SNAP Review – CDSK

[Andrew] You know how sometimes self-help guides sometimes tell you to bet on yourself? Well, it turns out there’s a trivia game that lets you do just that, and it’s great for family play. It’s called CDSK.

Game

[Anitra] This is a SNAP review for CDSK.

CDSK is a trivia game for 2-4 teams, published by Randolph and brought to the USA by Hachette.

The rules say you can play the “classic game” in “approximately 47 minutes” or the short game in “around 21 minutes”.

Art

[Andrew] Let’s talk about the art in CDSK. It’s a trivia game, and it really doesn’t need art, other than indicating the spaces on the board, I guess.

[Anitra] There are four major categories of questions – we’ll talk about those in a minute – and Fanny Saulnier ran with those major categories, putting emblematic artwork on every single spot along the path on the board. There’s tons of fun designs here.

[Andrew] There’s really no significant art on the cards, though. And there’s nothing at all on the player pawns – because you have to provide those for yourself! (Yes you do!)

Mechanics – How to Play

What are the mechanics here?

So, CDSK is just an initialism. The four major categories of questions in the game are:

• C – Curious – Very precise or bizarre subjects, like Parrots, Al Capone, and Barbie dolls.
• D – Delightful – This is like movies, music, sports, and pop culture.
• S – Seasoned – Grown up stuff! Weddings, and anniversaries, and gardening, and stuff.
• K – Knowledge – Science, nature, history, geography, school stuff.
• There’s also Challenge cards and Hurry Up & Win cards.

[Andrew] On your team’s turn, a player to your left will draw a card from the same category as the space you’re on, and read out the subject.

[Anitra] We’re on D, and this says “On a scale of 1 to 10, how well do you know Christmas Movies?”

[Andrew] Your team gives a ranking of how well you know that subject, between one and ten. I’m going to go with three. Then the other person reads out the question associated with that number.

[Anitra] Three says, “What is the name of the green character who stole Christmas from the Whos in Who-ville?”

[Andrew] If your team answers correctly (like “The Grinch”), they move as many spaces as the number you chose.

[Anitra] If you answer incorrectly, you don’t move.

[Andrew] If you’re on a challenge space, you’ll be answering a Challenge card – which may have a single question with a multi-part answer or several small questions.

[Anitra] For example, how many non-Simpsons yellow characters can you name?

[Andrew] This is so much harder than you think it is!

[Anitra] Either way, you do the best you can in 45 seconds or less, then move some number of spaces, indicated on the card.

[Andrew] Once you get to the end of the path, you’re in Hurry Up & Win territory. If you can answer this question correctly, your team immediately wins the game.

Expectations

[Andrew] Anitra, what did we expect from CDSK?

[Anitra] The name of the game is strange, and it doesn’t give much idea of what kinds of questions you’re going to be answering. The box looks kind of fun though.

I like the idea of using “on a scale of 1 to 10” to express your confidence in how well you know a subject.

[Andrew] I’ve seen games like this before where you pick the difficulty of a question – We reviewed a game called CAMP a long time ago that worked kind of like this. It seemed to work well in theory for different ages playing the same game in a family, but in practice, it just wasn’t really enough.

Surprises

[Anitra] So were you surprised about how it worked here?

[Andrew] Yes! Those games had a lot fewer options for difficulty and for subjects, and in this game there are so many – over 2500 questions – that it worked a lot more seamlessly. When we played, we paired a parent with a child when the kids were involved and that definitely helped.

But there were other times when, because of the way all the different subjects worked, we’d know we would get something, and we’d be like, “other people are going to know this, but I’m not, so I’m going to choose a lower number.”

[Anitra] This game makes me feel good about myself. Even when I don’t know much about a subject, questions one and two are still usually do-able. Like if it’s an NHL question it’s going to be like “What do the letters NHL stand for?” or something like that.

When I do know a lot, I can show off. The rest of the time, you can balance how confident you feel with how far you want to go on the board, and bump it up or down just a little bit. I think most people are going to stay between four and six most of the time.

[Andrew] I do think it’s weird that we have to provide our own pawns. But it kind of fits with the casual, low-key, flexible nature of this game. You just grab whatever is handy, paperclips or something, and use that to represent your team.

[Anitra] Because there aren’t pawns and things like that provided, you really could play this with any number of teams – but more than four teams means waiting a long time for your turn, so maybe make the teams a little larger instead.

[Andrew] Family trivia games have come a long way since our parents were playing Trivial Pursuit. CDSK adds a difficulty setting that changes with every question, which is cool! Plus, it’s got a wide variety, and we appreciate that it doesn’t take itself too seriously. Kind of like us.

Recommended

We recommend CDSK for gatherings of family and friends, maybe as a nice post-dinner, pre-dessert activity at your holiday gathering. It’s best for teens and adults, but younger kids can certainly join on teams. We had a great time with our family.

We’re going to rate CDSK 3½ questions out of 5.

And that’s CDSK in a SNAP!

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The Family Gamers received a copy of CDSK from Hachettte for this review.

This post contains affiliate links, which do not change your price, but help support The Family Gamers.

SNAP review music is Avalanche, provided courtesy of You Bred Raptors?