· Brisca · 2–4 players
Brisca with my mother-in-law: a game you can teach in broken Spanish
Simple enough that I taught it in my broken Spanish to someone who only speaks Spanish, close enough that the games stayed even, and fun enough that we played about fifteen in a row.
At the table
- Players
- 2
- At the table
- Me and my mother-in-law
- Hands played
- 15
- Overall winner
- Pretty even
The ratings
- Fun
- Easy to learn
Played: Classic two-player Brisca
I sat down to play Brisca with my mother-in-law. My Spanish is maybe 60%, and broken at that. She only speaks Spanish. So the real question going in wasn't who would win — it was whether I could teach her the game at all.
How it went
It turned out to be simple. Brisca doesn't have much to explain: three cards each, a trump turned up under the stock, play one card, highest trump or highest card of the suit led takes the trick, draw back up to three. You don't have to follow suit, so there's no rule-lawyering about what you're allowed to play. A lot of it you can show with the cards instead of saying it.
We played with a proper Spanish deck, which took me a little getting used to. The suits are coins, cups, swords and clubs instead of the hearts, spades, diamonds and clubs I grew up with, and for the first few hands I had to stop and look twice at what I was holding.
It was a pretty even game. I believe she'd played something similar before, because once the rules clicked she didn't need any help. We just kept going — maybe fifteen games — and it was enjoyable the whole way through.
What I'd tell a first-timer
Tip · If you're teaching someone who speaks a different language, lean on the cards. Lay out the Ace and the Three, point, and count the points out loud — the game explains itself faster than the words do.
Would I play it again? Yes. It's a great game for when you share a table but not a whole language.
Want to play it yourself?
Here are the full Brisca rules, the variations and a printable cheat sheet.