OUR REVIEW

Fish on top of Steak!

Feuer & Flamme

Barbecueing Stacks

Some topics seem to obvious and yet nobody seems interested to do something about them – we have built Villas, stacked chairs, pulled out and replaces wooden blocks in all kinds of manners, but nobody until now has come up with the idea to simulate the placement of barbecue food on a barbecue grill.

Now the idea has been picked up by a German/Austrian team of designers, Stefan Dorra and Manfred Reindl, and has been turned into a game; and they idea got support from a star of the culinary side of things, from star and TV cook Johann Lafer, who‘s also an Austrian. He was reportedly red-hot for the idea, and so the game about mushrooms, sausages and corn on the cob was named Feuer & Flamme (Fire & Flame).

So, man the barbecue grill and deal with appetizing things to grill – sausages, eggplants, burgers, corn on the cob, mushrooms, steaks and fish must be placed on the grill with a pair of tongs. But just like a standard barbecue this one needs some preparations, too – you have to spread out the things to grill, assemble the barbecue grill itself from two supporting bases and the grill itself, which is a piece of cardboard. The challenge cards are shuffled and stacked face-down. Each player then receives three different bonus tiles providing some assistance and also three grill chips of his color, and now we are ready to start.

You need some practice for a successful barbecue and that goes for this version, too. In your turn you must reveal the top challenge card from the stack and place the food pictured on the tile without dislodging something from the grill. And that’s where our barbecue is different from a real one: Over a bed of real charcoal it is not really best to place corn on the cob vertically on a steak or to put the steak on top of some fish, but on this barbecue here you are allowed to do that! Stacking is allowed, welcomed and necessary, too, because, the absolute taboo is to dislodge something already on the grill. If something drops off all the same, you discard one of your grill chips.

And of course there are more rules: You can use the pair of tongs with one or both hands, food can only be touched with the the pair of tongs and you may move food on the grill around, but again only with the pair of tongs. When you drop a piece of food between general supplies and grill you can pick it up again with the tongs and start anew. When the stacking seems absolutely impossible you can use one of your bonus tiles, but unfortunately each can be used only once. One of the tiles, “Break” allows you to skip your turn, you hand the tongs to your neighbor and he can fight with the slippery sausage. Very useful is the “apprentice” tile, it allows you to drop two pieces of food without penalty and also of tremendous help is the third tile “Done!”, it lets you remove two pieces of food from the grill before you place your piece of food.

You keep playing in this way, if necessary the discard pile of challenge tiles is shuffled for a new challenge stack. If you must discard your last grill chip, you must quit and the last in play wins the game. Should you manage to place the last piece of food on the grill without something dropping off you are a master chef and win instantly, but I have yet to see that happen.

This kind of barbecue is fun, at is has a bit more relation to real life then some of the other dexterity games, and it gives you an appetite, too! Fun for all the family! Have a good barbecue and may your fire be smoke-free!

Players: 2-5

Age: 5+

Time: 20+

Designer: Stefan Dorra, Manfred Reindl

Artist: Christian Opperer

Price: ca. 30 Euro

Publisher: Huch! & friends 2013

Web: www.huchandfriends.de

Genre: Dexterity

Users: For families

Version: de

Rules: de

In-game text: no

Comments:

Supported by TV star cook Johan Lafer

Very pretty components

Nice adaptation of a standard mechanism

Simple basic rules

Compares to:

All dexterity games involving stacking, from Jenga to Villa Paletti

Other editions:

Currently none

My rating: 6

Dagmar de Cassan

Dexterity in relation to reality – who has not already fought with sausages on a barbecue grill? This is a witty smoke-free simulation which can make you sweat all the same

Chance (pink): 3

Tactic (turquoise): 2

Strategy (blue): 0

Creativity (dark blue): 0

Knowledge (yellow): 0

Memory (orange): 0

Communication (red): 0

Interaction (brown): 3

Dexterity (green): 3

Action (dark green): 3