Order Up in Flapjack Flipout: A Game of Frenzied Flipping

Flip pancakes, find the right pancakes, and complete the orders! Remember where you put the right pancakes, however, and act faster than anyone else to become the master flapjack flipper.

Published by Mind the Gap Studios, Flapjack Flipout is a dexterity-based memory game with one very yummy theme and some lovely components. But how is it to play?

Gameplay

Each player takes one of the large, flat, solid griddle playing pieces in one hand. All the pancake tiles are mixed and spread out, face-down, in the center of the table around the bell. The order cards are all shuffled and set to one side.

At the start of the game, an order card is drawn and placed so that all players can see it. Each order card lists a number of pancakes and what flavors they have to be. Then all players start flipping pancakes simultaneously.

In order to flip a pancake, you pick one up with your free hand and place it (still face-down) on your griddle. You then attempt to flip it face up using only your griddle so that you can check the flavor. If it falls onto the table, you place it face-up in the community trash. If you keep it on your griddle, once you have determined the flavor, you then use your free hand to place it face-down in front of you in one of your personal pancake stacks. You can organize your stacks in any way you choose and may have as many as you like. But once a pancake is in one of your stacks, you cannot flip it over to check its flavor again.

There are three special types of pancakes. There are the either/or pancakes, which can act as one of the two flavors shown on them, there is the daily special pancake which you can exchange for any two face-up pancakes in the community trash, and there is the moldy pancake. When you get a moldy pancake you must place it face-up on one of your stacks. You may not use any pancakes in that stack as long as the moldy pancake is on top of it.

Once someone believes he has all the pancakes in his stacks to fulfill the order card, he hits the bell. He must select the pancakes from his stack that he believes are the correct ones and then flip them over. If the pancakes are not the right ones, the player is out of the round — however, any correct pancakes are applied to the order so that the other players will require fewer pancakes to complete the order. If the player successfully fills the entire order, he wins the order card and must return any remaining pancakes in his stacks. All other players get to choose which pancakes in their stacks to discard or keep, but may not look at the flavors before doing so. Daily specials and moldy pancakes are automatically discarded at the end of a round.

All pancakes not in stacks are flipped face-down and shuffled. A new order card is drawn and another round begins. The first player to win three order cards wins the game.

Flapjack Flipout components (photo provided by the publisher)

Review

Flapjack Flipout is just plain fun, from the flipping to the simultaneous gameplay. It's a little tricky, when you first start, to get the hang of flipping the pancakes on the griddles, but once you've been playing long enough it's quite satisfying when you manage to pull off a successful flip. The memory element balances the game and ensures it's not just about the player who is the best flipper.

We liked the angle of having to come up with an organization system on the fly for your pancake stacks, while the moldy pancakes increase the difficulty. Do you want to make large stacks when a single moldy pancake can take it away from you? But the more stacks you build, the harder it's going to be to keep track of them all, especially when you are trying to flip and stack as quickly as possible.

The components of the game are wonderful. The pancakes are sturdy and thick, the griddles have a nice solid feeling to them, and the bell is far too much fun to ring. The only real flaw in the production is that the two-player variant rules were accidentally left out of the rulebook and you have to find them online.

If you enjoy dexterity games,  Flapjack Flipout is a delightful one, from its aesthetics and theme to its mix of mechanics. Game time is fast and the rules are light and easy to teach.

Pros: Great production quality, fast gameplay, mix of memory and dexterity

Cons: Two-player rules were not included in the printed rulebook

Disclosure: we received a complimentary review copy of this game.