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by Thorsten Gimmler
Rating: 8/10 after 2 plays
by Cyril Demaegd
art Oliver Freudenreich
published 2004 by Amigo
players: 3-5
duration: 10-15 mins.
type: filler card game
PACE: QUICK. Pay a chip to avoid taking the face-up card, or take the face-up card. Players will evaluate whether or not the card can be sequenced by another player, and whether or not it can be sequenced by themselves. But all this takes about 7 seconds per turn.
COMPLEXITY: FLUFF. Rules: On your turn, take the top card and all the chips that have been contributed so far. If you don't want the card, pay a chip. At the end of the game, all cards are negative points, and all your chips are positive points. If any cards are in sequential order, the lowest card in the set is the only card counted against you. Highest score wins. 4 sentences; it's that simple.
LUCK: HIGH. Since several cards are set outside the deck, player can't be sure of exactly what will available, and therefore cannot know if the cards they have can even be sequenced. The cards come up randomly, and obviously a player who sits in front of you who is looking for the same card as you will have a better chance of getting it.
TENSION: MEDIUM. Since you don't know exactly what cards are in the deck, and since every chip you spend puts you closer to having to take a card by default, players are constantly assessing when to pull out, take the chips, and hope for some helpful cards later. For a 10 minute game, I don't think you can hope for more tension than this.
CONFRONTATION: MEDIUM. When you need a card, you will rarely take it to spite someone, since you need to focus on conserving your own chip reserve and get the cards that you need. But hey, if he needs the "16" and there's a big pile of chips, why let him have it?
INTERACTION: MEDIUM. It's all in the bidding and the taking. This is a very simple game though, so obviously interaction is pretty much limited to the draft card and the chips there.
VISUALS: GOOD. Very simple clean design with thick red plastic chips. Perfect for what it is (though I sense some sort of theme could have been on here if they had really tried.)
THEME: NONE. No theme -- just a numbered deck. (Not even any bull-heads!)
PLAYER SCALING: unknown. 5 players was very good.
GAMER APPEAL: PROBABLY. For a 10-minute filler, I am sure nearly everyone will want a copy of this.
CASUAL GAMER APPEAL: YES. This simple, this short, this tense. Almost a guaranteed success.
REPLAY: unknown.
RATING: 8/10 after 2 PLAYS
PWell, ignore all the presents and knick-knacks in the picture above. This game is a numbered deck of cards and a pile of red chips. Dead simple. Rules: On your turn you may: 1) pay a chip to avoid taking the card that is in the middle of the table; 2) take the card in the middle as well as all the chips played into the middle so far. Once someone takes a card and the chips, a new card is flipped up, and play begins again. At the end of the game, all cards are negative points, and all chips are positive points. If you have sets of cards in sequence, only the lowest card counts as negative -- so make sets! If you can. You see, several cards are secretly dealt out of the deck, so you can never be sure which cards are in there and which are not. Try making a sequence when the middle card is missing! Dead simple. And very much recommended.