I was in two minds about buying Flip 7: With A Vengeance. It’s a standalone sequel to a push-your-luck game so popular it was nominated for a Spiel des Jahres. The original is by far the most popular game in my collection, with friends and family of all gaming experience levels begging for another game. Still, I hesitated when With A Vengeance hit the scene this year – because the reviews have been so damn divided.
“This is more like it”, one BoardGameGeek comment says. Then, another says “I like the original better”. One person says “I love it way more than the original”, while someone else calls it “How to totally destroy what made the previous version so good”.
Finally, (because I’m very British) I said ‘sod it’. The game is less than $10, so I’m going to buy a copy and judge for myself.
With a Vengeance is the black sheep of the Flip 7 family. It’s the same game with added cruelty. This is a sequel that saw the dribble of ‘take that’ player interaction in Flip 7 and said ‘hold my beer’.
The basic play loop is the same. On your turn, decide whether to hit or stick, Blackjack-style. You’re aiming to rack up as many points as possible, and maybe even earn the coveted bonus points for flipping 7 cards. However, if you ever draw two of the same number, you’ve gone bust. Low-value cards appear less frequently in the deck, but they also mean less points – and you’re racing to 200 to win.
With a Vengeance shakes up the formula with new cards. We now have 13 cards in the deck worth 13 points, for example. There are also three unique numbers in the deck – a lucky 13 that won’t clash with other 13s, an unlucky 7 that makes you discard your previous cards, and a zero that means you only score that round if you Flip 7.
This alone spices things up significantly. There are more points to play for and more ways for your best-laid plans to fall apart. To spice things up further, With a Vengeance has replaced Flip 7’s modifier cards. No longer will these add to or double the value of your hand. Now, you’ll hand these to an opponent to subtract from (or even divide) their hand’s score.
The expandalone also adds new action cards. Flip Three has been replaced with the dicier Flip Four. Freeze has been usurped by Just One More, a card that forces a player to draw a single card, then stay, knocking them out of the round. Both of these up the high-risk, high-reward feel of the original game.
Our Second Chance card is gone, removing all safety nets. We also have Swap, Steal, and Discard cards that allow you to meddle with other players’ hands. That Swap card is especially upsetting, as you can bust one (or two!) opponent by giving them duplicate numbers.
If you want to heat things up even more, With a Vengeance also offers a ‘Brutal Mode’. This makes three key changes. Firstly, your score can now go below zero. Next, when you flip seven cards, you can choose to gain 15 points or subtract 15 from someone else’s score. And, lastly, you can play modifier cards on any player, even if they’ve already gone bust.
This is the version of Flip 7 that will make young family members cry. It’s also a longer play than the original, as the ‘take that’ mechanics make ganging up on leaders an obvious strategy.
Like the original, this game is a luck-fest. Masters of probability may breeze their way to success, but With a Vengeance makes it easier for the mathematically challenged to throw a spanner in the works.
And oh, how I love those spanners. Push-your-luck games already have a rollercoaster ride of thrills built in, but now you get to indulge in another, more mean-spirited kind of childish glee. This is the board game equivalent of chucking a Blue Shell at your best friend in Mario Kart – a fiendishly fantastic feeling.
My friends and family are lovers of deviousness. Flip 7 With a Vengeance causes outcry, but the kind that’s overacted to guarantee maximum laughs. We all understand this game for what it is: it’s an entrée game, a palette cleanser between tabletop titles to be taken more seriously.
If I had one complaint, it would be the rulebook. With a Vengeance adds more rules to the base game, but it doesn’t offer much in the way of clarity. You may occasionally find yourself debating with friends – not because of a nasty play, but because a rules interaction takes place that the rulebook can’t explain.
Arguably, With a Vengeance’s extended playtime means it does a worse job as a filler game. But, so far, everyone I’ve played with prefers it. The sequel is just as addictive as the original, and its cruelty adds a fresh, moreish layer of drama. I recently took my copy camping, and we played over and over, with at least one game on each of the trip’s five days.
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Source: Wargamer
