Summary
A game for 2 – 5 players
Playing time is 10 to 15 minutes
Publisher is Floodgate Games
Introduction
In Skyrockets, the successor of the popular game Kites you will once again work together. You will have to communicate well with each other to amaze the public and get the highest rating at the different Festivals.
Setting up the game
In Skyrockets, there are 30 festivals where you can earn 3 stars. Each festival has its own and unique challenge. Work together and create a spectacular and magical fireworks show by flipping the timers.
At the beginning of the game you will choose an event card that explains the purpose of this festival. Before you begin, it is recommended that you start with the 1st festival, training.
Once a festival is chosen, the rest are put aside and you can start. Make sure that all players know what the objective is and what is expected during this festival. The goal is to get at least 1 star and then you move on to the next festival but the more stars the better you have done.
After this, shuffle the deck of cards and give each player a number of cards as depicted on the event. You may look at your cards right away. In some cases you may start less or sometimes with no cards in your hand.
After this, place the rest of the draw pile near all players. Place the timers, Crowd tokens and the Crowd area tile as shown or explained on the event.
Let’s play
As soon as everything is ready, we can start playing.
The starting player begins plays a card (so in some cases directly from his hand) and places it on the discard pile. After this, the timers shown on the card are turned over. If it is on its side, it is placed upright.
After this, this player’s turn ends and it is the next player’s turn.
As soon as the timer on the countdown track is empty or nearly empty and you play a card with the color of the timer, you may move the timer one step to the next step (one number down). After this, your turn ends as soon as you draw a card.
As soon as one of the other timers runs out and you have not turned it over in time then you turn over one of the Crowd tokens, with the purple backing. If 3 tokens have been turned over then every visitor has left your show and you have lost the game.
Conclusion & final score
Difficulty: 1.50/ 5
Re-playability: 8
My score: 7 out of 10 dice
Skyrockets is a very fun but stressful (in a positive way) party game. Playing the right card in time to prevent an hourglass from running out caused me a slight stress moment, but when I finally succeeded in getting at least one star, it feels really good.
Skyrockets looks great! The artwork of the fireworks is great and don’t forget the insert (bottom right picture). The game explanation is very simple and may sound a little longer above but once you are playing you will quickly get the hang of everything. Pay attention to the instructions and also communicate with each other which hourglass empties faster than another, as they are not equal to each other. It is great fun to go through the different festivals, some are a little more difficult than others but make sure you communicate well but most of all have fun together.
If I have to choose between Kites and Skyrockets, my preference is for the latter, but that is more based on the artwork and the different festivals. That simply is a little more appealing to me.
My thanks to Floodgate Games for this review copy and the opportunity to write about this game.
