Advert: This game was kindly gifted by Asmodee via Mason WIlliams PR for the purposes of review. All opinions are ours and our reviews are always honest.

This week we’re oFISHally reviewing Bloops, a new card game of peeping, remembering, and shedding face down cards. Get rid of your high value cards so when someone calls Bloops you have the lowest score. Can you remember your cards, or are you some kind of PEDUNCLE with a memory of Goldfish and after a few seconds, bloop, you’ve forgotten. 

Wow! fact check time! I won’t have this kind of slander on this blog. Don’t feel GILL-ty if you didn’t know this but Goldfish actually have a pretty solid memory of months to years, and can be trained to recognise their owner, complete mazes and identify specific images. Koalas, Koalas are the animals you should’ve been thinking about… their memory sucks.

Key Stats:

2 to 5 players
10 minutes
8+ years

Publisher: Zygomatic
Designer: MontiBearnar
Art: Mathieu Lidon

Theme/category: Card Game, Memory, Party
Key mechanics: Hand Management, Memory, Push Your Luck, Card Shedding

Gameplay overview:

In Bloops, you start the game with 6 cards face down: 3 you’ve taken a sneaky peek at, 3 are pure mystery. Your mission is to shed as many of your cards as possible before the end of the game, in some cases triggering special abilities. Ideally you want to get rid of your high value cards, because the lowest score at the end of the game wins.

On your turn you draw a card, look at its value, then decide whether to discard it, or keep it and swap it with one of your own cards and discard that instead. If the card you discard is 6, 7, 8, or 9 an ability is immediately triggered, which could be looking at a facedown card, swapping a card with another player or playing a card from the top of the deck facedown in front of an opponent.

After a card is discarded (and abilities resolved, if any), you and any other player may also ‘counter-discard’ cards that are the same number as the discarded card. If they are cards with abilities, these are activated in order of play.

Uh Oh! I accidentally counter-discarded the wrong card, what happens now? You put it back face down in front of you and take an extra card from the deck as a penalty, putting it face down in front of you without looking at it. This penalty also applies to any other gameplay misdemeanours, from taking your turn early or if you ‘accidentally’ peek at a card when your shouldn’t. Fish don’t cheat! 

If the number 20 card is discarded (intentionally or not), the game ends immediately. Or the game ends when any player shouts ‘BLOOPS’ at the end of their turn. When this happens, all other players get one final turn, but can’t mess with the cards in front of the player who BLOOPED. If you say Bloops to trigger the end game then your opponents get one more turn but can no longer swap cards with you – but they can still add more to your collection!

When everyone has taken their final turn, players reveal their cards and tally up the scores. If you have 3 or more cards with stars on in your collection (the 10, 11, or 12 cards), congratulations! These are ignored and don’t add to your score. The winner has the lowest total. 

Our thoughts

Bloops immediately hits you with its whimsical cartoon fish splashed over the box and cards. It’s light, it’s bright, and it’s fun – a perfect reflection of the gameplay. Blending ‘card shedding’ (getting rid of cards, in this case higher scoring ones) with memory feels like a unique combination. And it works! It offers up some interesting decisions as you’re forced to take risks based on what little information you know – or what little you can remember! This builds tension, which is mirrored in the card artwork as the fish gets more and more stressed as card values increase – something we thought was a nice artistic touch.

In Bloops you are always doing something, there is always a decision to be made, and because a lot of the information is hidden it’s hard to know what the best decision is at any given point. Even on other players’ turn you need to decide whether you are going to risk a counter discard.

Memory games aren’t for everyone though, and Lauren for one struggled with it. She kept forgetting which cards she looked at and what was on them, which she found frustrating. . So if you have the memory of Koala like her, you might also find that it doesn’t appeal to your gaming preferences. 

My favourite aspect of Bloops is the end game conditions (discarding 20, shouting BLOOPS). This forces you to constantly question “Are my cards lower value then my opponents cards?”, deciding whether to end the game short or push to shed more. If you think they might be, then do you call ‘bloops’ and end the game or do you keep playing, and risk picking up higher cards or your opponent shedding more cards. More cards doesn’t mean more points – so you can’t just base decisions of who has more cards. Just because you end the game calling Bloops doesn’t mean you will win! and even if you make a decision the cards may have another idea and throw the 20 card up, which ends the game straightaway.

With a tiny box and a relatively small footprint – you need space for around 6 to 9 cards in front of you – it’s a pretty good choice for a travel or coffee shop game.

My only REEL criticism of Bloops is the poor quality of the card stock, they feel thin and a little bit flimsy. I would like thicker and ideally linen-finished cards. But for a price point of around £12 there may have been limited ability to upgrade the card stock.

What we like:

• Fun cartoon-style artwork with a quirky fish, adding personality to the game.  

• Quick party game that works with smaller player numbers and  doesn’t overstay its welcome.

• Limited down time as there is always a decision to be made, on your turn and other players turn,

• Love the blend of card shedding with memory, it isn’t something I’ve seen before.

• Interesting balance of ditching more cards or ending the game earlier.

• Good travel game, with a small footprint and an even smaller box.

Considerations:

• People who struggle with their working memory might not enjoy it.

• Card stock might not survive after a lot of shuffling, which is not ideal for a small filler game. 

Verdict:

Bloops is an exSCALEnt little filler game that can make a splash at your game night with a little laughter after those heavier games. It also works as a nice little game to play with the family especially after a family meal. But as with many games in the party game space, the fun will be dependent on the group.