Uno/Skip-Bo Review

Uno / Skip-Bo brings the two popular card games to the GBA for gamers who find themselves with the urge to play but without a couple of friends nearby. Well, technically you can play your friends in Uno / Skip-Bo by passing around your GBA, but at that point you may as well simply pull out the card deck.

Uno challenges players to be the first to get rid of all of the cards in his or her hand. A card can only be discarded on your turn if it matches the top card in the discard pile. Cards match if they’re the same color or number. If you don’t hold a matching card in your hand then you’re forced to draw another from the deck. Things are complicated a bit by special cards that can reverse the direction of play or force the next player to draw extra cards or miss his or her turn. Uno is a game that is perhaps 10% strategy and 90% luck, and has become popular as a family game due to its simple rules and enjoyable play. That being said, the electronic version of Uno lacks the whole family fun time, party atmosphere you get when playing the card game. Still, if you can’t find other people to play this game does do a good job of providing you with some competition from its AI players.

I personally found Skip-Bo to be more intriguing than Uno. Skip-Bo is played by dealing each player 20 cards in a pile and the object is to be the first player to empty his or her deck. Unlike Uno, only the top card in the deck can be played and you do not have the luxury of seeing which cards you have remaining. Cards are played from the deck by placing them into one of four community piles of cards in the middle of the table, and cards can only be played on top of a card with the preceding number – you can only play an “8” if there is a pile in the middle with a “7” on the top. Each player is also dealt enough cards at the beginning of his or her turn so that he or she will have five cards in his or her hand. These cards can be played into the middle in an attempt to make it possible to play the top card off of the deck, to block your opponent’s discard, or simply to get rid of the cards so that you can draw new ones next turn. Skip-Bo involves a greater degree of strategy than Uno, which is probably why it is more appealing when playing against the computer. It feels somewhat like a competitive version of solitaire in which you not only have to match cards to empty your deck, but need to look to block your opponents’ moves as well. If you enjoy solitaire style games you may find yourself getting hooked by Skip-Bo.

The game is nice enough to give you a few options when it comes to the background and music. The graphics are sharp and colorful, making it easy to see the cards on the GBA’s diminutive screen. My only real complaint with the game is that it can take a long time to finish a session because the cards are dealt rather slowly and the AI players are equally as slow in playing their cards. It would be nice to have the option to skip all of the shuffling and dealing animations.

In The End, This Game Hath Been Rated: 75%. Uno / Skip-Bo makes for some nice gaming on the go with these two family favorites.