dnup

The game name dnup needs to be written exactly this way, so that when you turn it upside down, it looks exactly the same. This is a game from Kei Kajino, designer of SCOUT (written in all caps). It also has the element of turning cards upside down to change their values. Every card has two different values at the two opposite ends. The end you are holding upwards is the current value of the card. dnup is also a shedding game. You want to get rid of your cards. I would say it is easier to learn than SCOUT because the rules are more conventional and familiar. 

There are several things you can do on your turn. The most basic one is to play cards. You can play a single card, or you can play a meld. A meld is two or more cards of the same number. These cards that you play are not immediately discarded. They stay in front of you until the start of your next turn. Only then they are discarded. While these cards stay before you, they are vulnerable. If someone else plays a meld with the same number of cards, and the value is higher than yours, you will be forced to take your cards back into your hand. That is not all. You must turn all these cards before taking them back. This can be disastrous. Your set of cards of the same value will become different values. It will take you more turns to play them. However it is also possible to make use of this mechanism. You can let an opponent turn a low card to a high one, which you can later play together with other cards you have. When you have a meld in play, you prevent others from playing a meld of the same size, if their meld is of a smaller card value. If you have a pair of 10's in play, you are stopping everyone else from playing pairs. 

One other thing you can do in the game is to add one card to someone else’s meld. This sounds simple, but there are a few implications. Let’s say you add a 5 to two 5’s, creating a meld of three 5’s. If at the point someone else has a meld of three 3’s, this newly created meld will beat the meld of 3’s, forcing the owner to take their cards back. That is not all. Let’s say later someone else plays a meld of three 8’s. This beats that meld of three 5’s. Although you have contributed one of the cards, that’s no longer your card. So all these cards go to the hand of the player who has the three 5’s before them. 

Yet another thing you can do is to take someone else’s meld. That sounds like an easy way to collect powerful cards. The twist is when you take a meld, you must turn all those cards. 

The last thing you can do is to turn all your cards in hand. It is all or nothing. 

The game feels like gin rummy, in that gameplay is smooth. You play melds and you do layoffs. However the ability to attack another player’s meld makes this a very different game. You always need to worry about whether your meld will be attacked. When you have the opportunity to attack, it may not always be the best move. When you have two 9’s, it may not be the best move to play them as a pair. Maybe it is worthwhile to play them as single cards so that you can mess with others more. 

dnup is easy to learn. However there is much depth to the game. If you are competitive, this is a game you can learn to play at a high skill level. You can pay attention to cards people have taken back. You can card count. You can even play this game with negotiation and collaboration. If someone has played four 1’s and you have three 2’s, you can ask for a collaborator with one more 2, so that you can work together to beat that meld of four 1’s. 

I hope dnup does well. It’s a great design. Clean and clever. It doesn't have and it doesn't need fancy powers on the cards. I think this is a deep game.