Players:2-4
Time: 30-60 minutes
Difficulty: 2 (of 10)
If you haven't read Edgar Allan Poe's "Murders in the Rue Morgue" be warned that this review contains spoilers for the story.
Some of the text is this review is borrowed from my review of Mystery Rummy Case No. 1: Jack the Ripper, particularly in the Game Play section. Nonetheless, I suggest reading the whole review through, even if you're familiar with the original, as the two games play considerably different.
The Components
Murders in the Rue Morgue comes with 62 cards and a rulebook in a small box.
The Cards: The cards in Rue Morgue are of an average thickness and seem fairly sturdy. They’re cut with rounded corners. The cards are printed five-color: the standard CMYK colors used to make up full-color prints plus a metallic gold ink. The gold ink is used fairly conservatively: on the backs, inside the card-type icons, as a border on the card text, and as a border on the pictures. It looks very nice and gives the cards a real touch of class.
The cards are overall laid out very well. A colored spine down the left-hand side of each card reveals all of the most important information: meld type (as the spine color); card type (magnifying glass for Evidence Cards or gavel for Gavel Cards); and card name. Most of the Evidence Card melds also have a matching meld which increases their value (called the Bonus Meld). The color of a card's bonus meld is shown in a diamond at the bottom of each Evidence Card's spine, but it's easy to figure out anyways, because they're clearly matched colors (e.g., a dark green and a light green; or a dark blue and a light blue). Despite the similar colors, they're all very easy to distinguish between.
The rest of each card features: a card scoring value (mostly "2"), a picture, a repeat of the card name, some game effect text, and finally color text from Edgar Allan Poe's original story. The art is all full-color, evocative, and appropriate for the period. It looks like it might be done with pastels. All of the rules needed for the cards are printed in the game effect text, though in a few cases jargon might confuse first-time players (e.g., "Search Rue Morgue", meaning "take a selected card from the discard pile"). The color text does a good job of hinting at what the various Evidence Cards reveal, even for people who haven't read Poe's original short story.
Overall, the cards are quite attractive to play with, and do an excellent job of summarizing necessary play information for the players. I think the cards will hold up decently, though my deck is showing some wear around the edges after about ten games.
The Rules: The rules are printed in a very small (card-sized) black-and-white 40-page booklet. I was a bit intimidated by its size at first, but there's actually not much text on each page. Overall, the rules are quite well done. They include not just gameplay explanations, but also a glossary of terms and strategy suggestions.
The Box: This was the only disappointment in the components. The box is constructed from flimsy card stock that will easily crush. It's a bit larger than the deck of cards, but has a built in tray for the cards themselves. Unfortunately, the tabs that hold the tray are pretty loosely held together. In my box at least, they don't hold the cards right. There's also not really enough room in the box for the rules, and thus the box doesn't close right if the rules are inside.
The components in Rue Morgue are an interesting contrast, with beautiful cards contrasting against a box and rule book that seem almost an afterthought. I give them an above average mark of "4" out of "5" for Style, though if I were grading on the cards alone, I'd probably give them a perfect score.
The Game Play
Following the story of Edgar Allan Poe's "Murders in the Roe Morgue", players are detectives trying to collect evidence in the murders of Madame L'Espanaye and Mademeoiselle L'Espanaye. Evidence may initially lead them to the hapless Adolphe Le Bon, but eventually it will be discovered that an Orangutan who escaped from an equally hapless Sailor is the true culprit.
Gameplay-wise, Rue Morgue is Rummy: you're putting down your cards in melds with the goal being to nearly empty your hand, discard your final card, and go out. However, through special Gavel Cards, bonus melds, and an Orangutan, Mike Fitzgerald adds considerably to the basic Rummy gameplay.
Setup & Order of Play: The game opens with each player being dealt 8-10 cards (depending on number of players), and the the top card of the deck being flipped face-up, to begin the discard pile. In addition, 2-4 cards are placed under a special Orangutan card which sits next to the draw pile. Players then take their turns one at a time, each either drawing from the deck or taking the top card of the discard pile. After drawing, each player then makes legal plays and discards a single card.
There are two card types in the game, gavel cards (marked by a gavel) and evidence cards (marked by a magnifying glass). A player may play either or both during his turn, subject to certain restrictions. In addition, the Orangutan continues to have influence throughout the game.
Evidence Cards. These are the Rummy cards. There are ten colors: four pairs of bonus melds, a red meld for would-be suspect Adolphe LeBon, and a yellow meld for Edgar Allan Poe. Each color (suit) has 5 cards, except Poe which has 4.
Players must play evidence cards as melds. This means that you have to have in hand 3 or more of the same color, and then you play them all together. You can also layoff a card on a meld already in play. For example, if an opponent has played a Lightning Rod (dark green) meld of 3 cards, and you have a Lightning Rod evidence card in your hand, you may play it on your turn as a layoff on your opponent's meld. These layoffs go in your play area and will be counted toward your score.
You may play as many legal melds as you want in your turn. However, whenever a meld is played during the first run through the deck, a card must also be fed to the Orangutan, as discussed below.
Eight of the melds are arranged into pairs, each one in the pair acting as a bonus meld for the other. For example, Lightning Rod (dark green) is a bonus meld for Back Windows (light green)--and vice-versa. If you have both melds in a bonus pair out in your play area, you get +10 to your end-of-the-round scoring. You also get the opportunity to play a special Brilliant Deduction Gavel Card and can potentially score a shut-out, as discussed below.
Gavel Cards. These are the special cards which add strategy to normal Rummy play. They're thematically grouped into Brilliant Deductions, Dupin cards, and a special card for Adolphe Le Bon. Only one gavel card can be played during each turn (in addition to however many melds you wish to play). This places a necessary choke on strategic play, and also keeps you from tossing out a pile of Gavel cards all at once (and going out)
The Brilliant Deductions include 4 cards, one for each bonus meld pair. They can only be played if both melds in the pair are out (not necessarily both in your play area). They score +7 points at scoring, and thus are quite valuable. They also are a necessary ingredient in shut-outs.
The Dupin cards give you some ability to search for cards that you need, increasing the strategic play of the game. Six of the cards are labelled "Dupin's Help", and allow you to recover a card from the discard pile or else draw wo cards from the draw pile. (They also have slightly different functionality in partnership play.) The seventh Dupin card is simply labelled Monsieur C. Auguste Dupin and allows the player to take a card from the Orangutan. The Monsieur Dupin card is also worth a variable number of points, depending on who has played Dupin's Help cards.
The final gavel card is the Prefect of Police, a red-spined card, matching the Adolphe Le Bon meld. It can only be played after Adolphe's meld has been played, and simply makes that meld more valuable. It's a +4 card for final scoring.
The Orangutan. The Orangutan is the culprit in Poe's short story, and he continues to have an affect throughout the game. In Rue Morgue he acts as a repository for cards, similar to a crib in Cribbage. Throughout the game, cards are placed (face-down) under the Oranguan as follows:
- At the start of the game, between 2-4 cards are placed under the Orangutan.
- Every time a meld is played during the first time throught he deck the player will place one card under the Orangutan. The player first looks at the top card in the draw deck, then decides to place either that card or the top discard into the Orangutan. If the latter, the top draw card is returned to its place in the draw deck.
There are two ways cards can be removed from the Orangutan:
- One selected card can be retrieved via the Monsieur Dupin card.
- If the draw deck is expended, the Orangutan "escapes". All the Orangutan cards are shuffled back into the deck, and no further cards are placed under the Orangutan.
If there are cards under the Orangutan at the end of a round, the player who goes out takes them and gets to play any legal melds, then any legal layoffs, then any Brilliant Deductions or the Prefect of Police. These all go into his play area and add to his score.
Scoring the Points: As already noted, a round of play ends when someone plays their penultimate card, then discards their final card to the discard pile. At this point, all cards are scored. All the cards on the table are worth points. Generally each card in a meld is worth 2 points; as noted above a few Gavel Cards are worth points as well: 4 points for the Prefect of Police; 7 for Brilliant Deductions; and a variable amount for Monsieur Dupin (essentially 2 points per Dupin's Help played by opponents, minus 2 points per Dupin's Help played by the you; the result can be positive or negative). Players should also remember to give themselves 10 bonus points for every pair of bonus melds they have on the table.
If the Orangutan has not escaped, the played who went out also gets to score all the points from the Orangutan.
Each player then subtracts from his score any points for cards in his hand with two exceptions: Evidence cards and the Prefect of Police are not penalized if their meld is already on the table; likewise, Brilliant Deductions are not penalized if either of their melds is on the table. Instead these are all worth zero.
Play continues until one player reaches 100 points, at which time the player with the most points wins. This tends to take 4-5 rounds for a two-player game and can run to a high of 8 or 10 rounds for a four-player game.
There are two possibilities for variant scoring: the unsolved crime and the shut-out.
Unsolved Crime. If no one goes out before the draw deck has been gone through twice, the crime is unsolved. No one scores points.
Shut-out. If one player has a pair of bonus melds out and the accompanying Brilliant Deduction and has received the Orangutan for solving the case the first time through the deck and his opponents do not have a bonus meld pair with Brilliant Deduction out, a shut-out is scored. Only the shutting-out player receives points for the round (positive or negative).
Partnership Play: Rue Morgue also allows partnership play. Partners can swap single cards before the game starts and also have the option to do so whenever Dupin's Help is played. A simple and clever signalling system is suggested to allow partners to convey information through this play. In all honesty, I've never tried the partnership play, because I purchased this game for two-player play. However, it looks solid and like it'll add notably to the game.
Relationships to Other Games
Rue Morgue is, as you would expect, a Rummy variant, but it also incorporates some of the play elements of other successful card games. The Orangutan acts very similar to the crib in Cribbage, ands adds a fair amount of interest to the game. The signalling methods suggested for partnership play are not dissimilar from partnership Bridge (though clearly tons simpler).
Rue Morgue is also the second game in the Mystery Rummy series, a series that currently includes three other games (Jack the Ripper, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and Al Capone and the Chicago Underworld, with Mystery Rummy #5, Bonnie & Clyde, rumored for next year), as well as one hanger-on game, Wyatt Earp, that's not in the series solely for thematic reasons.
Compared to the original Mystery Rummy (Jack the Ripper), Rue Morgue is considerably simpler. Whereas Jack the Ripper had 25 Gavel Cards, Rue Morgue only has 12. However, it's not sufficient to just say that Rue Morgue is half as strategic as Jack the Ripper, because various strategic elements are more tightly integrated into the game, through the bonus melds, the Orangutan, and the partnership play rules. Still, Rue Morgue is a somewhat lighter game.
The Game Design
Much like its predecessor, Rue Morgue in a well-designed Rummy variant. It adds both strategic elements and ideas from other card games to form a cohesive and enjoyable whole. Here's some of the better parts of the design:
Bonus Melds Allow for Bluffing & Signalling: The bonus melds, and their accompanying Brilliant Deduction cards, allow for some very interesting game play. They're the heart of the signalling system suggested for partnership play (e.g., if you're holding cards from both melds in a bonus pair, hand your partner the weaker meld card to signal that you want him to work on it). They're also great for discard bluffs (e.g., you throw out a weaker meld card in a bonus pair in the hope your opponent will pick it up and play, because you're holding the Brilliant Deduction). This all adds considerably to round-to-round strategic gameplay, especially when considering shut-outs as well.
Dupin Balance is Nice: In an arbitrary selection game (meaning any card game,) you always have a bit of a problem when one card is notably better than the rest, because it can offbalance the game. This is potentially an issue with the Dupin's Help cards, which give a player access to continued draws from the draw deck. The way the Monsieur Dupin card offers a slight balance to this is nice; if your opponent has a whole mess of Dupin's Help cards, either he'll get a minus to his score or you'll get a plus. It's really not enough to offset the power of the cards, but it does make you feel better.
True to Rummy Ideas: The ideas of Rummy are nicely expanded in this game by having the Gavel Cards match up with various Evidence Cards, even if they can't be melded together. The Prefect plays with Adolphe, while the Brilliant Deductions go with the appropriate bonus melds. Even though the Dupin cards don't go with any melds, all seven cards are color-coded to go together.
Theme is Nice: Although not as nicely thematic as Jack the Ripper, I still felt like the theme in this game was very nicely approached and well embodied. It was evocative when I first picked up the game, and gained even more power after I read the story. If you haven't read the story, I've included some spoilers on what all the cards really mean down at the bottom of the review.
I had one complaint about the game:
Orangutan Easy to Forget: Because it's such an unusual design for a card game, it's very easy to forget to feed the Orangutan when you place down melds, especially when you're dropping a couple of melds down at once. It's also possible to forget to score the Orangutan until after you've picked up your cards. Ten+ games later, it still gets missed sometimes. The inclusion of the Orangutan is still well worth while, but it'd be nice if there was a way to more smoothly include it as part of the gameplay. (I'm not sure there is.)
Overall, the gameplay of Rue Morgue is quite enjoyable and a solid notch above regular Rummy games for serious, strategic play. I was also impressed by the originality this game showed; despite being the second in a series, it's very different from the original. Based on some strategic play value and some originality I give Rue Morgue an above average "4" out of "5" for Substance.
Conclusion
If you enjoy Rummy play and want something slightly more challenging, this is an interesting choice that works for two or four player play. If you're looking for something much more challenging than regular Rummy, I'd instead suggest the original game, Jack the Ripper, but still think you might want to pick this game up afterward for variety. (In my own house, this game has occluded Jack the Ripper for play since its purchase, though I suspect that might be a temporary phenomenon.)
More spoilers for "Murders in the Rue Morgue". You have been warned.
- The Players
- Edgar Allan Poe: The author of "Murders in the Rue Morgue".
- Monsieur C. Auguste Dupin: A brilliant dilletante, who solves the crime outside the system.
- Adolphe Le Bon: A patsy who brings some money to the victims' apartment, and is thus accused of the crime, even though the money isn't stolen.
- Prefect of Police: The official stooge who has Adolphe arrested, and who Dupin shows up.
- The Orangutan: The murderer, as revealed by Dupin.
- The Victims
- Mademoiselle L'Espanaye: The daughter. Strangled and shoved up a chimney by someone with enormous strength.
- Madame L'Espanaye: The mother. Thrown out a window and nearly decapitated by someone with enormous strength.
- The Evidence
- Quartier St. Roche: The place of the murders.
- 3:00 A.M.: The time of the murders.
- Back Windows: The method of entrance and exit for the murderer. Apparently nailed shut, but one of the nails was long ago cut through, thus allowing the window to be opened.
- Lightning Rod: The method of access to the fourth story windows. A full four-and-a-half feet from the back windows, but the window shutters swing out three feet, allowing a particularly nimble individual to swing from the one to the other.
- Newspaper Ad: An ad falsely reporting the discovery of a lost orangutan, placed by Dupin to flush out its owner.
- The Sailor: The owner of the orangutan, who brought it from exotic lands.
