Verdant Arizona is a game for 2 players. They control the same truck, which lets them collect cacti. Cacti are placed into individual collections, which score based on their quality.

There are 40 cacti cards in the game, numbered 1 through 40.

GAME START

The second player chooses where the truck begins on the drafting display.

MOVEMENT

• The active player can move the truck 2 times.
• The truck must move between cards, or around the outside of the cards.
• Orientation is important - the truck has to move in the direction it is pointing in. Turning a corner is a normal move. The player can also choose to rotate the truck 180 degrees, at the cost of a single move.
• Cactus Wren tokens can be spent to get additional moves.

COLLECTION

• After movement, pick any face-up card adjacent to the truck.
• You will notice that some cards have Cactus Wren tokens. Take these if you claim the card.

DISPLAY

• After collection, display the chosen card in your garden.
• Gardens can never extend beyond 4x4 in size.
• New cards must be placed adjacent to existing cards.
• Two Cactus Wren tokens can be spent to swap the positions of 2 cards.

RESET

• If, at the start of a player's turn, that player cannot reach a face-up card in two moves, the players reset the drafting display.
• Any face-up card gains a Cactus Wren token.
• Then all face-down cards are flipped face-up.
• Newly flipped cards with Cactus Wrens each gain a Cactus Wren token.

GAME END

• The game finishes when both players have complete 4x4 grids. (ie, 16 turns each).
• Proceed to scoring.

SCORING

• 1 point for each row and column which has numbers in ascending or descending order. (skipping numbers is fine)
• An additional 1 point for each gecko icon in a scoring row or column. (so each gecko can score for both a row and a column)
• 2 points for each quadrant of the board where all cards are the same colour. (a quadrant being the 2x2 cards in each corner.