further, you will be penalized. Count the number of moves needed to go to the nearest home card from the city card you are on. You lose two Happiness for each move. However, Happiness does not become below zero. Losing sleep will affect your health. It is important to return home in a timely manner.

*You can't go back to a home card without an owner.

Can't get to the city center?

If you run out of time in the "morning hours" and fail to go to the city center, you will be eliminated from the game. Work is a duty of the people, and moderate work leads to Happiness. Earn well to get Happiness.

Player's Action 1: Morning Hours

Starting with the starting player and proceeding clockwise, each player moves their meeple from their home to the city center according to the rules below. After one player has travelled to the city center, the next player starts to travel.

*You will travel from your own home at the beginning of the game, but if you return to another player's home in the middle of the game, the next day you will start travelling from the home you have returned to. *You cannot put your meeple out of the city by moving it to a direction where no card is placed.

Rules for Travelling

Every time you move your meeple to the next card, it consumes 1 hour on your personal board. (It takes a total of 3 hours to the city center in the shortest distance.)
Each time you move to the next card, you can visit all the stores on that card that are open once in any order. (You don't have to visit them if you don't want to.)
When playing with 1-3 players, you can move to a home card that has no owner.
Example: If you travel to the city center on the green route, it takes 5 hours. In the middle of the travel, you can pay the cost and visit all the stores on the cards you have traveled to once.

Other rules shown in the figure:

To visit a store, spend the golds and/or time indicated on the store's icon by moving the markers on your personal board. After that, take the number of Happiness shown on the store from the supply.
If there are multiple stores on a single card, you can use them once in any order.
Visiting parks does not consume gold or time. You can earn 1 Happiness just by travelling to a card with a park.
Example: If you use the "gym", you will pay 4 golds by moving the marker on your personal board's gold track to the lower side and get 4 Happiness tokens from the supply.
No card may be visited twice during the same morning/evening hours without exception.
If a card has curved roads on it, you cannot move out to a direction that is not connected to the road you came in on.
You cannot travel cards diagonally as you have to travel along the road.

Player's Action 2: Earn Golds in the City Center

Everyone performs this action all together. Once everyone has arrived at the city center, players can spend time in the city center to earn golds. This step can be skipped. To earn golds, convert time into golds according to the rates on the summary card.

The maximum amount of golds you can have is 18. Even if you convert more golds than you can have, you can only have up to 18.
You cannot earn more than 10 golds even if you convert more than 4 hours at a time.
You need at least 3 hours to get home, so make sure you have at least 3 hours.

Player's Action 3: Evening Hours

After everyone has earned golds, each player travels from the city center to their home or to another player's home, starting with the starting player. The rules for travelling are the same as those in "morning hours". After one player has arrived home, the next player starts to travel.

If another player returns to your home, you get 1 Happiness from the Supply for each other player who stays at your home. When playing with 1-3 players, you cannot return to a home without an owner.

Player's Action 4: Earn Golds at Home

All players perform this action all together. After everyone arrives at one of the homes, players spend all their remaining time and convert it into golds. Time cannot be carried over to the next day, so any time left should be converted into golds. To earn golds, convert your time into golds according to the rate on the summary card.

The maximum amount of golds you can have is 18. Even if you convert more golds than you can have, you can only have up to 18.
You cannot earn more than 10 golds even if you convert more than 4 hours at a time.

10. ⑤ Prepare for the Next Day

When "Player's Action 4" is over, pass the starting player marker to the player to the left. Then flip over today's store tile on the day-of-week board, and remove all the holiday tiles from the city and return them to the supply. After these are done, the day ends and players go back to "Replenish Time" to start the next day.

Day 1 example: When Monday is over, flip over the (Mon) tile. The next day is Tuesday.

11. Achievement of Goal Cards

You can achieve 3 goal cards you have chosen during the setup. This gives you additional Happiness at the end of the game, in addition to the Happiness you get when you visit the stores. Each goal card can be achieved only once, by visiting all the stores listed on the card in the same order, either in the morning hours or in the evening hours. If you visit other stores inbetween the order written on the goal card, you will not achieve the goal. However, you can connect multiple cards in succession to achieve the goal cards. Keep the achieved goal cards face down until the end of the game.

Example: you have the 3 goal cards shown below. On Wednesday, you visited a department store during the morning hours and a movie theater, a convenience store, and a board game cafe during the evening hours. Since you visited the shopping mall in the morning and the movie theater at night, you cannot achieve the goal card on the left. Also, since you visited a convenience store on the way between the movie theater and the board game cafe, you cannot achieve the goal card in the middle, either.

On the following Thursday, you visited a movie theater, a board game cafe, and then a bar during the evening hours. In this case, since you visited both the "movie theater" and the "board game cafe" and the "board game cafe" and the "bar" in these orders, you achieved two goal cards shown below.

12. Game End

The game ends when "Player's Action 4" on Friday is over. Each player calculates their Happiness as follows.

The total Happiness of the Happiness tokens earned during the game.
The sum of the Happiness written on the top right of the front side of the achieved goal cards.
1 Happiness for every 3 golds you have.

Add these up, and the player with the most Happiness is the winner. If more than one player is eligible, share the victory.

Once you get used to the game

If you get used to the game, all players may play morning hours and evening hours at the same time. However, it is also a good idea to pay attention to which stores other players visit and how they spend time.

13. Solo Play

When playing solo, the goal is to explore the city and earn more Happiness. When you prepare for the game, you place the city cards as you would in a 2-player game, with the following differences.

In "Setup", prepare meeple, personal boards and goal cards only for yourself.
In "Setup ①④⑥", place home cards, initial city cards, and a city center card just as you would in a 2-player game. However, only one home card of your color is an owned home.
In "Setup ⑧", draw 3 cards from the deck instead of 2, and keep them as a hand.
In "Game Flow 2: Place City Cards," place 2 cards from your hand instead of 1 card, and then draw 2 cards from the deck. Therefore, in Solo Play, you always have 3 cards in your hand.

The rest of the rules are the same as those for 2-player games, except that in "④ Player's Actions", you explore the city alone.

The following titles will be given according to the score at the end of the game. In other words, it decides how your meeple will spend this weekend.

0-50 points: Usual Weekend
51-60 points: Happy Weekend
61-70 points: All Night Long Weekend
71+ points: Nonstop Full Throttle Weekend