Card Game Review - Fluxx

Title:  Fluxx
Publisher:  Looney Labs


# of players:  2-6
Time:  15 minutes
Age Range:  8+


Rating:  3 out of 5

The rules of Fluxx are simple:  Draw one card, play one card.  You play cards to try to meet the current goal...  But... then someone can change the goal.  And then they make it so you can draw three instead of one, play two cards instead of one, and shuffle up all of the cards on the board and deal them out randomly!  The goal changes again and the discard pile is shuffled back into the deck.  How will you win now?

As the box states, Fluxx is a game of ever-changing rules.  If you're going to win, you will need to keep up!

That intro may have made this game seem complicated, but you really shouldn't be too intimidated.  At its heart, Fluxx is very simple and is more about altering current rules than adding completely new ones.  There are four different kinds of cards...

Keepers:  These cards represent things or ideas.  You play them from your hand and you try to make a collection that meets the current goal.  If you meet the current goal, you win the game!  This include Milk, Cookies, Time, Death, the Sun, Love, Money, and so many more!

Goals:  These cards tell you which keepers you need to have in front of you to win.  These goals combine keepers in ingenious ways such as "Time is Money" (you win if you have Time and Money on the table) and "Hippyism" (you win if you have Love and Peace on the table).

Actions:  These cards are used to do a ton of different things including drawing extra cards and stealing keepers.  These are really powerful - use them wisely!

New Rules:  These cards are placed in front of you and alter many different rules of the game.

So that is how you play... but what does it FEEL like to play?  Well, Fluxx is a lot of fun!  The game is easy to learn and each round plays very quickly.  The goals make you really think about which keepers you want to play, and there is some degree of strategy in the order of the cards you play.

The thing that really draws this game down, however, is that all it takes to win is a bit of luck.  At its heart, Fluxx is just a card-drawing game, and that means that play can get very random.  No matter how much strategy you try to put into the game, your carefully laid plans are always vulnerable to a lucky draw on the part of one of your opponents.  But in the end, Fluxx isn't supposed to be a serious strategy game.  So you lost that round to a lucky draw - so what?  Just shuffle up and play again?  Odds are, you will get completely different cards and will win through a completely different route.

Fluxx is a perfect game to pull out and play if you only have a few minutes to spare, or if you want a light enjoyable experience with which to pass the time.  What it lacks in depth is made up for in charm.

3.5 out of 5.

Time Travel in Games: Chrononauts

Today, I want to share with you all one of my favorite card games:  Chrononauts.  Made by a small company called Looney Labs, Chrononauts is a game for two to six players.  In it, each player assumes the role of a time traveler with a unique mission.  You must battle against the other time travelers in order to alter the time space continuum to your liking, all the while amassing a fortune of artifacts from the past and the future to aid you.

The genius of this game is directly related to the Timeline:  a set of cards arranged in a grid that represent important events between the years 1865 and 1999.  By using certain cards called Inverters, time travelers are able to change major events and cause ripples through time.  These ripples paradoxes that must be repaired in order for the time traveler to set the timeline to how he likes it, and win the game.

The Timeline

For example:  On August 1st, 1936, Germany hosts the summer Olympics.  What if a time traveler went back in time and assassinated Hitler at the opening ceremonies?  This would cause ripples in time that would change may things, including World War II.

The concept of the Timeline makes playing this game a truly visceral experience, and really gives the player a feeling that he is altering events that have real repercussions on others.  Players also have secret missions that revolve around them collecting certain artifacts.  If a time traveler completes this mission, they can win the game.  Artifacts can come from the past or the future, and include things like a Cure for Cancer, the Lost Ark of the Covenant, a Live Stegosaurus, and a Videotape of the Creation of the Universe.  These artifacts add a certain humorous flare to the game, and keep the atmosphere very light.

The final way in which a player can win is if they repair paradoxes in the timeline (which are created when time travelers muck around with time-space).  However, travelers must always be cautious - if there are 13 or more paradoxes at any given time, the Timeline will collapse on itself and everyone will lose!

Although Chrononauts may sound complicated, it is a simple game at heart, and does not take a lot of time to learn.  It provides a great amount of entertainment (games last around 30 minutes), and also has a lot of educational value.  If you are a fan of games and/or time travel, check this one out!