Several years ago my husband and I stumbled upon Kooky Kalooki while we were out shopping. It says it’s a Jamaican card game, and since his mom is from Jamaica, we thought it would be a great gift for her. Despite never having heard of the game before, his mom quickly became the expert (9 times out of 10, she wins).
If you’ve ever played Phase 10, it’s a little like that, but more complicated. Everyone starts on Round 1, so everyone is dealt 9 cards and is trying to get 3 sets (more on sets later). If I’m the only one who gets 3 sets, I move on to Round 2 and get 10 cards for my next hand while everyone else is still on Round 1. So once you play a few hands, you can all be working towards different goals (the tricky part for whoever is dealing is remembering how many cards everyone gets). Now, in the rules you’re supposed to play 9 rounds or to a certain amount of points, but we play until someone completes Round 9. The way we play always takes longer.
For each Round you need a certain number of sets and/or runs:
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