Buru is a mid-weight, Euro-style board game for 1-4 players. Over five game rounds, you and your fellow players secretly deploy explorers to the four different regions of the island in order to gather resources, recruit islanders, set them to tasks, and pay tribute to the spirits revered there. The object of the game is to win the islanders' esteem. You can earn esteem in many ways, primarily by paying tribute, but also by pleasing elders, tasking local nobles, fulfilling the king's decrees, and holding a totem when any player pays tribute to that spirit.

At the end of the game, the player with the most esteem wins and is declared the new governor of Buru!