Some comments about three similar Reiner Knizia card games: Lost Cities, Digging, and Zirkus Flohcati.

Presumably everyone reading this has already played Lost Cities and is familiar with its structure of playing exactly once through a deck of cards, the opponents seeing how well they can score while that specific journey transpires. Digging and Zirkus Flohcati both make use of the same structure, though with their own twists, and both turn out to be quite good games which play in a matter of minutes. Digging is closer in flavor to Lost Cities. It is designed primarily as a partnership game, 2 on 2, and that's how we played it exclusively. The scoring mechanism here involves first "opening a mine" -- that is, playing a mine card for either copper, silver, or gold -- followed by playing cards representing the appropriate metal on the opened mine, concluded by " closina the mine" with a card that does exactly that. While you are occupied with that simple procedure, your opponents have two different wavs to make things difficult for you.

1) They can close the mine themselves, prematurely, ofcourse, before you've had a chance to play all your cards of the respective metal.

2) They can try to steal the mine with "bandit" cards. These bandits are mercenary fellows (numbered 1 to 12) who defend one mine just as readily as attempt to steal another, so once a mine is under attack, it will be held after one turn of cardplay around the table by the partnership whose bandits' sum is higher than the other. Alternately, the defenders may choose -- if they have a closing card -- simply to close the mine and fake the current profit rather than to defend with bandits of their own. Now the really interesting thing about Digging, once these simple rules about scoring are under your belt, is that you only do ONE thing on your turn, and that includes drawing a card! That's right: You can either play a card or draw one from the deck -- but not both! (You also have the option of passing a card to your partner.) It takes a little getting used to, but only a little.

The really nice thing about it is that it makes the game ZOOM by! "Is it my turn already?" will be heard more often with this game than with any other in recent memory, and around our group's gaming tables, that is certainly a bonus. The simplicity of play and scoring is extreme -- but so is the speed of the game, and we found them to be nicely matched and therefore a very, very playable package. And it's nice to have a simple partnership game available.

Zirkus Flohcati rings some changes on the one-time-through-the-deck theme as well. Here you have 10 different colors ("attractions" in the circus) numbered 0 to 7, and just three wavs to score: 1) 10 points for each "Trio" melded (a Trio being a set of 3 matching numbers) 2) 10 points if you declare a "Gala Show" -- meaning you have all 10 colors in your hand -- a declaration which also ends the aame. 3) At game's end, points for the highest number of each color in your hand (including the cards in your Gala Show, but not those in any Trios you have melded). So once again the scoring mechanisms are very simple, but you only have one quick trip through the deck to make them work for you -- and maybe not even that loner, because a Gala Show may be declared. The way you collect cards is interesting, all by itself. You don't simply draw them from the deck. Instead, you turn as many cards face up from the deck as you want, choosing one card whenever you are ready to do so. The limiting factor on that is that if you turn up a card the same color as another card already displayed, you don't cret to take any card. Like Digging, this game is refreshingly speedy to play. It has worked very entertainingly for us with 3, 4 and 5 players, with no real differences in the game.

Steven Carlberg is a son of Atlanta, GA. and is known to the SGS Authorities.