Dirty Fridge
Dirty Fridge Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Components
The game has been designed for Print & Play and requires only 50 cards, which is the exact number of sleeves in any of the premium Euro Size 59 x 92 mm card sleeve packets in the market.
- 49 Game Cards
- 1 Cleaning Cloth (3 different options)
Game Objective
All the cards in Dirty Fridge have a number value written on them, some of them are negative. This value represents the amount of filth the card adds to your fridge. The game objective is to be the player that ends the game with the cleanest fridge (lowest filth value). Game cards with a negative sign will count as negative values towards determining the final score.
Game Setup
- Place the Cleaning Cloth. Place the Cleaning Cloth Card in the center of the table within everyone's reach. In the Dirty Fridge deck there are various Cleaning Cloth Cards, use the Cleaning Cloth Card that corresponds to the number of players in the game and return the rest to the game box. They will not be used during the game.
- Deal 4 cards to each player. Shuffle the remaining game cards and deal 4 cards face down to each player. Place them in front of each player as shown in the illustration. These cards will constitute each player's fridge.
- Create the draw deck. Place the remaining cards in the center of the table within everyone's reach creating the draw deck. Leave some space next to the draw deck for the discard pile.
- Look at the 2 bottom cards. Each player may now look at the 2 cards in the bottom shelf (row) of their fridge. Beyond this point you are not allowed to freely check your cards. For this reason, you'll need to remember their value.
- Choose a starting player. The last person to have forgotten food in a container which went bad and consequently had to throw it away, will go first. The following turns will take place in a clockwise fashion.
How Do You Play? The Game Turn
Each player, in their turn, reveals 1 card (the top card) from the draw deck and places it directly on the discard pile. In that moment, the player will have to choose between two options:
- Swap the revealed card with a card from their fridge. The player takes the revealed card and swaps it with any of the cards in their fridge, leaving their old card face up in the discard pile and the new card face down in the spot previously occupied by the discarded card.
- Perform the action on the card. If the card revealed is any of the cards shown below, the player will have the choice of performing that card's specific action.
Pass 1 card (# 5): All players pass 1 card from their fridge to the player seated to their right. The player that receives the card decides where to place it. In the possible case that a player has no cards to pass, the player will not pass a card to the right but will still receive a card from the player to their left (if they have one).
Fred performs the Pass 1 card action. All players pass 1 card to the player to their right.
Blind Swap (# 6): The player that performs this action can swap 1 of the cards in their fridge with 1 other card in the fridge of any player they choose. The player may not look at the value of the cards being swapped.
Martha performs the Blind Swap action, so she takes 1 of her cards and swaps it with a card from another player's fridge.
Peek & Swap (# 7): The player that performs this action can swap 1 of the cards in their fridge with 1 other card in the fridge of any player they choose. In this case the player may secretly look at the values of both cards before swapping them. The player can't cancel the action if they realize the movement is unfavorable to them.
Fred performs the Peek & Swap action so he takes 1 of his cards and 1 card of a player he chooses. He secretly looks at both cards and swaps their position.
Open a fridge (# 8): The player that performs this action can take a look at the value of 1 card in their fridge or the fridge of any other player.
Martha performs the Open a fridge action and chooses 1 card to look at in Fred's fridge, which she does secretly. Following this, she returns the card to the spot where it was.
NOTE: it is important that when revealing cards, you do so as quickly as possible so that all players get the chance to see the card at the same time.
Deep Clean Special Rule
Besides swapping cards with other players or with the discard pile, Dirty Fridge offers other ways of lowering the level of filth of your fridge. We call this rule the Deep Clean.
Every time a player reveals a card on the discard pile at the beginning of their turn, all players, including that player, may discard 1 card of matching value as the card revealed. To do so, a player will grab a card from their fridge or another player's fridge and immediately place it face up on the discard pile. However, only one player will be allowed to Deep Clean at a time, so players must race to be the fastest.
If the active player has grabbed the revealed card to swap it with a card from their fridge, the card will no longer be on the discard pile and therefore none of the other players will be allowed to Deep Clean. They're simply too late.
In his turn, Fred reveals the top card of the draw deck, which turns out to be a 6. Fred can now either swap the revealed card with a card from his fridge or perform the Blind Swap action. But Martha, who remembers that one of her cards is also a 6, and therefore of matching value as the card currently visible in the discard pile, quickly discards the card, beating the other players to it. Now Martha has only 3 cards left in her fridge and Fred may continue his turn.
Since a player may Deep Clean with a card from any fridge in the game, if the player uses a card from their own fridge, they will not replenish the card and will continue the game with 1 less card in their fridge. However, if the player Deep Cleans with a card from a fridge that belongs to an adversary, the player will replenish that card by handing that player 1 card of their own fridge.
If instead of discarding one of her cards, Martha had discarded one of Fred's, Martha would now hand 1 card from her fridge to Fred, who would have to place it in his fridge. Martha would continue the game with 3 cards in her fridge and Fred with 4.
You may only Deep Clean on a card that has been revealed from the draw deck. You may NOT Deep Clean on a card that has been placed on the discard pile after a swap. Furthermore, if a player starts their turn and before they perform an action another player Deep Cleans and therefore discards 1 card, the active player will then resume their turn in a normal fashion.
You Got the Wrong Card!
If a player discards a card that doesn't match the value of the card already on the discard pile, the card discarded is immediately returned to the fridge it came from, the player draws 1 new card from the deck and without looking at it, adds it to their fridge face down.
Fred tried to discard a 4 but made a mistake and placed a 2 on the discard pile, so he returns it to his fridge, draws 1 new card from the deck and adds it to his fridge without looking at its value. Fred will now continue the game with 5 cards in his fridge.
End of the Game
If a player believes to have the cleanest fridge (lowest filth value), during their turn they may call the game to an end. Instead of performing an action during their turn, that player will grab the Cleaning Cloth Card from the center of the table. Following this, all other players will get to play one last turn. Once the player that grabbed the Cleaning Cloth Card is up again, the game will come to an end and the scoring will take place.
The player with the cleanest fridge (lowest filth value) is proclaimed the winner. In case of a tie, the player that grabbed the Cleaning Cloth Card wins. If the tie persists, the player with the least number of cards in their fridge wins. What? You are still tied? Play another game!
Hints
Dirty Fridge is a dynamic game with lots of interaction, but in your first games it's possible for some players to get lost and forget the value of their cards. To prevent this from happening, we recommend you often perform the swap with the revealed card action. Although the swap won't always be favorable, it will allow you to obtain useful information from your cards.