In Viticulture, players take on roles of people in rustic, pre-modern Tuscany who have inherited meager vineyards. They have a few plots of land, an old crushpad, a small cellar, and three workers. They each have a dream of being the first to call their winery a real success.

The players are in the position of deciding how they want to allocate their workers throughout the year. Every season is different on a vineyard, so the workers have different tasks they perform in the summer and winter. There's competition on those tasks, and often the first worker to get to the job has an advantage over following workers.

Thankfully for the players, people love to visit wineries, and it just so happens that many of those visitors are willing to help out around the vineyard when they visit as long as you provide a worker to take care of them. Their visits (in the form of cards) are short but can be very helpful.

Using those workers and visitors, players can increase their vineyards by building structures, planting vines (vine cards), and filling wine orders (wine order cards). Players work towards the objective of running the most successful winery in Tuscany.

Viticulture - Essential Edition comes with components for Viticulture, but adds parts of the expansions from Tuscany, including 36 Mama & Papa cards, Field cards (previously known as "Properties"), and 24 Automa cards (solo variant), along with a couple of minor rule changes.