WYNGO

WYNGO is a super clever trick-taking card game for 2 to 5 players, set to twist your mind with an intriguing premise. In each round, everyone bids the exact number of tricks they will win, but there's a crucial catch: the total of all bids can never be nine! This means that, even before the first card is played, it's known that at least one player will fail their contract. There's no trump suit here, nor an obligation to follow the led color. In each trick, you play any card you like. The highest numbered card takes the trick, regardless of its color. In case of a tie, color breaks it, following a hierarchy from weakest to strongest: Yellow, Blue, Green, Red, and Indigo. The trick is deciding which trick you want to take and which you want to let go, because an unwanted trick costs as much as one you should have won but failed to. The card backs are colored, allowing you to see which colors your opponents hold, but not their values. This gives you a clue as to who can still take a trick and who can only shed cards. Jokers and Zeros share the same purple back and are the only cards played face down. A Joker beats everything, a Zero loses to everything, and nobody knows which has been played until the trick is over. Between two Jokers, the first one played wins. The player to the dealer's left bids first and leads the first trick, and the dealer bids last, being responsible for ensuring the total bids don't sum to nine. The deck is shuffled only once, the first time the box is opened, and never again. The player to the dealer's right cuts the deck, no shuffling, and the dealer deals nine cards each. Meeting your contract scores 30 points, each trick off costs 10 points. The first player to reach 100 points wins, or whoever has the best score after 12 rounds. Each color carries its own geometric symbol and no card bears any text, which is a very elegant touch.