HIGHLIGHTS AMONG GAMES

COLORETTO

CHAMeLEON UNIVERSE

Dear reader! With his deck of cards, made up from 63 chameleon cards, which come in seven colors, plus 3 joker cards and 10 +2 cards Michael Schacht has created a small marvel rich in tricks. Absolutely deservedly so, Coloretto has won the award for the best card game created by a game designer in 2003, playfully easily, and that in both interpretations of the phrase. Because after a divertingly short explanation of the rules you can happily start collecting chameleon after chameleon. But not so fast! Only the three most successful colors that you caught will be awarded a score in the end, the rest were fruitless efforts, and even result in steep penalty point deduction. During one of the many events connected to the Austrian Games Museum you should take a look at this fast and challenging hunt for chameleons. You will definitely not regret it! www.spielen.at

The light of our obligatory lamp brings chameleon after chameleon into focus, the more of those camouflage-able little animals appear, the higher the collecting fever, that is, the display, advances. All players in the game, that can be from two to four, collect cards of identical color - theoretically that can be all seven colors. But you do only score positive for the three colors in which you have amassed most cards, for all other colors you suffer quite steep penalty points. But one is absolutely in the dark about what could turn out to be the longest color in one's own display. Both score tracks, for positive and penalty points, develop according to the triangle numbers, famous since Euclid, that is, for one card 1 point is allocated, for 2 cards you score 3 (1+2) points and for 3 cards you get 6 (1+2+3) points, and so on, up to the maximum number of 21 points. In your turn you must choose between two cute alternatives - turn up a card and add it to the display, whereby the maximum number of cards for each column (the number of columns depends on the number of players) is three - or you can pick up a display and add it to your own open-faced collection. Sounds tantalizingly simple, and is simple, at least in theory, but as soon as you have to choose you are facing the dilemma of choice. Because when maybe, at the start, three-card displays can add lots of volume, that is, chameleons, to your your display, you will towards the end catch one or the other penalty card. In scoring they can turn out to be a stumbling block, oh sorry, a chameleon's tail, and then there are the special cards, "Joker", with which you can enhance any column, or "+2", colorless cards to upgrade any column. And finally, for a last surprise, late in the game some cards are shuffled into the deck, which include a card indicating the end of the game, so that you never know exactly when the game will be over.

One final remark: This little card game plays fast and fluently, and cries out for a re-match, regardless if you are a tactician, a gambler, a bluffer or a soldier of fortune. And don't forget to take the displays of your opponents into account, as not to be left with a few meagre chameleons instead of the triumph to score the maximum number of points. Take up the deck and start playing!

Comments to: hugo.kastner@chello.at

Homepage: www.hugo-kastner.at

RECOMMENDATION # 99

Players: 3-5

Age: 8+

Time: 30+

Designer: Michael Schacht

Art: Michael Menzel

Price: ca. 8 Euro

Publisher: Abacusspiele

www.abacusspiele.de

Year: 2003

Competence: 4 von 9

Info±: 1 von 9

Chance: 4 von 9

"… much tension created in this small game, if I can come up with possibilities for placing cards which frustrate others", writes Dorothea Heß, member of the Jury Spiel des Jahres in Spielbox, And therein is the reason for the high score in "Competence". The elements of chance and tactics are happily balanced.

Hugos EXPERT TIP

By all means, play a game of three or four players. It's more fun that way, aggravating your fellow players.

Hugos FLASHLIGHT

It is the simple and yet sophisticated scoring mechanism that, next to the strikingly simple choice of "place a card" or "take cards and leave the round", has turned this creation of Michael Schacht into an almost classic game. Regardless for which age of player, the words of Peter Neugebauer in "Fairplay" stay in mind: "More depth than supposed"!

PREVIEW

7 WONDERS

Weltwunder der Antike