Come with me, reader, to a land where “playlists” were shared through the careful, time consuming, labor of love of adding songs to the A and B sides of a cassette tape*. No one had the world’s library of music at their fingertips like they do today. To have a recording of a song before you had the album meant frantically pressing record on your stereo when the DJ played it on the radio. If you were REALLY good at this, you’d only cut off a fraction of the beginning of the song. If you were lucky, the DJ wouldn’t talk over the intro. Mixtapes meant something when someone gave one to you. We used mixtapes to express emotions so we didn’t have to actually talk to each other. We were SUPER deep in the 90’s. Something tells me designers Dan Hughes and Mike DiLisio made a lot of mixtapes in their day.
Games come in many themes, some more deep than others. It’s rare to have a game jolt me back to my youth the way this one did, especially with theming alone. This was one of the first reasons I was drawn to I Made You a Mixtape, but let me share with you five reasons why this game just might be for you.
*Cassette Tape – an analog relic from the 80’s and 90’s known for delivering handpicked musical journeys and frustrating tangled disasters, all in one compact little box. Think of it as Spotify with about 10 songs, way more rewinding, and a lot more love.
Reason #1 – You’ve Ever Made a Mixtape
I get that this one is super obvious but it is relevant. Disclaimer: You can 100% enjoy this game if you’ve never made a mixtape or you have no idea what a cassette tape is. I do think you’re going to appreciate it just a tad more if you have though.
This game brings you back to curating a mixtape. The primary mechanic here is “I Split – You Choose.” Each round, you’ll draw three cards from the cassette deck and decide how to split them up. You’ll create two stacks of cards – 1 stack with 2 cards and 1 stack with 1 card. There are six different genres to choose from – Rock, Pop, Rap, Alternative, R&B, and Punk, as well as a Wild option. Each card comes with an associated balance cost and flow pattern. You may try to group things together that will disrupt another players’ flow or balance. Which ever stack of cards they don’t choose comes back to you, so choose wisely.
Lining up the cards for your A side and B side takes you right back to creating an actual mixtape. Songs come one after the other, you can’t change your mind halfway through the tape and insert a song somewhere, this isn’t Spotify! Once a song is recorded it’s locked in order.
Reason #2 – You Like Patterns and Puzzles
If you remove the nostalgia of creating a mixtape you are still left with some really cool puzzles and patterns in this game. One way to score points is to have the flow of your tape line up. This means connecting the flow pattern on each card that you play. Trust me, it is easier said then done, but it creates a really fun puzzle to how you choose and place each song card. It certainly added a layer to how I decide to split the three song cards I draw each round. The more flow you align, the more points you score!
The second way to score points is by having your A and B sides be “balanced.” Each song has a rating between 1 and 3, which corresponds to its length. The closer you can get to the same runtime between sides A and B, the more points you score! But if one side becomes too unbalanced, you won’t be able to place any songs on that side until the balance is restored.
Reason #3 – You Like Set Collection
The third way you score points is based on the number of cards you have from each genre. This brings a nice set collection mechanic to the game. The more cards you have of a given genre the more points you’ll score. This is pretty thematic too, as THE BEST mixtapes have a vibe and you don’t want to hop between too many genres. Ok, you get it, I like mixtapes.
Reason #4 – You Like the Risk/Reward of I-Split-You-Choose
This is the heart of the game, as you must split your hand of three tracks and hand them to another player so they can choose one of the stacks to add to their own mixtape. Do you put your favorite songs in the two-card stack, or tempt the other player with two cards for their sorely lacking B-side?
But be careful, as you won’t know what that other player will be sending you, either. If you haven’t been keeping an eye on your balance between the A and B sides, and the other player sends you songs for the wrong side, you may not even be able to place them!
Reason #5 – You Like Games That Play Quickly and Have a Ton of Fun Table Talk
This game was quick to teach and easy to get to the table no matter the player count. Most of our games lasted around 30-40 minutes. It really depends on how long it takes someone to make their decision and place their cards. Some people take a little more time to think through those decisions. Regardless, we could easily get a couple of games in a short amount of time. I would say this is a fantastic light game to play as a palate cleanser or during game day when you’re waiting on another group to finish up. For us, we often wanted to play more than one round.
Kids of the 80’s and 90’s are going to recognize the majority of the song titles in the game. I double dog dare you to play an entire game without someone breaking into song. These songs will take you way back!
Final Thoughts
I REALLY hope Dan and Mike consider expansion packs for more cards. The Kickstarter version will come with some blank cards to add your own favorites in. We’ll be adding in Zombie, Ice Ice Baby, Wonderwall, and some Metallica for sure.
Early on, when we were learning the game, the scores would sometimes have a pretty big gap. Don’t let that discourage you. Once we played a couple of times we saw the scores get closer together.
This one won me over quickly with the theme, but the challenge of keeping your sides balanced and the flow aligned is what keeps me coming back. I really love games that have that a puzzle aspect to them and this brings more than you’d expect. You can plan a little but will have to switch gears quickly based on what cards you draft each round. I’m historically terrible with the I Split You Choose mechanic so I would feel SO clever when I’m able to get things to line up well. For me, personally, the theme helped me be better at this.
As of publication, the Kickstarter is winding down, so watch for late pledge options or for the retail release.
*All images are of a prototype. Final product may vary.