When Cinq-O was my hero

Cinq-O is a game that I picked up very early in my board gaming life. Like before I ever made an online board game order. Before I hauled a ton of games home from a convention. Back when my collection consisted of a bag that held a couple of Looney Lab card games and some Cheapass Hip Pocket games. I’m not ever sure I’d picked up the travel version of Settlers of Catan, which may have been my first ‘big’ purchase. 

I was going to say before I’d heard of Ticket to Ride but that was just because Ticket to Ride hadn’t been published yet lol

Cinq-O is a dice game where you are trying to get to a hundred points. It consists of five regular dice and one special Hi-Lo die, along with a cute little carrying case that also doubles as a playmat.

The elevator pitch is that, each turn, you are either trying to roll low or high. The key is the Hi-Lo die. The side that you lock in will determine both whether you going low or high AND what the multiplier will be. You can get up to ten points for either five ones or sixes and that can get multiplied up to three times.

A few more key points. You have to lock at least one die every roll but you can also bank dice. Put them to one side and lock them in for a later turn and keep rolling the rest of the dice. And a straight is also worth ten points, giving you another option other than low or high.

Back in the day, I played a lot of Cinq-O. And revisiting it now, I find that mechanically it holds up better than I expected too. With the generous amount of rerolling that you can do, the option of banking dice, and the option of going for a straight, I found that I had a lot more control than I expected. Yes, the decision tree was pretty obvious, but there was more than just roll dice and hope for the best.

Cinq-O has been out of print for at least fifteen years. And while I found that it was still fun, I don’t know if it will get reprinted.

Simply, the number of alternatives for this niche have really grown and there are just better little dice games to play. With options like Qwixx or the Rolling Japan family or the Pretty Clever family, there are just options in this game space that offer more engaging gameplay and more complex decision trees. Heck, I’ve seen Qwixx sold at gas stations so it’s hitting the same mass market audience Cinq-O was.

While it’s not mindless and I had fun playing it again, Cinq-0 feels simple and bland compared to games that either came later or I just found out about later.

Still, for a mass market game from 2003, Cinq-O was a solid gaming experience. And if you wanted to try it out now, making a homemade copy would be a few minutes work.