[crux]

Teach your kids Tarock, not Bridge.

Ok, that phrasing is mostly just to keep the pattern going. But I do want to bring to light the fact that there are actually a larger class of games of the same sort as Bridge - imperfect information, high skill, with a body of strategy and discussion - than most Americans are aware of.

I think it’s worth mentioning these for two reasons:

1. They’re really wonderful games! And they have deep cultural roots, which can be added delight for those of us who enjoy engaging with other cultures.

2. Bridge players can be kind of… dicks? That is, it’s unfortunate but true that the culture of Bridge can often be quite rigid and unfriendly. Especially to newcomers. As mentioned elsewhere, a surprising amount of Bridge has to do with the conventions encoded in the bidding, and if you don’t know those conventions you might feel rather lost, and your partner might get very annoyed at you.

Luckily, there are other games in the world that are the ‘Bridge’ of their own countries of origin - deep, strategic, rewarding years of play and study - that the average English speaker has never heard of.

I won’t go into too much detail but some highlights are:

- Preferans, a straight-trick-taking game for three from Russia;

- Skat, a point-trick-taking game from Germany;

- Tarocchino, a point trick taking game played with a 62 card tarot deck from Bologna;

- Koenigrufen, a point trick game played with a 54 card tarot deck from Austria;

- Danish tarok, a point trick game played with a 78 card deck;

- Vira, a straight trick taking game from Sweden;

- a half dozen incredibly deep and challenging games from Hungary alone. Something in the water over there.

In point of fact, Bridge is quite interesting, especially if you’re interested in the meta game of communicating through bidding conventions. I am not; there are other games out there that have really interesting features, lots of strategy, and a history dating back hundreds of years. Check them out!

Because I’m an annoying evangelist for this sort of thing, I’ll make sure my email is in my profile in case you’d like to know more.

[simlan]

Adding Doppelkopf a 48 cards combined half decks game. Played by 4. Teams 2 on 2 determined throughout the game. The game was influenced by Skat and Schafkopf and borrows from them. It is however very casual usually and the rule variations depend on the region you are in. Anyway to sum up trick an bid games are really fun!

Fyi for the US there is also binocle that has some traction and at least to my experience has been largely forgotten in the originating areas of Germany.

[jean-]

So happy to see tarot games mentioned on HN, I'm a big fan of their strategic depth and centuries-old cultural background.

Something a lot of people don't realise is that when tarot cards were invented, their intended purpose was to be a game. The whole divination/cartomancy aspect was made up much more recently, mostly to amuse French aristocrats.

An excellent resource for people interested in learning more about this very old tradition is the following YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DiCFfp_ZY4g

[JoshTriplett]

I'm a huge fan of Hanabi. It's a cooperative game with imperfect information, both because you only know other players' hands (not your own) and because you don't know what order the rest of the cards will come in. But with good strategy and good communication (within the bounds of the game's restricted communication) it's possible to win just about every game.

[4ggr0]

In Switzerland a lot of people play Jass[0]. It's almost like a national sport. I can't play it, but it feels like I'm part of a minority.

Jass games are even being broadcasted on national TV, it really is a huge part of our culture.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jass

[yread]

Czechs play a lot of Mariáš https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mari%C3%A1%C5%A1 it's in some ways similar to bridge specifically the Licitovaný mariáš variant:

There is ordered bidding that often conveys information, further information can be conveyed by playing style (if you hold an advantagous card in betl you use the cards in descending order, otherwise you use descending order) and lots of counting and memorization is involved. Both for the current game as for the next ones - cards are not shuffled only cut - so skillful players can reconstruct approximately who has what cards based on the previous game.

On the other hand it's most often played in a loud pub with a beer in hand so lots of mistakes are made.

It's also referenced frequently in literature esp. from 1st half of 20th century (Hasek, Polacek)