SPLINK is an exhilarating, maddening, fast paced family-friendly card game that leaves you counting the moments until you can come back for more. Play with your kids, your friends, your co-workers... even your in-laws. SPLINK turns an ordinary night into an extraordinary adventure that is crazy good fun for one and all!
The object of the game is to WIN! ;-)
So, how do you WIN? Great question. Here’s the short version:
You want to focus on 2 primary things—getting as many cards on the main board as possible and being the first player to “SPLINK!”—which means, depleting your SPLINK STACK of 10 cards.
SPLINK! THE GAME
We’ve been playing card games in our family for 5 generations. SPLINK evolved out of several of our favorite card games—where we took elements that we really liked, combined them, and eliminated what we didn’t like.
SPLINK is meant to be a fast-paced game, however, you can play at your own speed. Made in the USA, for 2-8 players, ages 10 and up. The beauty of this game is its appeal to people of ALL ages and walks of life. From families with children, to college age, baby boomers and seniors-- everyone loves SPLINK!
We designed SPLINK to play in TEAMS. This works well because it’s an easy way to introduce a new player (where they can begin playing immediately without feeling awkward or out of place) and it’s also a great way to balance the game (partnering younger players or newbies with advanced seasoned players). Of course, you can also get super competitive and create TEAMS that play at lightning speed and crush their competition like a bug. Hey, whatever floats your boat ;-)
You also have the option of playing “cutthroat”. This means SINGLES. Where each player operates on their own without a team member.
Bottom line is, SPLINK is a versatile, highly addictive game for people of all ages and stages. You can play fast or slow, in pairs or singles, for hours or minutes. But one thing never changes—you’ll end the game already thinking about when you’ll be able to play again. Players always leave excited to come back for more.
THE SETUP:
Choose your SPLINK symbol—this will be your deck.
Find the deck that best represents you—we’ve got 6 to choose from—
HEALTH, WEALTH, HAPPINESS, PEACE, WISDOM & LOVE
Once each player chooses a symbol,
you’ll want to thoroughly shuffle your deck.
You’ll notice your deck consists of 4 sets of colored cards
(blue, orange, purple and green) numbered 1-10
A WILD card
And a FREEZE card.
Your blue and orange cards also include a SUN and
your purple and green cards include a MOON.
Let’s setup your game…
Place 3 cards in front of you, facing up, across—side-by-side. This will be your SPLINK STASH.
Count out 10 cards, face down, in a stack (one on top of the other). Now turn your stack over and place it to your right—face up (you can see the top card). This will be your SPLINK STACK.
The remaining cards (there should be 27) will be your ASSIST DECK. You’ll keep these in a stack and use them to flip during play.
THE PLAY:
SPLINK works well with teams (2 players per team) or as a single player. The difference between playing doubles/teams and playing single/cutthroat is that in order to WIN the hand BOTH players in a team must SPLINK!
In other words, both players must deplete their SPLINK STACK. When both players from the team are out, the round is over. Once one player in the team depletes their SPLINK STACK they CANNOT play further. Meaning, once their SPLINK STACK is at zero they cannot continue to add cards to the board.
You have two main areas you will be playing—the game board or middle of the table (if you don’t have a board) and directly in front of you.
Remember, the object of the game is to DEPLETE your SPLINK STACK (the stack of 10 cards to your right) AND to play as many CARDS IN THE MIDDLE as possible.
To play in the middle section you build POINT PILES of cards, beginning with the number 1 in ascending order, by color (i.e., If you begin a pile with a BLUE 1, the next card that can be played is a BLUE 2). All players build on the same POINT PILES in the middle, in free-for-all style. The cards added to the POINT PILES in the center are the ONLY cards that generate points for you.
The other area of play is on your SPLINK STASH--the 3 cards directly in front of you.
Your SPLINK STASH is where you can move cards in order to DEPLETE your SPLINK STACK and essentially “stash” cards that you can’t currently play on the POINT PILES.
You build your SPLINK STASH in DESCENDING ORDER—alternating between SUN and MOON—regardless of color (i.e., If you have a 4 SUN (blue or orange), the next card you can play on your SPLINK STASH would be a 3 MOON (of either green or purple).
You can also COMBINE your SPLINK STASH to open up a spot—where you can then pull a new card from your SPLINK STACK (i.e, If you have one SPLINK STASH where the first card is a 7 MOON and you have another SPLINK STASH where the bottom card is an 8 SUN, you can move the entire stack (that begins with 7 MOON) over to the bottom of your 8 SUN to build one stack. This leaves an open spot (where you now have just 2 SPLINK STASH instead of 3) so you can pull a card off of your SPLINK STACK to fill the open spot.
Just remember-- You’re always building UP (ascending) by NUMBER and SAME COLOR on the POINTS PILES and you’re always building DOWN (descending) by NUMBER and alternating between SUN/MOON (regardless of color) on your SPLINK STASH.
Play begins by scorekeeper saying, “Ready, Set, SPLINK!”
To begin play you will make any initial moves that are available to you—meaning, if you have any 1’s in your SPLINK STASH (3 cards directly in front of you) or if you happen to have a 1 as the top card on your SPLINK STACK (stack of 10 cards to your right) you can play those on the board by creating a POINTS PILE.
Other plays can play on the POINTS PILES in the middle by adding cards (in ASCENDING order, of the same color). Remember, it’s free-for-all style play so the first card to make it on top of a POINTS PILE is the card that counts. In our family—you’ve gotta be quick! ;-)
To continue play you will begin dealing through your ASSIST DECK by holding it face down and dealing out 2 cards, then flipping up the 3rd card—face up. Look to see if that card can assist you in playing (either on the POINTS PILES—in the middle—or on your SPLINK STASH in front of you). But keep in mind, the GOAL is to get as many cards on the POINTS PILES as you can AND to play from your SPLINK STACK, whenever possible. You can only use the TOP card on your SPLINK STACK—you can’t pick it up or shuffle through looking for other cards.
When a WILD CARD appears you can use it for anything you want. When you play it on a POINTS PILE you simply need to CALL IT OUT to let the other players know what it is (i.e., If you play your WILD CARD on top of a PURPLE 7, the WILD CARD becomes a PURPLE 8—and you’d let everyone know that you’re playing a PURPLE 8).
When a FREEZE CARD appears, you shout FREEZE! All players should immediately STOP PLAYING. You have 5 SECONDS to play alone on the board. The players can count out the time by saying, “1 SPLINK… 2 SPLINK… 3… SPLINK … 4 SPLINK… 5 SPLINK”… then play resumes for all players.
The first person to DEPLETE their SPLINK STACK shouts, “SPLINK!”
For TEAMS, BOTH players must SPLINK OUT
before the round ends.
When both players from the team are out, the round is over. Once one player in the team depletes their SPLINK STACK they CANNOT play further. Meaning, once their SPLINK STACK is at zero they CANNOT continue to add cards to the board.
If you’re playing cutthroat (SINGLE), the first person to DEPLETE their SPLINK STACK shouts, “SPLINK!” and the round is over.
When the ROUND IS OVER, all cards from the POINTS PILES are gathered and given to the score keeper.
Each player counts the remaining cards left in their SPLINK STACK.
Cards below a 5 count as their face value (i.e., 1, 2, 3, 4) and cards 5 and above count as 1. Add those up and that’s your DEDUCTION (which is the number you’ll need to give to the scorekeeper).
The SPLINK BOARD is an optional part of the game. Since we like to play SPLINK on the go (like at restaurants or hanging with friends) we don’t always want to carry the board. Play works great either way—so it’s more of a personal preference than anything.
Follow these instructions for game play WITHOUT the Board:
Unless otherwise agreed, you can have unlimited number of POINTS PILES going at any given time. When a POINTS PILE reaches 10 cards in the pile, it should be turned over and removed from the playing area.
Follow these instructions for game play WITH the Board:
When playing on the SPLINK BOARD, when playing with 6 PLAYERS you may have a maximum of 12 separate PONTS PILES or with 5 PLAYERS OR LESS, 10 separate POINTS PILES going at any given time. You cannot start a new POINTS PILE unless there are 9 POINTS PILES or LESS currently in play. When a POINTS PILE reaches 10 cards in the pile, it should be turned over and removed from the playing area.
THE SCORE SYSTEM:
The scorekeeper sorts all the cards from the POINTS PILES into symbols and counts how many individual card each symbol/player has on the board. Those are the POINTS you earn in that round. Team points are combined into ONE set of POINTS.
Then each player tells the scorekeeper how many NEGATIVE POINTS they must deduct (which is based on the number of cards left in that player’s SPLINK STACK). Team points are combined into ONE DEDUCTION.
The number left is your SCORE for the ROUND.
You can decide how many overall points make up a GAME.
When you play, each round lasts between 3 to 5 minutes and the game is designed to last virtually as long as you want—based on the number of points you set as the “winning score”. (ex: Short games to 100 points would last 5-6 rounds (15-20 mins). Games to 300-500 would last 20-30 rounds (60-90 mins).
RULES OF PLAY:
Even the most mild manner folks get carried away in SPLINK MANIA—which tends to get loud and maybe even a little aggressive (in the nicest sense of the word ;-)
Here’s a few rules to help make your play a little less chaotic:
Players can only use their hand to place a card on the POINTS PILES—arms should not be stretched across the board or blocking other players.
Players can only use ONE hand to add cards to the POINTS PILE—and when adding cards one after another, the player must place the first card, then come back and with the same hand take the next card and place it on the POINTS PILE. The first card MUST be in place on the POINTS PILE before the player TOUCHES the second card they will be playing.
Players must place the cards on the POINTS PILES—no throwing cards. If cards get off the piles, ALL PLAYERS MUST STOP PLAY and place the cards on their proper piles. In the case of a duplicate card, the BOTOM CARD on the POINTS PILE stays and the top card is returned to the player to be placed back on the SPLINK STACK.
SPLINK TOURNAMENTS:
You think playing SPLINK with friends and family is face paced? That’s nothing compared to the frenzy of a SPLINK Tournament. Your team goes head-to-head with other teams in lightning fast play.
You can setup SPLINK Tournaments in your local area for fun or you can join in on the national competitive level and go after the title, SPLINK MASTER.
