Use your funds to purchase the games you want and enjoy! Hopefully, some people get some use out of this post. You can actually get some games cheaper through the Japanese eShop (example: buying a 2000 yen card costs about $17.55, which will allow you to buy Snipperclips and still have 200 yen to spare). The final traditional Japanese New Year game is karuta – a card game. The name karuta originates from the Portuguese word for “card” – carta. This is because Portuguese traders introduced playing cards to Japan sometime in the 16th century.
With thanks to Yishin Sho and Henry Park for help with the rules, terminology and variants.
Introduction
Flower cards were invented in Japan, possibly in order to circumvent laws against playing with conventional 4-suited card decks. Nowadays, however, it is in Korea that games with flower cards are most popular. The best known Korean flower card game is Go Stop, which like most Japanese flower card games is a fishing game.
Players capture cards from a central layout by playing a card of the same month (flower). The aim is to collect scoring combinations among the cards captured. When a player's captures have a sufficient value, the player can stop the game and claim payment, or can continue the game (go) in the hope of winning more, but risking that an opponent will win meanwhile. It is this decision to stop or go that gives the game its name.
The flower cards used for this game are known in Korean as hwatu. Since the game is rather popular, they can often be obtained in supermarkets the sell Korean food or other goods. Korean Flower Cards can also be ordered from amazon.com. If Korean cards are not available, Japanese flower cards can be used as a substitute.
Players and cards
There can be 2 or 3 active players. It is possible for up to six or even seven people to take part in a game, but if there are more than three, only three will play at any one time, while the rest wait for the next deal and may be compensated - see the section on more than three players for further details.
A pack of flower cards - known in Korea as hwatu - is used, consisting of 48 cards, to which one or more jokers may be added. There are 4 cards corresponding to each of the 12 months of the year, in most cases represented by a flower appropriate to the month. Some of these cards also show a ribbon, animal or other object, indicating a higher value.
The cards are divided into four unequal groups: 5 bright (kwang), 9 animals (yul), 10 ribbons (tti) and 24 junk (pi), as shown in the following illustration:
Bright kwang /Animals yul / Ribbons tti / Junk pi
February plum
April wisteria
June peony
August pampas grass
October maple
December willow/rain
With a little practice, the cards are easy to identify. In most Korean packs (unlike Japanese ones), the five bright (kwang) cards have the Chinese character for 'guang' (bright) printed in white on a red disc, which distinguishes them from the animals (yul). The least obvious card to identify is the junk of the December (rain or willow) suit. Most packs include two different versions of this card, but only one is used in the game.
In addition, most packs contain a collection of jokers with special properties. The game can be played without them, or using just a few of them.
It seems that the number and nature of the jokers varies from deck to deck: below are examples from five decks.
For simplicity of explanation I will assume that the game is played for chips. If you want to play for money you should decide the value of a chip before the game starts. The score can be kept on paper if preferred by recording how many chips each player has won or lost.
Deal and layout
The first dealer is chosen by lot. Thereafter, the winner of each hand deals (and plays first) in the next hand.
The dealer shuffles the cards and the dealer's opponent (the player to dealer's left if there are three players) has the right to cut.
2 players: the dealer deals 10 cards to each player and 8 face up to the centre of the table as follows: 5 cards to dealer's opponent, 5 to dealer, 4 to the table, 5 to dealer's opponent, 5 to dealer, 4 to the table.
3 players: deal 7 cards to each player and 6 face up to the centre of the table as follows: 4 cards to each player, 3 to the table, 3 to each player, 3 to the table. The 3-player game is dealt and played counter-clockwise: the first cards are dealt to the player to dealer's right.
The remaining cards are placed face down in a stack in the centre of the table to form a drawing stock.
As in most card games, the players pick up their cards and look at them, holding them so that the owner can see their faces but their opponents cannot.
The cards that were dealt to the table are laid out face up in the centre area so that all are visible, normally on either side of the drawing stock. I call this the centre layout. During the game cards will be added to and captured from this layout.
Each player stores captured cards in front of him or her, but kept face up so that they are visible to all players. It is convenient to group captured cards into brights, animals, ribbons and junk, so that the state of the game is clear. I will refer to the area where a player keeps captured cards as the player's capture area. Captured cards normally remain in the player's capture area until the end of the play, but there are a few special events that require a player to surrender a captured card, moving it to another player's capture area.
Play
Before the play begins, players check for triples or quads (three or four cards of the same month) in their hands or on the table.
The dealer plays first. A normal turn consists of
This may result in the capture of some cards, as detailed below. The turn to play then passes to the right.
The aim of the game is to capture cards by playing cards that match cards in the centre layout. Cards match when they belong to the same month (flower).
After you have played from your hand and from the stock, and taken any cards that you captured, you may have the opportunity to stop the game, if your score is sufficient. Otherwise the turn passes to the next player to your right.
The play continues like this until someone stops the game (see below) or until the cards run out. The deal is such that when the last player plays their last card from hand, there will be just one card remaining in the stock, and of course the final cards will automatically match, leaving the centre layout empty.
Special events during the play
Certain special events allow the current player to capture one junk card from each opponent:
If any of these four things happens, each opponent surrenders one junk card of their choice from their capture area, and the cards are moved face up to the player's capture area. A player who does not have any junk cards in their capture area does not have to surrender a card. Some junk cards are more valuable than others (being worth 2 or 3 cards in scoring): a player who has no ordinary junk cards must surrender a valuable junk card if he or she has one.
However, if the play runs right to the end, the first three special events above don't count in the last player's last turn, since the cards are guaranteed to match. Nevertheless, a capturing a three-card stack (ppuk) at the end of the play still counts.
Capturing a three-card stack that you created yourself in a previous turn is known as ja-ppuk. For this each opponent pays you two junk cards (or a card that is worth at least two junk cards) instead of just one.
Other special events:
The bomb
If at the start of your turn you have three cards of the same month in your hand and the fourth card of that month is on the table, provided that you have not declared heundeum for your three cards you may play them all at once, capturing all four cards of that month. This is known as bombing the field. You complete your by turn up the top card of the stock as usual.
Playing a bomb leaves you with two cards fewer in your hand than you would normally have (you have played three cards instead of one). To compensate for this, in any two subsequent turns (not necessarily your next turns but at any later turns in the same deal) you may if you wish play no card from your hand and simply turn up and play the top card of the stock. After exercising this option twice you will once again have the normal number of cards.
After you have bombed the field, not playing from hand may be a good option if you are unable to capture anything from the table and suspect that all the cards in your hand are cards that your opponents are waiting to capture when they appear.
Playing jokers
Jokers are bonus cards that add an extra element of luck to the game. Whenever you play a joker - either from your hand or by turning one up from the stock - you place it directly into your capture area face up, and immediately turn up a card from the stock which you must play as a substitute for the joker. Therefore on a turn when you play a joker, you actually turn up two cards from the top of the stock - one as a normal part of your turn and another as a result of playing the joker.
If there are any jokers dealt face up on the table at the start of the game, the dealer moves them to the captured cards in front of him or her and replaces them in the layout by turning face up an equal number of cards from the stock.
Often the game is played with two jokers: one of these jokers counts as two junk and the other counts as three junk, so that there are 50 cards in the pack in total.
Ending the play and payments
Before beginning the game, the players should agree a target score at which the play can be stopped. When there are 3 players the target is normally set at 3 points. With only two players it is usual to set a higher target - normally 5 or 7 points.
Certain combinations of captured cards have a point score, as listed below. The first time that the total score of your captured cards at the end of your turn reaches the agreed target, you have the opportunity to stop the game. You must either say 'Stop', in which case the play ends and you claim payment as detailed below, or you say 'Go' and the game continues.
After you have said 'Go', you do not get another opportunity to stop the game until the score at the end of your turn is higher than it was the last time you said 'Go'. When this happens, you must again announce either 'Stop' or 'Go'.
The scores for combinations of captured cards are as follows. Note that in several cases cards of the December (rain) suit are less valuable than similar cards of other suits.
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