Matthew BaileyToday we’re going to be looking at Nine Tiles Pokémon Dokoda! – more commonly known as Pokémon Nine Tiles. Nine Tiles has been a particular success story for Oink Games in Japan, but oddly, it’s never really caught on much in the West. And this version is no different – it’s a Japanese import. You can, however, get it from travelgames.co.uk.
The concept is super simple. You each get nine tiles, each featuring different Pokémon, and they’re all double-sided – but not in the same way. So a tile with Pikachu on one side might have a completely different Pokémon on the other, and no two “Pikachu” tiles are identical.
When the game starts, you draw a card that shows a 3×3 grid of Pokémon. Your job? To recreate that grid as fast as possible using your nine tiles. The catch is, you’ll often place down eight tiles and find your last one doesn’t have either of the Pokémon you need – cue frantic flipping and rearranging to make it all work before someone else gets there first!
You keep playing until all the cards are gone, and the player with the most cards wins. Or, if you’re like us and often play this in a restaurant while waiting for food, you just keep going and declare the winner as whoever has the most when the mains arrive.
It’s such a simple game, and it vaguely reminds me of Dobble in the way your brain starts to learn the patterns – but this has a lovely puzzle twist. On the surface, it looks like a light, throwaway game – and it is – but it’s also loads of fun. There’s a surprising bit of tactical thinking: how you lay out your tiles to start, which ones you place first, and how you deal with the chaos when your last tile isn’t cooperating. Sometimes you luck out, sometimes it’s a scramble – but that’s all part of the fun.
You can happily pick up the regular Nine Tiles in the UK, but this Pokémon edition is exclusive to Japan. Oddly, I actually find it easier to play – the Pokémon are really distinct, which helps when you’re matching at speed.
I’m a massive fan of Nine Tiles in general, but I really like this version in particular. The kids love it too – thanks to the Pokémon theme – and I’d 100% recommend grabbing a copy. The regular edition is widely available, but if you’re after the Pokémon version, you’ll need to head to Amazon Japan or travelgames.co.uk – both of which I’d definitely recommend.
If Pokémon isn’t your jam they also do Disney, Minions and Hello Kitty versions, again all Japanese imports.
It is currently out of stock on travelgames.co.uk but if you contact Ben he can get it fairly easily.
Disclaimer: Ben Davenward is a member of our community and I consider him a friend. I do, however, wholeheartedly recommend https://travel-games.co.uk/.
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Ambie Valdés
