Interesting card game - never heard about it before. But it reminds me of the card game Set [1], which has a similar objective of finding cards that "belong together" in some sense. It also has interesting (and similar) mathematical properties, although there is no analytical solutions (as far as I know) once you start playing by removing sets. I was really fascinated by this twelve years ago, an simulate game play to find the probabilities [2]. Great fun!<p>1. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Set_(card_game)" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Set_(card_game)</a><p>2. <a href="https://henrikwarne.com/2011/09/30/set-probabilities-revisited/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://henrikwarne.com/2011/09/30/set-probabilities-revisit...</a>
Matt Parker's video is a fun exploration of this too<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTDKqW_GLkw">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTDKqW_GLkw</a><p>From a YouTube comment (eeeuw!), the reason for the 55 cards instead of 57 is confirmed:<p>> The reason why this game doesn't include 57 cards is indeed that the printing company that is used by asmodee (the game company that acquired the rights to Dobble) can only print 55 cards on a print sheet. That's what asmodee told to a german math YouTuber (DorFuchs) which they sponsered to promote the game.<p>I've played a related game called "Ghost Blitz" in which you're trying to find either the correctly coloured object, or if that isn't on the card, you grab the object that isn't represented on the card by its object or colour.<p><a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/83195/ghost-blitz" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/83195/ghost-blitz</a>
Spot It! is a great game, especially to play with young kids. I find that it's one of the few games that are not completely up to luck, yet you don't have that much of an advantage being a grown-up. That makes it a lot of fun for players of all ages.
The title is a bit misleading, it's not mind bending maths or other obscure/exotic properties. Simple logic, geometry/topology and combinations :-)<p>Very easy and fun game, good for enhancing observability and reaction time, especially with kids. Here in Europe it's known as Dobble.
Unfortunately, the link to a site with code for this doesn't work, but archive.org has our back:<p><a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20160503021303/https://radiganengineering.com/2013/01/spot-it-howd-they-do-that/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://web.archive.org/web/20160503021303/https://radiganen...</a><p>The GitHub link works still:<p><a href="https://github.com/WRadigan/pySpot-It/blob/master/pySpot-It.py">https://github.com/WRadigan/pySpot-It/blob/master/pySpot-It....</a>
This is one of the few games that my kids (6 and 4) can sometimes beat me while playing straight (not letting them win), making it a really interesting experience(since almost no luck is involved).<p>Also there's an easier version with fewer cards (30) and drawings of animals that should be suitable for even younger children.
Have you tried Ghost Blitz [1]?<p>[1] <a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/83195/ghost-blitz" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/83195/ghost-blitz</a>