Allan's Colorama

It’s fun. It’s challenging if you are bored with the standard 52-card deck. Allan’s Colorama’s curiously symmetrical deck is fun once you learn it. You can play Allan’s Colorama if you can match colors, even before you can count. People who can count can really play it and refine their addition skills. I like to play color rummy.

Allan’s Colorama is a 72-card deck based on numbered color pairs from 1 to 16. Some of the pairs have similar multiples, for example, the number “8” is represented by the pair “red and white” and the pair “orange and white.” There are 36 color pairs in the game, and there are two cards of each pair in the 72-card deck. The instructions are printed on a separate card included in the deck.

The deck is very friendly to the creation of new games. Traditional 52-card deck games can be adapted to the 72-card Allan’s Colorama deck.
There are 72 cards in the deck, all of which are available to play. 2 or more players. 4 or 5 max. Or you can play with 2 decks if you have more than 6 players. Dealer deals each player 6 cards. Place the rest of the cards in the middle. Turn one face up to the side, creating the discard pile. Player to the left of the dealer leads. Play goes clockwise. Player draws a card from the deck or takes one (or more) from the discard pile. Player must be able to play (lay down a scoring combination) if taking from the discard pile. Player must play the bottom card player takes. Player must then lay down a scoring combination or discard 1 card into discard pile, face up. Next player does the same: draw or pick from the discard pile. Lay down or discard. Object behind scoring combinations is: Lay down cards that add up to 17, or a straight of 3 or more cards, or 3 of a kind, or 4 of a kind, or 5 of a kind, or 6 of a kind. OR lay down a 6, a 7 and a 2. That’s called White Out and ends the hand. The other way to end the hand is to lay down a scoring combination and have no cards left in your hand. Players, at the end of the hand, score 5 points a card for each one laid down; minus 5 points a card left unplayed in the hand. Play to 200 or pick a total to play until. Scoring a White Out is worth 30 points. White Out occurs when 6+7=12, but only if you take away half of 2 (white). That’s the complicated part. You combine the 6 (blue and white) and the seven (black and white), but you take out the white, leaving blue and black. That’s 12. Half of 2 (brown and white) is white. So 6+7= 12 but only if you take the white out. TIP: 6’s and 7’s and 2’s are harder to come by than many cards, so it is best to hang on to them.