It’s been a while since I last played, so I may be a little fuzzy on the details.
The game play, though simple is interesting. You have a limited number of cards (family members) to play on events and depending on the event and the person they may require additional people and servants to be placed with them. The cards give special abilities so you’ll want to acquire more and and cycle the ones you already have. Also those servants are required a day off (there not slaves) so you have to make sure you have additional servants to replace/cover for them. You’re spending money you don’t have to throw these events and increase your prestige level. So you’ll need to make some money and earn prestige. Hopefully your American Aunt with the drinking problem doesn’t show up and botch you your badminton tournament with the duke.
As you can probably guess, the theme is on point. Every game gives you your own little episode of Downton Abby or Upstairs Downstairs. There’s definitely decisions to vacillate over. It’s not Rosenburg or a LaCerda level complexity game and it doesn’t need to be. The base game alone I’d rate a 7. I think you really do need the Upstairs Downstairs expansion which adds more cards/ events and worker types. It really does a lot for the game. I have the other expansion but it’s not as necessary unless you want more families (players) to choose from or you want to play with more players.