Mermaid Rain

About this board game

Mermaid Rain is a Japanese board game for 3–6 players that takes about 45 minutes to play. Across five rounds, players move their mermaids around the sea, collecting five different types of goods while competing for the most victory points.

Each round begins with the surf predicting phase. Players simultaneously select cards from their hands to create poker-style combinations, using up to five cards or choosing a pass card to sit out for the rest of the round. These melds provide bonuses, such as victory points or special powers, while their ranking determines player order.

In order, players select a face-up sea tile. The tiles have different shapes and one of three suits, or a wild suit, and are then placed on the board during the surf riding phase. Players use some or all of their remaining cards to move their mermaids across matching tiles and spaces.

• Select and place wave tiles on the sea board.
• Use cards to move between matching spaces.
• Explore islands and collect face-down goods tokens.
• Build collections of goods for end-game points.

Whenever a mermaid reaches an island with tokens, the player looks at the face-down tokens and adds one to their collection. At the end of each round, darker-colored sea tiles are removed, displacing any mermaids on them to an unoccupied starting location of their owner’s choice. Players then receive new cards, with a maximum hand size of nine.

After five rounds, each player must discard one token of each symbol or lose five victory points for every missing symbol. Players then score their collections, with rarer tiles and larger sets earning more points. With language-independent or easily decipherable components and English rules, Mermaid Rain offers a distinctive blend of card melds, shifting sea tiles, movement, and set collection.