Game Review: Optrita: Lines

Open information and trick-taking rarely go hand-in-hand, unless you're playing alone apparently. Optrita: Lines does this by adding a hint of strategy to a straightforward trick-taker. Chance and skill comingle in a push-your-luck style game of risk and foresight.

You face a grid of cards and a selected trump suit from a card in your hand for the round. Each trick starts with choosing a row or column and starting with the card on the perimeter, you turn each card one at a time until you reach a card of the same suit as the card played (this includes any cards already face up) and highest card wins the trick, taking out the relevant card from the grid. If you've revealed an entire row without following a suit, your card will lose to the lowest trump which you will remove unless there are no trumps and you win and can take any card from the row. You can only play a trick on a full row so you lose options on each subsequent trick. After all cards are played out the grid is refilled and another round is played.

First to a set number of points after a round wins, if the grid reaches the score you lose (it's implied it doesn't matter if you tie). Normally this is a race to 21, but a harder mode has your goal at 31 and the grid only needs 11 points for your to lose.

In this game your imaginary opponent can actually put up a fight and you're not at the mercy of a random number generator, not that such fights are inherently bad. In this game you always have the initiative that the grid counters through secrecy. The fog clears with every turn but danger still lurks, a different feel from a constant fear of ambush.

With every new piece of info comes lesser options every trick and revealed cards might be rendered less useful if you can't use them. The strategy of card play is between playing a card assessing a likely win and the grid tossing a possible wrench in your plans. 

The choice of trump is important, while the trump suit is only of use to the grid you still decide it, neutering any chances of being trumped can go along with working around them through cardplay. Since the chosen indicator card is out of play during the round that is also another factor to consider.

Optrita: Lines doesn't play like the usual trick-taking game, but in this game your opponent is more than just an algorithm to follow, but a diagram to analyze. It's is more fun to risk when you think you have enough information.