Introduction
I think Einstein fills a neat little niche as a party-style game that really is best played and enjoyed in teams (though a 2-player mode is included).
What sets it apart from other trivia-focused games in this genre is that it’s not about who has the largest collection of otherwise-useless knowledge and who can reason and solve puzzles in the quickest time.
I’m coming into this saying all my plays have been with families and going to finish by saying that’s where it’ll shine the brightest.
Setup
Nice and simple to get up and running here. Place the hexagonal board on the table and give one team the blue hex markers, the other takes the red – you get 10 each. The little Einstein meeple goes in the centre of the board and already we’re almost there!
Take 20 random puzzle cards from the 300 included and give them a shuffle, making sure there’s a green card on the top. Now we are there!
Budding genii assemble!
Rounds involve nominating some one from your team to go up against your opponent to answer the puzzle first. Challengers are chosen, the card is flipped and it’s then pretty much a race to see who can figure it out first. The catch is that you must yell EINSTEIN! before your answer in a sort of Simon Says fashion. It’s not clear what this achieves other than a sense of structure (and I suppose attention to some detail) but we have always enforced it and would suggest you do too.
The first round differs only slightly – everyone plays and confers before declaring an answer. After that it’s the lonely environment of shouldering the burden of responsibility for everyone
If the answer is correct, that team places one of their hexes over Einstein and can then move him to any adjacent hex before the next challenge starts. If it’s incorrect, the other team gets 20 seconds to get it right otherwise the round is over and the team that didn’t last move Einstein gets to place him.
The game ends either when one team gets 4-in-a-row of their hexes or runs out of pieces.
Variety is the spice of gaming
There’s a few things worth noting on how you can mix it up – both ‘official’ (i.e. suggested in the rulebook) and ‘less official’ (suggested by me now)
- The 2-3 player variant (official) brings the green hexes into play in a specific way. Moving Einstein to a green hex triggers an “Einstein Round” which must use a green-backed card (as opposed to the trickier black-backed cards) and allows “all players from the other team to challenge”. This is all well and good, but practically in a 2-player game, that’s going to happen anyway so I’m not entirely sure I understand the thinking
- No winner stays on (official) means that in any team game, no player can attempt two challenges in a row – you’ve got to mix it up to keep it interesting
- Category selection (less official) gives you the opportunity to separate the puzzle cards out by type (see below) and allow one team – the one who didn’t move the Einstein meeple perhaps – to choose what kind of challenge is attempted. I think there’s a reasonable chance that could give you some kind of catchup mechanism if one team is behind
Puzzles galore
Well… assuming 11 is galore which I don’t know. There are 11 categories of puzzle and they all focus on slightly different things. Some are anagrams that you need to unscramble to find the common connection, some are 2x2 sudoku maths puzzles, some are fill-in-the-missing-piece picture clues, some are memory games, some are odd one out… There’s genuinely a lot of variety in here and each category has two levels of difficulty, though from my experience we only had one card that sticks out as being particularly fiendish.
The rulebook has the answers at the back for anyone needing to settle a dispute.
Final thoughts
So where does all that leave us? If you’re a fan of TV programmes like The 1% Club I think this is likely to be a good fit for you. The difficulty doesn’t increase but the brain-teaser approach is very much in common so that would be a definite yes in my opinion.
I think it’s a good family game – particularly for larger gatherings. This saw a lot of table time over Christmas and New Year in particular with three adults and three kids (ranging 13-16) and there was no obvious runaway leader any of the times we played. It’s suggested for 13+ and I think you could probably get away with a slightly younger age group with a few modifications like the ‘less official’ suggestion above or allowing more time after an incorrect answer.
Is it going to knock your socks off? Probably not. Is it solid enough to have on your shelf for that perfect occasion? I think so. Would I pick this over a trivia-style game? Yes. There’s no reliance on point-in-time knowledge the way there is with games like Trivial Pursuit or anything else in that general family. There’s nothing wrong with those at all, but the do age and I think this by comparison doesn’t
You might like
- Accessible to a wide range of people
- Good for parties and a good family game
- No reliance on knowledge – much more about reasoning
Might not like
- You won’t play it every week so be prepared to have it for occasional use
Artwork – 2/5
Complexity – 2/5
Replayability – 4/5
Player interaction 5/5
Component quality 2/5
Overall 68%
