Do you have kids (or a spouse) that are always claiming they are bored at home and on the road? Check out this awesome card game and they will never utter those words again. Fluxx can be played by those aged 8 and over. It's the card game of ever-changing rules, so no matter how many times you play it, it will never be the same game twice. The object of the game is to be the first to reach whatever the "goal" is (example: milk and cookies, where you need to get both the card with milk on it and the card with cookies on it), but since there are many goals and everyone wants to win, the goal will continue to change throughout the game. You may have 3 cards or 12 cards in your hand at any given time, because the rules will continue to change. You may have to pick up 3 and leave 1 or exchange cards with another player. A game can last 5 minutes or 30 minutes, but it will always be a blast.
Want to know more about how to play? Here’s how it works. Every game starts with the Basic Rules which is a card you leave next to the draw deck. The basic rules are always “draw a card, play a card per turn”. Once the game starts, the players may use a New Rule card, which will add rules to the basic ones or change them completely. You may end up with an X=X+1 card, which then means you add one to all the numbers on the rules cards, making the basic rules now “draw 2, play 2”. Another new rule might be “Draw 2, play 3” and you would put that one over the basic rules card, because it totally changes them.
Throughout the deck are Keeper Cards which are used to meet the goal. You will usually need two to win, like Bread and Butter or Sun and Moon. With these also come Goal Cards which will give you a goal to work towards in order to win the game. Of course, the goal will change throughout the game as well, so you might have the winning combo at one time, only to be thwarted by another player’s cards before your turn comes back around.
Action cards are just what they sound like. When you play one, you must do as it says, like resetting the rules or drawing the specified amount of cards and playing them immediately. As you can see, this can totally ruin your own strategy, which is why you never know what will happen. There is even enough healthy competition when just two people play. My husband and I have the best time trying to ruin each other’s hands to win. Usually this only helps us lose to the other faster, but it doesn’t stop us from having fun.
There are several different versions of the game and they can be used separately or as one big deck. The current sets include: Stoner Fluxx (no longer on sale, but can be found on Ebay occasionally), EcoFluxx, Family Fluxx, Zombie Fluxx, Monte Python Fluxx, Martian Fluxx and Pirate Fluxx. Some come with brand new rules to play by, too. There are even expansion sets, for those that think one pack of cards is never enough, but too many rules is too much! We have Fluxx 4.0 and Fluxx Zombie now, but have yet to venture into playing them together. We take them with us everywhere, though, because it’s a great time-waster. It keeps you on your toes and is really fun. It’s the perfect travel game. We play it on the plane, in our hotel room, at the Laundromat. Anywhere there's a flat surface! Just one look at our box can show you how much we love this game.
Don’t live in the U.S.
