I played a bit of Hanabi over the weekend, it’s another small game that’s pretty easy to explain and a snap to set up. That and the fact that it’s a co-op game make it a slam-dunk feel-good experience. Even when you don’t win.
The main hitch in the game is that you’re not allowed to look at your own hand of cards. This is a strategic hitch in that it’s the main mechanic you’re trying to overcome, but it’s also a physical / muscle memory hitch in that you need to break that ingrained urge to look at a card you’ve drawn.
Once you’ve successfully managed to draw a hand and NOT see any of the cards, you need to figure out how to communicate to your fellows what cards they have. Play is simple, 1 through 5 ascending in each of 5 colors, but HOW to get the cards down is a novel challenge. You can only tell people one piece of info per turn (color or number) and there’s a limit on how many hints you can give.
Once you get too good at intuiting your cards there’s an advanced ruleset, but I think I have quite a few more rounds before I’m ready for that. Two thumbs up, light some fireworks tonight!