A Week at the Factory

Algae, Inc. turn structure: four weeks, each with Monday Morning income, a five-turn Work Week on the action board, and the Weekend — then the End of the Month.

A week

The game is one month: four weeks, each a round with three phases, shown along the bottom of your department board.

1. Monday Morning — everyone takes income.
2. Work Week — five turns each, one per work day.
3. Weekend — bonuses and cleanup. After week 4 the Weekend is replaced by the End of the Month.

I. Monday Morning

Every week, including the first, each player takes income in this order:

Step	Income
A	1 algae cube per operator in your facility, taken in turn order.
B	€2, plus €1 for each €1 icon revealed on the export/2x tiles still on your side board.
C	1 VP for each VP icon revealed on those tiles.
D	1 cube move per engineer, along main belts only.
E	1 science point per scientist, up to 10.

Steps D and E (and the department step below) may be done by everyone at once.

Taking algae

Take cubes only of species you have open storage for, from the matching tank on the map. If a tank is empty, buy a cube from the supply for €1 instead — but never more than one cube per operator in total.

Moving cubes on Monday

Each engineer moves one cube one step along a main conveyor belt . You may split the moves over several cubes.

Income upgrades

Each department has three team income science tiles. Removing one (with your scientists) adds +2 to that team’s Monday income — and to the matching side-board income bonus — but not to the team’s activation.

Tile removed	Monday income becomes
Operators	1 cube per operator +2
Engineers	1 move per engineer +2
Scientists	1 science per scientist +2

Department step

Two departments have an extra Monday step: Food degrades unexported food and spoils food that had already degraded; Biofuel may do one refining. Food · Biofuel

II. Work Week

Starting with the first player and going clockwise, each player takes a turn; five turns each make the week. On your turn:

A. Move your supervisor

Move your supervisor up to the next action strip:

• first turn of the week: any spot on the bottom strip;
• later turns: a spot on the next strip connected to your current spot.

Several supervisors may share a spot.

B. Take the action

Then either

• take the action shown on your spot — see Actions; or
• take the alternate action: one choice action token, or €1, or one algae cube, or one cube move along a main belt.

The alternate action counts as an action, so an export/2x tile can still repeat or replace it.

Action tokens

Token	What it does
Choice action	Change which team or machine you activate (operators → engineers, Machine B → Machine A). It cannot turn a team action into a machine action.
Wild action	Take any action or sub-action instead of the one on your spot.
Export/2x tile	Once unlocked (both markers on it gone): repeat your spot’s action or take the alternate action. One per turn; the tile goes back to the box.

A second action from an export/2x tile can itself be changed with a choice or wild token.

III. Weekend

After each of the first three weeks, once everyone has taken their fifth turn:

A. Weekend bonus

The last spot your supervisor reached touches two bonuses on the weekend strip. Check your energy:

B. Update the action strips

Return all supervisors to the start. Move the week marker up one round space and flip the action strip beside it to its other side. Turn last week’s export bonus tile face down. Before week 4, also flip the weekend bonus strip to its empty side.

C. Refill and balance the tanks

• Refill each algae tank to its capacity: 4, plus 1 for each matching algae storage tile any player has removed, up to 6.
• Byproduct tanks: take one cube out of any tank that is completely full; add one to any tank that is completely empty. Then, if the two tanks differ by 2 or more non-empty rows, move cubes from the fuller to the emptier until the difference is at most 1.

D. First player

Pass the first-player token clockwise and start the next Monday Morning.