Double or Nothing - August 5, 2006

I can't tell you how disappointed I was with this new offering from Knizia and Uberplay. My research before buying had indicated that it belonged in the press-your-luck genre of games. When I read someone comparing it to Diamant (a real crowd-pleaser in my home) I knew I had to check it out.

Hmm. Yes, you do have to press your luck. But the system is so abstract that it's difficult to care. The game has a unique deck of cards that create "lines of suits" across the table. A line is only complete if it is represented in every card placed on the table thus far. Look at the picture for an example. Going from right to left, notice that the diamond suit is the only one with a continuous line. Spades and hearts crapped out after the first card, and clubs died after the third. The object of the game is to take the points you're offered (the total value of all the suit icons represented in all the current complete lines) or take your chance and draw a card. In the above example, if the player doesn't take his six points (six diamonds showing), he can take a chance and draw another card. If a diamond doesn't show up, he's toast.

Once a player is out, he's out until all players either crap out or score. This involves turning your player token from IN to OUT (something we all habitually forgot to do). The last player standing has a mildly interesting dilemma. He must draw two cards. If he scores, he gets double. If he busts, he gets nothing. Double. Or Nothing. Get it?

I dunno, it just didn't grab me. One core problem is that the deck is SO non-standard that it's difficult to calculate your odds at any given time. The best you can say during any draw is that your odds of success are at least 25%. Unless you study the wildly irregular deck, it's really difficult to calculate your outs.

Double or Nothing is an example of a game that works perfectly, but doesn't inspire or impress. This felt like a game that Knizia designed in the margins of his notebook while working on some other game.