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Thor
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Game components contain some foreign text, possibly requiring occasional reference to rules translation.
An English translation of the rules is provided.
 
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The wild Norse gods need to be calmed. With circumspection and understanding, you must select the correct sacrifice in order to finally attain the favour of the most powerful ones. But guard against Thor's anger, because his powerful hammer Mjöllnir can make even the gods falter.
Reiner Knizia seems to be equally adept at creating both light games and the heavier games that are of greater appeal to me. My wife, however, is more of a casual gamer and tends to enjoy sompler games with impressive components. At a Unity Games gathering a couple years back, she played the out-of-print Milton Bradley game of Quandary. This is exactly the same game as Flinke Pinke but with impressive heavy chips instead of cards. Quandary is a very nice game, but hardly deserved the lavish treatment it received. It is a filler game that was given the deluxe treatment. My wife wanted it though, and that edition remains on our wish list.
Fast forward to 2003. Flinke Pinke is now available in two editions again, and which you choose is entirely up to your interest in the base game. The cheaper alternative is called Loco, and is exactly the same game as the earlier editions. The more deluxe but still affordable editionis Thor.
The basic game is simplicity itself. Heck, if you really wanted to you could play it with a regular deck of cards, but the game designer deserves some compensation for having invented this cunning little game, and having components devoted to the game makes it that much easier to play. The basic game of Thor is identical to Flinke Pinke/Quandary/Loco. On each turn you trade a numbered card for a particular suit of cards, and take a scoring card for any one of the suits. When the sixth and final suit card is laid on its stack, the game is over and each score card is worth the number of points on the top card of its suit. In other words, if you have three score cards for red, and the last card played for red was a four, then you get twelve points for the red suit. Amazingly simple, but the angst experienced on each turn is impressive!
Thor brings more to the table with a set of action cards. RAther than taking a scoring card, a player can choose to take one from the action card stack, and later play it rather than setting down a suit card. Thre are action cards that increase or decrease the eventual total for that suit, as well as ones that allow extra cards to be taken or force other cards to be returned. There are some slightly fussy bits about removing prior cards from the table, but they really do not increase the complexity very much. The game is given an extra layer of strategy without adding measurably to the basic simpicity of the game. All in all, a worthy addition to an already nice game, and one that can be used or not at your leisure.
This is one of the better filler games on the market, easily playable by two to five (or is it six now?), and scales well to any number. Lots of fun in a little box. Recommended.
