Looking back and finding out Wurfel Bingo was a milestone

 I have been a big fan of legit multi-player solitaire games ever since I finally got my hands on a copy of Take It Easy more than ten years ago. Don’t get me wrong. There is a lot to be said for competition. Trying to kick each other’s teeth in is an important part of gaming. However, non-confrontation has its place too and can be the only way to get some people at the table.

In the past year, games that use the ‘bingo with strategy’ mechanic of Take It Easy have become more important because, hey, no contact. Perfect for social distancing.

And if your social distancing is over video conferencing, Roll and Write multi-player solitaire (and I have driven the jargon train off the cliff) is the  perfect format. I love Take It Easy and Cities/Limes and Karuba but everyone needs the tiles and the board. With R&W, one person needs the dice and/or cards and everyone else just needs the player sheet and something to write with.

These days, Roll and Writes have pretty much exploded. And, judging by the number of design contests focused on Roll and Writes, that’s not going away. (The fact that they have to be relatively easy to manufacture has to be a factor in that.) And a lot of them are multi-player solitaires.

I have yet to be in a position to actually play one via some form of video conferencing... but I’m ready if anyone ever asks me!

While the number of R&R multi-player solitaires might be in the triple digets, the first one I came across was Wurfel Bingo. I refuse to believe it’s the earliest example but it was only the third multi-player solitaire I had come across (and the second one was Take It To the Limit, the direct sequel to Take It Easy!)

Wurfel Bingo, also known as High Score, is a five-by-five grid that you fill out with the sum of two dice. You score lines basically by creating ‘poker’ hands with the numbers and the diagonals score double. Its origins are shrouded in a bit of mystery since Reiner Knizia published close to the same rules fifteen years before it was published.

When I first discovered Wurfel Bingo, it was a revelation. I did a lot of gaming out of a bag and having a Take It Easy experience where people needed a pencil instead of 27 tiles was an amazing space saver.

While the game is pretty abstract and simple by the standards that have developed over the last ten years, it’s still pretty strong. I particularly like how the odds of what numbers can be rolled with two dice means you can make informed decisions. Even if that does mean everyone tries to fill out the diagonals with sevens.

Since I first found and tried out Wurfel Bingo, I’ve found a lot of games that fill a similar niche. And it’s a niche that I think has become increasing important and valuable. It is no longer the top of my list for games I’d recommend. However, looking back, it was a milestone for me.

Criss Cross boils down R&W to the absolute basics

I’m going to be upfront. I made a PnP copy of Criss Cross instead of buying it. For many reasons, I am hesitant to make copies of published games but, in defense of this particular situation, I downloaded the board from the publisher themselves. If the publishers give me the files, I have no problems.

Criss Cross is an incredibly simple roll and write game from Reiner Knizia but, amazingly enough, not the simplest one he’s made. That’d be Katego.

Okay. Description time. Criss Cross belongs in the same school as Take It Easy. Everyone has their own board and fills it out with the same information. It’s literally multi-player solitaire. 

In this case, everyone is filling out a five-by-five grid with the rolls of two dice that have six different symbols on them. At the start, everyone puts a different symbol in the corner. (If you have more than six players, there’s going to be some duplicates)

Then, roll those dice. Everyone has to mark down those two symbols on their grid and they have to be adjacent to each other. Diagonal doesn’t count. And if you accidentally make a square impossible to fill, that’s just too bad for you.

After you’ve filled in your grid, time to figure out points. You score each row and column. Set of symbols (and they have to be next to each other) are what earn you points. A set of two is worth two points but a set of five is worth ten points. Most points win.

There are two advanced rules. One is that you score one of the diagonal lines but you score it twice. The other is that if a row or column doesn’t score any points, you get negative five points for it. I would never play without these rules. Even if I was teaching Criss Cross to a non-gamer, I’d still teach the game with the advanced rules. There’s not much to the game so a little more adds a lot.

Criss Cross reminds me of a lot of games, even within the Take It Easy family. Mountains and Valleys from Sid Sackson’s Beyond Solitaire, Mosaix, Not Another One. However, the game I find myself really comparing it to is Würfel Bingo/High Score. 

I like High Score more. Since you are using the sum of two dice, you can use probability to make decisions. However, there’s going to be more variance in Criss Cross on different players boards, which is  a good thing.

Okay. What do I actually think about Criss Cross? I’m going to damn it with faint praise by saying I like it just fine. All the parts work, it doesn’t overstay it’s welcome and I’m pretty sure any group I’d show it to would have fun with it. Criss Cross does just what it’s supposed to. It is pretty random but that’s a given when the whole game is twelve dice throws.

However, I have played a lot of games like Criss Cross. And some of the are definitely better, although others are definitely worse. It’s biggest sin isn’t how random it is (that’s both expected and that randomness hits everyone equally) but there’s nothing about it that makes it really stand out in the pack.

The most interesting thing about it when looking at it in a global perspective is that it is so stripped down and basic. Knizia boiled down the idea of Roll and Write to its fundamentals with Criss Cross.

Would I play it if someone suggested it? Sure. Like it said, it does what it is supposed to and it has the added bonus of being super portable. I’m sure I will play it some more. It’s decidedly not bad. It’s just decidedly not special.

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/220988/criss-cross