Tally Up! Review: Flip 7 With Dice?

🔢 Tally Up! |🧥 Designer: Eric Olsen | 🏢 Publisher Messy Tables Games

👥 2+ players | ⏳ ~20 minutes | 🎲 Push your luck, dice, simultaneous play

Some people describe Tally Up! as Flip 7 with dice, and I get it. They’re both simple push your luck games where you’re deciding how greedy you want to be. In Tally Up! You decide to be either IN or OUT, but you’re still invested in every roll. Everyone plays at the same time. If you’re OUT, you’re probably hoping everyone else busts. If a Tally Up! shows up, suddenly you’re screaming because you want to be the first person to claim it 😂

There’s no waiting. If you grew up playing Left Right Center, Farkle or Yahtzee, like push your luck, I think you’ll get what Tally Up! is going for

⚠️ Disclosure: I playtested and wrote the rules for this game.

This is my honest review. We do not accept compensation for our opinions or recommendations

🎲 My Experience

Tally Up! went through a few iterations during play testing, and one of my favorite parts was getting to teach the game to friends as it evolved. In the last iteration before it went to print, I met up with six friends at a wine bar to play. We were having so much fun that we actually got told to quiet down. It's probably one of the best compliments a game can get. It doesn't matter if you are shy, if you get into it, you'll get loud. The comment from the bar manager was entertaining. It wasn't only please settle down, it was, what is this game you are having so much fun with and where can I get it?

🎮 HOW TO PLAY

1️⃣ Secret choice: choose IN or OUT and reveal your tokens at the same time

2️⃣ Roll: the dealer rolls 3 Tally Dice for the whole table

3️⃣ Resolve: add points to the running total.

• If two stars show up, everyone still IN busts and gets zero for the round

• Up Die: if a circled number appears, the Up Die is rolled. It can double the total or hit you with a penalty

Note: If at any point three stars show up on your first roll, whoever screams Tally Up! first earns 200 points. Everyone else still IN, scores 100 points

The biggest appeal here is that everyone plays at the same time. Even though one person is acting as the dealer and rolling the dice, they are rolling for the whole table. There is absolutely no downtime. The question is always the same: How far are you willing to push your luck before you bust?

🏆 HOW TO WIN

The player with 2,500 points or the most points wins. If the game seems too long, you can always shorten the total points. You can also play one round where every player acts as the dealer once and the player with the most points wins. We've had this backfire and end up with less than 500 points, but we have also had marathon rolls, where someone scores 2,500 or more points in one round

PROS

⚡ Zero downtime

🥫 It comes in a tin box!

🎲 Simple yet addicting

🎓 Easy to learn and play

👜 Pocket-sized perfection

🗺️ Language independent

CONSIDERATIONS

🤯 Can get loud and rowdy

📉 Busting can be brutal

CONSIDERATIONS

Tally Up! is a really fun push your luck game, but what I like most is that everyone is watching the same roll and hoping it goes their way. It has that same thing I love about Flip 7, where even when it isn’t technically your turn, you’re still paying attention. I may be biased; I got to play it with friends, and watch it become the game it is now. I’ve had a lot of fun with it along the way, and I’m still happy to pull it out. I really like the tin. It's small enough to fit in a purse or pocket!

If You Like the Sound of Tally Up!

One of my favorite things about reviewing games is figuring out where they fit. Tally Up! is a simple push your luck game where everyone is watching the same roll, so here are a few places I’d go from there:

• If you want more push your luck: MLEM: Space Agency – send cats into space, decide when to bail, use a lot of puns, and hope everyone else pushes their luck a little too far

• If you want something in between: Deep Sea Adventure – dive for treasure and decide how deep you’re willing to go before turning around. The farther you go, the harder it is to make it back (I recommend this one exclusively at six players)

• If you want more strategy: The Quacks of Quedlinburg – brew potions by pulling ingredients from your bag, and try not to explode. Decide when to stop, then use your winnings to buy better ingredients for the next round