With about 40 minutes to go, I decided to try the final Uberplay small box game, released this Spring. For the second time tonight we were building pyramids but, this time, by collecting and laying down numbered cards. A pyramid consists of at least two levels of cards, with cards on the same level being of the same number and cards directly above them being 1 higher in value. Also, each higher level must have at least one fewer card than the level below it. Once laid, the pyramid can, on subsequent turns, be scored or extended. The score is based on the card values in each level and the sum of these is multiplied by the number of levels, so a three level pyramid using cards of values 1,2 and 3 would be worth 18 points. The higher you build the pyramid, the better your score, but others can play cards to try and remove cards from your pyramid so, the more greedy you are, the more likely a target you become. Each time a pyramid is scored, a marker moves the game board and once the 10th pyramid is scored, a Game Over card is shuffled into the draw deck. As soon as this appears the game ends and the person with the most points is victorious.
Despite the suggested playing time of 40 minutes, our game took about double that. However,it was quite good fun and I rate it the best game of the series. It's a game where you need to keep scoring, unless you are able to build a couple of very large pyramids and are able to protect them. Mark K managed to score 5 pyramids as did Mark G, whereas I only managed 4. At the end, my card drawing skills deserted me and, even though I had scored a 120 point pyramid, I still came in last. Both Marks had scoring pyramids at the end but Mark K had the edge.
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