Players: 2-6
Playing Time: 2-30 minutes
Difficulty: 1 (of 10)
The Components
Fluxx comes with a short rulebook and 84 cards in a small card-sized box.
The cards are printed on solid cardstock with rounded corners. They tend to be printed black & white on the back and two-color on the front. One card, the "Basic Rules" has a distinctive back that makes it easy to pick out; the other 83 cards are mixed together as a single deck. They're split into four types of cards: New Rules, Keepers, Goals, and Actions.
The fronts of the cards are very simple, but also very well designed. Each card displays: a card type across the top; a colored sidebar that matches that type, featuring a card title; a standard explanation of how to use this type of card; and additional explanation of the specific card. Goals and keepers feature black-and-white line artwork across the bottom; the pictures on the keepers are also shown on the goals that they are used for. The rules cards also feature artwork, this time on the top, making it iconically obvious what the card does in most cases.
Overall, these cards are extremely intuitive, featuring some of the best card design I've seen in the field. It's literally possible to start someone playing the game without more than a minute of explanation thanks to the careful iconification and reptition of rules on each card.
The cards are also designed to work well based on how cards are held, something that is often missed in card design. The left-hand sidebar displays the card type iconically right alongside the name, so that when you fan your cards it's immediately obvious what you have.
The flip-side of the intuitiveness of the cards, with all their required card text, is that their design is very plain--much simpler than your standard card game. This does have one advantage: players can create their own cards for Fluxx, and they'll look pretty much like the originals, mixing into the deck nicely. Personally, I prefer the full color artwork and more active design that was done for the German Fluxx, but it's all a tradeoff, as they lost the rules texts in doing so.
Though Fluxx's black & white artwork is below average for what you generally find in the card game industry, I think the solid card design pulls up the overall Style rating, which I thus give an average "3" out of "5".
The Gameplay
Fluxx is a very simple game. You start out with a hand of three cards and a basic rule card which reads "Draw 1, Play 1"; in other words, you draw 1 card and play 1 card each turn.
These basic rules can be changed by the play of other Rule cards, which define, among other things: how many cards you draw, how many cards you play, how big your hand can be, and how many keepers you can have out.
Goal cards define how you can currently win the game. Most of them require a pair of cards. Bed Time, for example, requires Sleep and Time, while Hippyism requires Peace and Love. You play goals to the middle of the table, overriding the provious goal.
Keepers are played directly in front of you. They're things like Sleep, Time, Peace, Love, The Sun, and Money. If your keepers match the current goal, you win!
Actions are the final type of card. They have various immediate affects, such as allowing you to draw cards, steal keepers, discard rules, trade hands, etc.
Quite simply, you play cards, accumulating keepers, until you manage to meet the current goal. There's some randomness, but there's also some real strategy in the game, as you can sometimes manipulate the play of Rule cards to force other players to play cards that will allow you to win. The playing time quoted above, 2-30 minutes, is entirely accurate. Some games end quickly and randomly, while others allow for more planning.
Relationships to Other Games
This is the earliest of Andrew Looney's card games. They all seem to share a similar light, fun feel. Others include: Aquarius, Chrononauts, and Nanofictionary.
Looney Labs now has in the works a new game using the same core system as Fluxx, but featuring all new Keepers and Goals: Stoner Fluxx. Whatever you think of the issue of the American Drug War, LL's decision to publish a potentially controversial game based on their moral convictions is a courageous one.
Relationship to Fluxx v2.0
This version of Fluxx is much the same as older ones. Some work has been done to better balance all of the cards, getting rid of less useful cards, and replacing them with more useful ones, and overall that seems to have been quite successful.
If you've played a previous version of Fluxx, it was probably version 2.0 or 2.1. (Version 1 was printed entirely in black and white and distributed prior to the deal with ICE.) I don't have the patience to run through all the Actions and Rules that changed from version 2.0 to 3.0, but here's the changes in Keepers and Goals that have occurred since the ICE edition:
Keepers Removed: Coffee, Doughnuts, The Eye, The Pyramid, TaxesKeepers Added: Dreams, Sleep
Goals Removed: Coffee and Doughnuts, Death and Taxes, The Great Seal, The Mind's Eye, Money (no Taxes)
Goals Added: Baked Goods, Bed Time, Dreamland, Hearts and Minds, Rocket Science, Squishy Chocolate, Winning the Lottery
There's a bit more info on the genesis of version 3.0 of Fluxx here.
And, as a side note, the card stock for versions 2.0 and 3.0 is relatively similar, though there's a slight difference in corner radius. Overall, though, if you're missing some of those removed 2.0 cards, you can probably mix them in with little trouble.
The Game Design
Fluxx is a casual game that plays like a casual game should: enjoyably and quickly. Here's some of the better parts of the design:
Very Simple to Play: The idea of matching up keepers to form goals is very simple, and thus allows for gameplay with almost no explanation; the usage of rule cards played to the table just adds to this simplicity.
Minor Storytelling Elements: The goals in Fluxx, such as Chocolate Milk and Hippyism almost form mini-stories, creating a game that's about more than just playing cards. This often leads to enjoyable jostling about what other cards combinations aren't goals, such as Toasted Chocolate or Brainy Dreams.
Very Expandable: The core elements are simple enough that it's very easy to add new cards, especially goals and keepers. The simple line drawings of the game make this even more appealing--and in fact Looney Labs makes additions to the game easy with their partially preprinted Fluxx Blanxx. I'm actually amazed that Looney Labs has never put out an official expansion for the game.
Some Strategy Possible: Despite the simplicity of the game, there is the potential for strategy, particularly as you grow familiar with the goals, and thus can start planning for what card sets you're trying to build toward. Some of the strategy is even a bit devious, such as playing a "Play 3" card to force an opponent to play cards he doesn't want that you think will be to your benefit.
Good for Many Player Numbers: I've played this game with 2 many a time and I've also played it with 5 of 6. It works great at all player numbers.
I do hear some people complain about the randomness of Fluxx, and though there is strategy, a lot of victory does come from random chance. However, I think Fluxx is exactly the type of game that can support this type of random chance. It's short and it's fun if you win or lose.
Overall, Fluxx is a pleasure to play and well-designed, so I give it a "4" out of "5" for Substance.
Conclusion
Andrew Looney's first published card game continues to play well many years later. Fluxx is a great game to have when you've got just a couple of minutes free or when when you're wanting very casual gameplay.
