Memoranda: an original card game by David Parlett

This was first published as a children's game in 1983 under the title Memini, which I have since come to think of as totally unmemorable. I did think of renaming it Casablanca, from the 1942 film with Wilson Dooley singing "You must remember this", but the connection seemed somewhat remote. Having next rejected the title Forget-me-not, I then thought of Memorandom, which I rather liked for its word-play. But, fearing people would merely think I couldn't spell, I finally went for the safe option. (I don't actually like memory games, but have forgotten why.)

Cards

Use two separate 52-card packs differing in back design or colour. One of these is the playing pack, the other the dealer's pack.

Deal

The dealer receives no cards but deals the playing pack around as far as it will go until everyone else has the same number of cards. If any remain undealt, leave them face down to one side.

Play

Everyone has about half a minute in which to memorise all their cards. When the dealer calls "Time!", the others lay their hand of cards face down on the table before them.

The dealer then turns the top card of the dealer's pack face up and clearly announces its identity. Whoever thinks the called card matches one of those they were dealt may claim it by announcing "Mine!". Then:

If exactly one person claims it, the dealer gives them the called card.
If no one claims it, the dealer adds it to a pile of unclaimed cards.
If more than one player claims it, the dealer adds it to a pile of disputed claims.

The second and all subsequent cards are then turned up one by one and the same procedure followed for each until all 52 cards have been rightly or wrongly claimed.

Score

When all the dealer's cards have been called, everyone turns up their original hand and scores 1 point for every card they correctly claimed as belonging to them.

For each card in the Dispute Pile that should have gone to them, they score p points, where p is the number of players including the dealer.

Any card they received that should not have gone to them (but did so because the true claimant failed to claim it) must be returned to the unclaimed pile.

Finally, the dealer scores p points for each card left in the unclaimed pile.

Game

The turn to deal passes to the left and a game fiinishes when everybody has dealt once. The winner is the player with the highest cumulated score.

Variations

You can, of course, vary the length of the packs according to the number taking part. With four very young players you may wish to reduce them to 40 and deal 10 cards each. With six you could add a red and a black Joker and deal nine each.