He takes the Emperor card and doubles his own score! (The player who loses the Emperor card does NOT enjoy any of the Emperor card benefits!) Should the Empress card be in play, the player holding that card forces a “royal marriage”. In this way, you may go out with only 1 Forbidden card but still DOUBLE your score! But the Emperor is not invulnerable. If you ARE the Cheng player, the Emperor counts as an additional Forbidden card to multiply your score. If you hold him and are NOT the Cheng player, he will neutralize any Forbidden cards caught in your hand. Now, the effects of those Royal cards are felt. The other players may play cards from their hands as melds or onto melds already played (but NEVER on an opponent’s meld). Once someone has gone out, that round is over. If you are NOT the first to go out, EACH Forbidden card held by you reduces your score by 5 points! Go out with 2 Forbidden Cards and your scored is doubled go out with 3 Forbidden cards and you’ve tripled your score! (You may go out with any number of Forbidden cards or even NO Forbidden cards but you may NOT go out with only 1.) But there is a flip side here. If you are the first to go out (“Cheng” in game terminology) by melding all your cards, the number of Forbidden cards held in your hand act as a score MULTIPLIER. But using Forbidden cards in this way deny you their other benefits. Forbidden cards, discarded voluntarily or played as a block, may be taken into a player’s hand if he so wishes on his next turn as his draw. You may, if you wish, simply discard a Forbidden card. So cards discarded on TOP of the Forbidden card MAY be taken with impunity. But ANY opponent may play from his hand a Forbidden card which not only blocks you from picking up the card(s) but ends your turn immediately! Once a stack has been Forbidden, however, it may not be blocked again. As mentioned, when beginning your turn, you may, instead of drawing a card from the draw deck, take the face up card on one or more individual discard stacks. And, then, of course, you have the cards that give the game its name: Forbidden cards.įorbidden cards have multiple uses. There are THREE Wild Cards which may be used in the place of any number of any color and FOUR Royal Cards (Emperor, Empress, Rooster and Monkey) which play special roles (more on that later). Card values run from 2 through 9 EXCEPT there is NO 6 or 9! Instead, you have a yin/yang card that can be used as EITHER a 6 OR 9. But there are a few twists here that give the game a life of its own.
Now, if that was all there was to the game, you could safely pass it by. You end your turn by discarding one card onto your own individual discard stack. In ALL cases, sets and sequences must contain only cards of a single suit (color).
Melds come in three varieties: sets of three or four of a kind or a sequence of three or more numbers in a row. If drawing from an opponent’s discard stack, you must then play a meld. On your turn, you first draw a card, either from the draw deck OR from the top of a discard stack (from one or more of your opponents’ individual discard stacks). The remaining cards become the draw deck and are placed on top of the Treasure Chest. The deck is shuffled and 2 cards placed inside the Treasure Chest. There is also a red envelope (the “Treasure Chest”), 4 scoring cards and a small, but complete, rules folder.Ī scoring card, for easy reference, is given to each player. The blister style packaging of the game holds a box containing 104 cards: 84 number cards in three different suits, 9 Forbidden cards and 7 “special” cards. Orbanes turns his talents to a new and different card game: Forbidden. He designed the first wargame on Vietnam (Vietnam by Gamescience back in 1965), the brilliant business game Cartel (by Gamut of Games) as well as lighter fare such as the very successful Trumpet (International Games and featured in the Spring 1991 GA REPORT). Phil Orbanes has a game design resume about as broad as you can get. Reviewed by Herb Levy (Winning Moves Games, 2-4 players, ages 10 and up, 35-60 minutes $7.95)
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