Reiner Knizia, cats, tile placement, and push your luck? Yeah... this game basically had my name written all over it. Purrramid is one of those games that feels familiar the moment you start playing. Roll dice. Chase your luck. Regret your life choices. Roll again anyway.
I learned this one with a friend, and within a few turns we were already doing the classic push your luck thing where you know you should stop but convince yourself that one more roll is definitely the right call.
Spoiler alert: it never was.
Purrramid is published by Lucky Duck Games and designed by Dr. Reiner Knizia. We are massive fans of his designs in our house, so we had high expectations. It plays 2 to 4 players and comes in at around 30 minutes. Your goal is simple: get all of your kittens tucked into the pyramid before your friends and earn the right to place the Gold Cat Tiles!
UNBOXING
Lucky Duck brought the bedtime chaos to life with bright colors and a solid assortment of components. What’s in the box?
- Rulebook
- 84 Cat tiles (12 gold ones): these are chunky, colorful, and extremely satisfying to stack
- 12 Wool tokens
- 5 pretty cute dice
- Double sided game board
HOW IT PLAYS
The game is a race to empty your personal pool of cat tiles onto the board. On your turn, roll all five dice and use them to claim spaces on the shared pyramid board. Each space has a number, and the dice you place there must add up exactly to that value. Need a 6? You can use a single 6, or a 2 and then a 4. Or whatever weird combination the dice gods decide to bless you with.
After claiming a space, you face the central decision:
Play it safe and stop, or
Push your luck and roll any unused dice to try and claim more spaces.
You can keep rolling until you choose to stop or until the dice leave you with nowhere legal to play. Here's the catch: when you stop, all of the spaces you claimed that turn must be connected to each other and properly supported by the pyramid below. A space is supported if it sits on the bottom ground row or if ALL the spaces directly below it already have cat tiles or dice on them. Pass the placement check? Replace the dice with cat tiles. Fail it? Everything disappears and you get absolutely nothing for the turn. Ask me how I know.
WOOL TOKENS & BONUS TURNS
This is where the game really came alive for me. Place a cat on an 8 space and you'll earn a wool token. These let you reroll a bad result later, which can be the difference between glory and watching your entire turn evaporate. These little balls of yarn are absolute lifesavers when the dice decide they hate you.
The bonus turns are even better. Use all five dice in a turn or build across three levels of the pyramid simultaneously, and you immediately get another turn. Sounds amazing, right? Well... each bonus turn gives you fewer dice to work with. The first extra turn uses four dice. Then three. Then you're basically negotiating directly with fate.
Player to place all their tiles first, wins, but the game doesn’t end then. The first player to empty their supply claims the 12 Gold Cat tiles and keeps playing to rack up points while everyone else desperately scrambles to unload their remaining cats. The game ends when the board fills up, a second player places all their cats, or the Gold Cats run out.
The winner scores points based on how many Gold Cats they managed to place, while everyone else loses points for every cat tile left in their supply. The rulebook awards a title based on your final score, which is a cute touch.
BOTTOM LINE
Purrramid takes a familiar push your luck formula and gives it a clever spatial puzzle twist. The decisions are simple, the turns move quickly. Every turn had me debating whether I should stop while knowing full well I was about to roll again anyway. This is the kind of game I'd happily pull out with younger family members, newer gamers, or anyone looking for a light puzzle with plenty of cheering and groaning around the table.
Did I make smart choices? Rarely.
Did I keep pushing my luck anyway? Absolutely.
If You Like Purrramid, try:
Same vibes?: MLEM: Space Agency for more Reiner Knizia push your luck cat chaos where everyone stays involved.
Want something faster? Heckmeck ( Pick-omino depending on your region) for an even quicker, pure push your luck dice chucking experience.
Similar but no push your luck? Knitting Circle for another cozy spatial puzzle from the same publisher.
Harder and longer? Calico if you want cats and significantly more brain burn.
About the Author:
Coty is a board game blogger, reviewer, and accidental LEGO art collector. When she’s not testing rulebooks or trying to beat her wife at two-player games, she’s playing ice hockey. Follow her adventures on Instagram or read more at KaCo Plays.
