Hurry’cup!
There’s a lot of interest in racing games, evidenced by the sheer number that have come out over the years. Until Asmodee Editions released the Hurry’cup! board game, though, the quick reflexes needed to take to the track were all in the imagination. Now players test their actual reflexes as they grab for the pawn that takes them the farthest on the game’s changing route. If they snatch the piece that offers the best combination of speed and maneuverability, they can hit the finish line ahead of the competition.
The nuances mean this game is geared (ahem) toward family-friendly play… the hands-on approach and simple mechanics pull in the younger gamers while appealing to their thoughtful adult rivals. It straddles the line marvelously, making something accessible for the kids without boring the parents. Fans of meatier fare won’t give up their Bolides or their Formula Ds for this, but if they have offspring they now have an excellent gateway to bring them into a wider world of racing games.
The track is modular, made up of a few dozen hex tiles that can be laid out in a variety of ways. This surrounds the Starting Board, where oversized wooden pawns are placed. The players show their current position using markers of their own: dandy little cardboard stand-ups depicting their racers. Each turn a player shakes up a bunch of six-sided dice, called Fuel Tanks, in the plastic tumbler (the eponymous “cup,” so to speak) and uncovers them all at once. Then comes the undignified scramble.
Each die corresponds in color to one of the wooden pawns. A player grabs—or rather, tries to grab—a pawn that suits the terrain for which he’s headed. If he wants to go fast he probably wants a pawn whose die came up with a high number. Of course, players always want to go fast but that’s better on the straightaways; they can’t take the turns quickly if the speed limit prohibits it. The Fuel Tank die one obtains determines how many hex spaces the car travels, but each driver must also individually roll the Accelerator die. Together the two results determine the car’s speed in tens of kph.
For example, a 6 on the Fuel Tank and a 2 on the Accelerator mean the car is going [6 + 2 = 8] 80 kph. The 6 is still the number of hexes crossed, but if one of those hexes has a speed limit listed, it better be 80 kph or more. Anything less and the car must stop short of that space.
It’s not all bad, though, stopping on the long stretches. That’s where Bonus chips are to be found. Between these and the Trump chips everyone is assigned at the start of play, the game has plenty of unpredictability. One may get a brief burst of speed or a sneak-peek at the dice before the tumbler is removed, or even use a dirty trick like an oil slick. Then again, there’s the dreaded empty fuel tank . . .
Small touches like these keep the outcome in doubt throughout the race. Should someone pull out to an early lead, he might still be overtaken by someone who finds the shortcut token. Someone who finds he cannot move past a particular hex gets a Second Chance chip that allows rerolls next turn, and the hindmost player can use the Red Lantern to advance a space before his turn starts. It’s rather well thought out, meaning no one finds himself backed into an unwinnable corner.
It’s not all good news. The mechanic for grabbing a pawn off the starting board means there’s a lot of good-natured violence going on; pockmarks are inevitable. The rules are in seven languages, but English at least has a couple of spotty bits where the rules (like those for shortcuts) must be puzzled out through a couple of readings. The person removing the cup is usually at a disadvantage with those who can just concentrate on grabbing (which is why the job rotates each turn), and it’s easy to move the wrong character. The stand-ups look similar, their colors can blend, and since they’re upright it’s detrimental if light in the room comes from above.
The components are European quality – first class much of the way. Each player receives a character sheet so everyone knows who’s controlling which vehicle, but these are black and white (so it’s a match to the character, not the color). These are flimsy, but they’re done up as postcards; sturdy, no, but a clever touch. The graphics please throughout the game, with Pierô’s artwork making each racer distinctive (that the small stand-ups make this hard to see or capitalize on isn’t his fault). The tumbler seems impossibly small and yet the dice seldom seem to come out piled atop each other. All the tiles and boards are heavy stock, and the rulebook is almost a work of art unto itself.
For those trying to raise gamers in the household, Hurry’cup! primes the pump for that proud moment when the littlest player graduates to the adult table. It may be a quick bit of fun for less juvenile groups, but its strength lies in its appeal to the family unit. With bright, colorful, easy-to-read tiles to tickle the senses and a fairly seamless set of mechanics to keep both young and old (and experienced and green) on an even playing field, Asmodee has added another worthy contender to the gamut of racing games.