Firmly grasp it.

A cacophonous rattle fills the room, any attempts at conversation immediately stymied. The box hits the table with a hollow clunk and its lid is promptly removed. Excited players peer into it, commenting on the distribution of its odds and ends in something approximating strategy. Metal shot glasses are distributed, one to each participant, which are immediately fidgeted with.

The countdown begins. For the next 15 or so seconds, chaos reigns. Then, a game of Poker if it was played in Wonderland. Then the rattle begins anew, because no one has ever played Grabble just once and said “yeah I’m good”.

Grabble is a localization of Naoki Fukuda’s “Nuts a GoGo!“, a game that once topped the wishlists of my Japanese import-pilled friends in the early 2020s, when we all very much needed a bit more joy in our lives. It’s a chaotic, physical, truly singular design that defies mechanical comparison. Where it does bear some resemblance is amongst the lighter entries of CMYK’s catalog, see their new edition of Magical Athlete or Monikers, which is to say this is either “Exactly Your Thing” or “Literally Not a Game“, depending on whether the person you’re asking has any remaining capacity for whimsy. And me? I’ve been Mirthmaxxing.

You see stuff. I see opportunity.

I should probably at least attempt to explain this thing. The game of Grabble is played over two shockingly short halves. After a box of disparate tchotchkes is shaken up, distributing its contents every which way, players start grabbing pieces in real time and collecting them in their lil cup one by one. This is done with exactly two fingers, almost in a chopstick-esque motion, as if players are operating particularly choosy birds pecking away at random objects to insulate their nests with. What’s that? Which items do you want? How many of each? There’s no time for that, what if all the chrome hogs are gone before you get any??? What then, mister smart-fingers?

Anyway, eventually someone feels they’ve grabbled enough and collects The Comically Large Pawn. They then begin a countdown. All other players must go pencils-down and slap the table (meaning they aren’t collecting stuff anymore) before the countdown ends, lest they be penalized and have to hand the counter one of their precious items. Sure they get to choose which is lost, but losing anything can make the second half of the game all the more difficult, as this is where Grabble metamorphosizes from dexterity game to “Go Fish for Jerks“.

This is not a good hand. Probably. Unless…?

Players dump out everything in their cup and keep the contents hidden. The Pawn-haver then reveals an item, calling it out to the table and throwing it back in the box. Every other player must then reveal a matching item (size doesn’t matter, and yes there are varied sizes of things that are otherwise the same) and follow suit. If they can’t?

THAT PLAYER IS ELIMINATED FROM THE GAME OF GRABBLE.

Then the next non-eliminated player clockwise gets a chance to name an item, repeat until only one player remains. They are the Grabble champion, the envy of all, at least until a minute later when the group has concluded another entire game of Grabble and that same player lost on the first item due to grabbing some of everything except a traffic cone. Imagine being caught CONELESS. How SHAMEFUL.

The clock begins ticking once again, though not by any measure of seconds I know.

I need to emphasize how much of the fun of Grabble, at least with my players (who have ranged from grown adults to 5 years old), has been in the reveal step. Of course there’s joy to be found in rooting around for pieces, bumping into each other, calling someone out for hogging all the hogs in the midst of the chaos, but the true cleverness of the design exists primarily in the game’s second half. Slowly revealing something from your hand, as if you’re a professional Card Gamesman, only to declare “but do you have…a golden banana?” and be met with loud swearing? Priceless. That’s board games right there. That’s the good stuff.

Believe it or not, there is a certain amount of strategy to be had here even if it’s nigh-impossible to track everything people are grabbing. Forcing people to discard the same thing over and over is a pretty good move, as is thinning out items you’re heavy in, and reading people’s responses to certain things being called can be a useful tell. Make no mistake though, this is a game with a runtime of about a minute. You ain’t Grabblin’ for an ELO rating, here. You have just enough time to execute on something resembling a strategy, but said strategy could instantly crumble if the 3 people ahead of you all call “the letter G” and you find yourself afflicted with sudden onset illiteracy. You need to accept this. If you can’t, I worry your dopamine receptors may be defective. Check your manufacturer’s warranty.

One banana was enough. Four Gs was not.

In my Magical Athlete review I said that I didn’t want to play games with anyone who couldn’t get down with its particular brand of clown. Grabble is an entirely different beast, and one that I feel similarly about, though this time around I do at least understand why it may not be for everyone as it is incredibly silly and short. That said, it is absolutely for me and mine. The shaken contents of its box are playground for those with eyes to see, a game simultaneously short and low stakes but also perfect for establishing local metagames, like our player who made a habit of grabbing the pawn early only to count veeeeeeeeeeery sloooooooowly, baiting players to resume taking items, then quickly finish counting and demand pieces from the table’s greediest. Or the various times the aforementioned 5 year old was eliminated with a surplus of hogs and almost nothing else, because hog hoarding had worked prior once or twice and she was never going to get caught lacking again. Or the particularly long back and forths with only 2 players remaining, the games where Grabble‘s magic trick was most apparent, where I could feel myself genuinely caring about a game where my best play was to keep saying the word “GREEN MAN” over and over like a mantra.

It’s a good game, is what I’m saying. I’ll be keeping this on the shelf long-term as a nightcap game, the perfect “one last thing” before seeing friends off for the night. If CMYK keeps reliably hitting dingers like this I’m going to start inspecting their staff for cork.

9/10

Review copy provided by publisher.