Overview
At a glance
Is this game right for my group?
ABG editorial scores on a 1–5 scale.
Easier to teach
High replayability
Highly interactive
Scales well
Light strategy
Luck-sensitive
How it plays
How does it play?
Climb a prickly-pear card stack as daring lemurs, use timely powers, and stop before a risky draw costs the round.
Core mechanisms
Key systems that shape the decisions players make.
Push Your Luck
Choose whether to secure current gains or risk them for a larger reward.
Hand Management
Time and sequence a limited hand of cards to preserve future options.
Ladder Climbing
Play increasingly strong combinations until opponents cannot or choose not to respond.
Take That
Use Take That as a recurring structure for player decisions and resolution.
Read the full game description
Mada is a quick push-your-luck card game about ring-tailed lemurs gathering prickly pears. On your turn, play a card equal to or higher than the current value, draw safely, or gamble by revealing the top card blind. Lemur, double-lemur, and scorpion cards bend the normal climb, creating sudden escapes and pointed setbacks. When a player cannot continue, that lemur scores nothing for the round while everyone else banks the top card of their stack. The game ends when someone has collected five scoring cards, rewarding players who know when a modest harvest is worth protecting.
