Darwin's Dice (2016)

Overview

Description from the publisher:

Darwin’s Dice is a simple, fast-paced trump card game, where two dice set the conditions of every turn. You’ll need both a tactical approach as well as a fair amount of luck. Two to four players meet in this game for a struggle of sheer survival. Only the player who’s best prepared and whose cards match the conditions can obtain the opponents’ cards and collect points.

Before each turn a player – the Darwin – rolls the dice. The combination of number (1 to 8) and colour (blue, green and yellow) determine which card becomes the trump during this turn. Additionally, one die (with + and -) specifies if high or low numbers have an advantage. Each player then plays a card upside down and then flip them over simultaneously. The player of the strongest card wins, becomes the new Darwin and rolls the dice for the next turn.

The strongest card is either the trump or – of no trump has been played – the highest or the lowest card. If it comes to a draw, the size of the animal is of the essence (+ for big / - for small). But there are three special cards as well: The red cards (1 to 8), if they should win a turn, although they are not able of becoming the trump and will always lose in a draw, they can destroy the collected cards of the player with the second best card. The grey cards (0 and 9) are always the highest or lowest numbers. They can only be beaten by the trump. The brown cards (4.5) are the worst cards, because they are neither the highest nor the lowest cards - they are right in the middle. But if the trump has been played, they are the only ones able to beat it.

A game consists of several rounds, each consisting of individual turns. Each turn consists of rolling the dice and playing one card. A round is over when all the hand cards have been played. The game is over when the card deck is used up.

At the end of each round – after all the hand cards have been played – the points of the cards, according to the number of symbols in the corner, are counted and written down. These points are safe and cannot be destroyed. At the end of the game – when the card deck is used up – the player with the highest score wins.