Oh Crab!

Summary

👥 A game for 2 to 5 players
⏳ Playing time is 40 – 60 minutes
🏢 Publisher is Smart Flamingo

Introduction

In Oh Crab! you step into the shell of a crab trying to escape a very unpleasant fate: the chef’s kitchen. What follows is a chaotic, highly interactive race across a crowded beach filled with obstacles, other crabs, and unexpected effects. The goal is simple: be the first to reach the sea. But the path there is packed with clever decisions and, most importantly… getting in each other’s way.

Let’s get it on the table

Each player starts with a set of cards and a crab on the beach. As the game progresses, you build your personal “path” of cards, which generates your actions. These cards are the engine of your turn and determine how effectively you move toward the sea.

The game is played over multiple rounds, and each round consists of three phases: a planning phase, an action phase, and a round-end phase.

During the planning phase, everyone simultaneously chooses a card from their hand and places it face down. Then comes the action phase, where players take turns performing their actions, starting with the player who holds the chef marker. Once everyone has finished, you check if the game has ended or determine who becomes the next starting player.

At the start of your turn, you make an important choice: do you add a card to your path or do you rest? If you add a card, you place it face up next to your existing row of cards. This can unlock new actions, especially when symbols on adjacent cards complete each other. By combining two half symbols, you activate additional basic actions on top of the main action shown in the center of the card.

After that, you resolve your actions. You can perform them in any order and even chain multiple actions together, as long as you have access to them. Every card provides a main action, which is always a basic action such as moving forward, diagonally, or toward the sea. As mentioned, cards can also grant extra actions through their side symbols or via special abilities, which are often more powerful but may require a cost, like discarding cards.

Movement is at the heart of the game. Whenever you move, you advance your crab across the board, always toward the sea unless an effect states otherwise. When you enter a space, you immediately resolve its effect. This could mean collecting a shell, discarding a card when encountering an obstacle, or even getting knocked over on a tricky space.

If you choose to rest, your turn plays out very differently. You clear most of your cards, keeping only one on your path, then take a new card from the market and return your discard pile to your hand. This action allows you to improve your deck and build stronger turns for later in the game.

In Oh Crab! there’s plenty of interaction. If you move onto a space occupied by another crab, you push it away and knock it over. This can even trigger chain reactions, causing multiple crabs to shift and topple.

During the game, you can also collect shells. These can be spent to gain extra actions through three special action tiles. On top of that, the chef marker grants you an additional movement action.

At the end of each round, you check if any crab has reached the sea. If so, this becomes the final round and all players finish their turns. If no one has made it yet, the chef marker moves to the player who is furthest behind.

The game ends as soon as one or more crabs reach the water. The player who gets there first usually wins, but there’s an interesting twist. If multiple crabs reach the sea in the same round, you compare the number of cards in hand. If that number is equal, you then compare the number of shells. If it’s still tied, victory is shared.

Final Conclusion & rating

Weight: 2.00/ 5
Replayability: 7
Our rating: 7,5 out of 10 dices

Oh Crab! is a delightfully chaotic family racing game where everything revolves around creating the best card combinations and striking at just the right moment. The interaction is high and sometimes a little mean, but that’s exactly what makes it so lively and hilarious. What starts as a simple race to the sea quickly turns into a game where you need to play your cards smartly, weigh risks, and constantly anticipate what your opponents are about to do. The mix of deckbuilding, positioning, and direct interaction ensures that no two games ever feel the same. The modular board adds to this as well, letting you easily adjust the length of the game if you’re short on time.

What really makes Oh Crab! shine is how all its systems come together. You’re constantly building your row of cards, and how you place them matters a lot. Combining symbols to unlock extra actions creates satisfying little puzzle moments, while pushing other crabs around leads to pure chaos.

If you ever feel stuck, you can choose to rest and improve your deck through the card market. You’ll swap out weaker starting cards for stronger ones with special abilities, allowing your strategy to evolve and grow throughout the game.

Oh Crab! is a fantastic and fun game to play with both kids and adults. We’ve had some truly great sessions with it!

Curious now? Oh Crab! will also be available in Dutch via HotGames!

🙏 Thanks to Smart Flamingo for providing this review copy and the opportunity to write about it.