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Introduction
Hanabi Deluxe What a show! is a 2-5 player cooperative card game where you must work together to create a dazzling fireworks display. Each person will have a tray containing 5 cards which are numbered from 1-5, each of these cards could be coloured green, red, blue, yellow or white. However there is a twist, nobody can see their own cards. A turn consists of either playing a card, giving a clue to a teammate on what card they have, or discarding a card for a clue token. Clues can only be given if you have any of the 8 clue tokens to spend, and the clue is also limited, it can only contain information about what colour or number a teammate has. With the information you have received, you must play 1 card down a turn, with the end goal of getting 5 piles of each colour card, starting with the number 1 to the number 5. However there is an added challenge, each colour only has three 1’s, two 2, 3 and 4’s and one 5. Therefore if you were to discard one of these then you could ruin the firework display final score. The Deluxe version of Hanabi also comes with 3 new add-ons. Colour Avalanche: 10 multicoloured cards, Black Powder: 10 black cards and 5 Flamboyants: 6 bonus tiles and game aid. I will go into more detail about these add-ons later on.
Game set up
To set up a game of Hanabi is simple. You will give each player a card holder tray that will hold their cards upright. You will then decide if you want to play with any of the add-ons. Once you have done this you will shuffle all the cards and give each player 5 cards (2-3 player game) or 4 cards (4-5 player game). The players will then place these cards in their trays facing all other players so that you can’t see your own cards. You will place the clue tokens on the table within reach of all players, the remainder of the deck face down, the three error tiles you have blue side up and the player aid on the table. The player with the most colourful outfit starts the game. Now you are ready to play Hanabi!
Game Round
On your turn, you can do one of three things. Give a clue by spending a clue token, play a card or discard a card to gain a clue token back. When giving a clue to a player you will take a clue token from the supply and then give a player a colour or number clue about the cards that
are in front of them on their stand. For example, if they had three 2’s a 5 and a 4, I could say they have three 2’s and then point to them on their tray. Furthermore if one of the 2’s and the 5 were white, I could instead say that those two cards are white. When giving a clue you have to tell them all of the numbers or colours they have, you can say they have one 2 or say only one card is white. It is your job as the player to remember what clues have been given to you, you can also rearrange your tray in whatever way you see fit to try to remember the clues that have been given to you.
The turn then moves onto the next player in a clockwise direction, now that this player has this information they could play one of the cards, discard a card or again give a clue. If a white 1 was already in play, they could risk playing one of their 2s and hope it is a white. Or they could wait for someone to confirm it’s white with another clue. However, if all the firework displays in front of them are now on 2 or above, it is safe to discard your own 2s and gain a clue token back. If the player decided to play a 2 that was already in play, you would then flip over one of your three error tokens and place it in the discard pile, once all three error tokens are flipped, you lose the game. Once a card is played or discarded, you draw from the deck to replenish your tray. Play continues until you flip all your error cards and lose, or you finish the fireworks display. The last round starts when a player can no longer draw a card from the deck, each player then gets one more turn. Once this is done, you will add up all the points in front of you to see the final score. For example, if the displays were as follows in the picture below, you would score 16, as there is a 3 4 5 2 2.
Deluxe add on’s
As I previously said, Hanabi Deluxe edition also comes with three add-ons.
Colour Avalanche: This add-on provides you with 10 new cards to use in the main game, however, they are multicoloured, now this can be a problem. If you were to give a colour clue to a teammate these cards could be every colour.
Black Powder: This add-on again provides you with 10 more cards that can be used in the main game however they are Black cards. These new black cards have the opposite amount of each number as the normal colour cards, for example, there are three 5’s but only one 1. As you can see this could also become a problem when you give a teammate a numerical clue.
5 Flamboyants: This add-on provides you with 6 card tiles that contain effects that can alter the game. When you place a number 5 down and finish a stack of fireworks, you may draw a tile at random, this tile will have an effect, such as winning a clue token, giving a piece of colour information, or my favourite, taking a card from the discard pile and putting it into play.
One of the best things about these add-ons is that you can pick and choose if you want to include 1, 2 or even all three in a game of Hanabi. I think my favourite is the 5 Flamboyants as it doesn’t really change the difficulty of the original game but instead provides you with help, or even a second chance to score a higher firework display.
Thoughts
Hanabi Deluxe is a great addition to my boardgame collection, it’s easy to teach, and simple to play but hard to master, and with the additional add-ons that Deluxe offers it keeps the replayability high as it adds many more challenges to the game. However, for everything that it does well, it still feels like it’s missing something. It’s always a game that I will play every now and then, but I feel like the game feels more like a puzzle and I’m not really excited to play it, it’s more the satisfaction of winning. Furthermore, even though I have played it multiple times, I will always score around the 17-22 mark so it feels like I'm not getting worse or better at the game. I feel like the game becomes more of a puzzle and more fun if you have 4 players as it really matters what clues you should give. When playing a two-player game I would find myself giving the other person a clue and then they would play or discard a card, which would then make it my turn again therefore you can easily get trapped in a cycle of one person giving clues and the other playing their cards until all the clues have ran out. Overall Hanabi Deluxe is a great game and one that I would keep in my collection, however, it isn't my go-to boardgame when I want to play with friends or family. In my opinion, games similar to Hanabi Deluxe What a Show are The Mind and The Crew.
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