Last year I reviewed a small card game called Slide. I enjoyed it, and found myself classifying it as a ‘caravan game’. The idea came to me as I was thinking how to talk about this particular type of game. I’ve warmed to the idea the more I thought about it. I am sure others might disagree with the idea, but I mean it as a compliment, not a takedown. For me theses games are small, easy to transport, quick to teach, and have that feel of being something classic. The kind of game you would see on the carousel next to the till at a petrol station. Mind Up falls into this category as I believe was the intent of publisher Catch up Games. It is designed by Maxime Rambourg, with art from Christinge Alconffe.
Mind Up was given to me by Hachette Boardgames UK for a fair and honest review. I accepted no payment beyond the copy of the game for this review.
Mind Up seems to be completely random at first. The main component of the game is a deck of 60 cards, numbered 1-60 in 5 different colour suits. No number is repeated across the suits.
At the beginning of the game you deal out a number of cards equal to the number of players in the middle of the table. Each player is also dealt a hand of 7 cards. In front of each player are 5 scoring conditions, numbered 1 to 5. These are arranged randomly, but in the same way in front of every player. Placing cards on these scoring conditions will get us the points we need to win.
Each player simultaneously chooses a card from their hand and places it face down in front of them. They are revealed at the same time, and then arranged in ascending order below the cards we dealt out earlier. The card above the one you just played is now yours for scoring. Each player takes that card and puts it in the first free space, going left to right, below their scoring conditions.
The cards that you all just played are now the central cards. You all choose a new card from hand, and arrange the cards you reveal in ascending order, taking the cards above them for scoring. Wash, rinse, and repeat for a few rounds. As you gain more cards on your scoring conditions they must go into empty spaces, or into a space with a matching suit already present. This means you can build up multiple cards on a single scoring condition. This cycle keeps going until only 1 card is left behind.
The scoring at the end of the round is where all this seeminly random placement comes into a sharper focus. Each card on a scoring condition is worth the value of that condition. 3 cards placed on the 2 scoring condition will score 6 points (3 multiplied by 2). 3 cards placed on the 5 scoring condition will score 15 (3 multipled by 5). There are some additional bonus and penalty points on some cards that get added, or subtracted, to your final score after the multiplication part.
Now you are going to do this dance for two more rounds. The hand of cards you get for the second and third rounds, are going to be the cards that were on your scoring conditions in the previous rounds, plus a little extra.
This has the effect of making the random feeling of that first round into a more honed calculation. It turns the second and third rounds into more of an exercise in memory and deduction than pure guess work. Now you weren’t only playing cards out to try and score points, you were building your hand for a future turn.
This twist not only changes the nature of the game completely but the scoring cards change their order for subsequent rounds as well. If it goes 5, 3, 1, 4, 2 in the first round it might become 1, 2, 4, 3, 5 in the second. This first round setup would encourage folk to try and get a lot of cards on positions one and two, going for a couple of suits as best they can to maximise points. The second round would likely see players tussling to try and get over the hump of 1 and 2 into the latter half of the scoring conditions. Achieving this could require more manuevering and trying to get a couple of suits into those one and two slots before doubling down on slot 3 to get the sweet four times multiplier.
One of the consequences of that twist coming at the end of the first round, is that it makes teaching the game incredibly easy. The first round becomes almost a tutorial, showing players how to play and score cards. Everything else builds on that foundation, leading to some great ‘Oh I see’ moments emerging in play. The short playtime also means you can just go again, now fully versed in how to manipulate the system.
After that praise I still feel Mind Up fits perfectly in my imaginary ‘caravan game’ category. It plays up to 6, is simple to teach, with a beautiful twist that changes everyone’s perception of what exactly they are playing. I won’t pretend it is the deepest card game, or even my favourite small box game, but there is more here than meets the eye. It is good to be reminded not to judge a game by its cover, or even the first round of play.
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