The worst thing about playing a modern board game is “the learning” – that endless period of time when you first sit down to share something unusual with a new group of people. Very rarely does a game come along that literally doesn’t have a “learn” moment where you can just sit down and go through the first few rounds and things just sort of make sense. gapthe latest offerings CMYKis just such a magical offering: a chill game, built for good vibes, that requires almost no explanation.
Fans of CMYK will know the studio’s hit games: Nicknamesa lively take on charades, and Wavelength, a new pop culture-inspired device featuring a large plastic spinner. Both popular party games basically have no limit on the number of players they can accommodate. gap is a much more intimate experience built for just two players.
It also doesn’t look like a board game at all.
gap comes in a colorful cardboard tube. Pop the top open and just below you’ll find a plastic panel that looks like a shaker from a large plastic jar of paprika or garlic powder. Under that panel are all the parts: 49 colorful wooden flowers, 12 metal player pawns and a play mat made of heavy fabric. Unboxing is a visual and tactile delight, but the pregame setup is where the real fun begins.
You take the 49 flowers and throw them into the tube, put the plastic panel back on and literally shake them out onto the playing surface. Together, both players more or less move things by hand, making sure there are no big bunches of flowers. Then they take turns placing pawns for a total of six rounds.
Photo: CMYK
The goal is to place your pawn between two flowers of the same color. Players then take those two flowers and leave their pawn in place. Once all 12 pawns have been placed, players scan the board and pay close attention to the remaining 25 flowers. Players collect those flowers based on whose pawns are closest to each. Any disputes can be resolved quickly with the included plastic ruler. It adds a surprising layer of strategy to the game and it offers the big “A-ha!” moment when everyone at the table suddenly understands the game.
I proposed for the first time gap to my family on a recent car camping trip in Wisconsin. After a long, hot, 6-mile trek through a tick-infested forest, the kids and I were dog-tired, as was the dog – yet we were all restless in some way. So I withdrew gap, rolled out the cloth mat as if I was performing a magic trick and then scattered the colorful flowers on the picnic table. Two minutes later, the kids were hooked. The antique chess set and several other family favorite board games were quickly forgotten in the minivan. Most importantly, I was able to sneak out to start preparing dinner by the campfire. Both my 10-year-old and my 13-year-old, and later the other adults we traveled with, all left the weekend excursion excited about the fun new game they had discovered.
Photo: CMYK
gap isn’t perfect. Some of the flowers are a bit closer together in color than I would have liked. It’s the rare case that colorblind players can actually have an advantage, as each color also has its own shape and pattern to tell it apart. There is no special area on the board to score at the end of the game, which feels like a missed opportunity. However, my main problem is that the flowers tend to roll away when you pour them on the table. We even lost one in the folds of someone’s sweatshirt and didn’t find it all the way to the other side of the campground until we checked out the next morning. But it’s easy to see how shells or treasured stones could be used as an alternative in a pinch.
But most of all it was just nice to have something bright and colorful that is easy to learn after a long day on the road. gap was one of the highlights of our first big family trip of the summer, and it’s earned a spot in our car camping bags — probably forever. gap can also easily become a fun new tradition for your family.
Pre orders for gap starting June 6 at a discounted price of $34.99 on the CMYK website, which seems more than fair given the production values. Expect an MSRP of $39.99 when it ships in July.