Lumina — Chase fireflies as long as you can remember how to get there

Memory games have been around for so long — those games where you flip up two cards and hope that they match. It’s a simple something that even children enjoy playing. Lumina is a board game that takes that simple idea and uses it for all of the game’s movement, making it  so much more than the normal memory game! 

In Lumina, you and up to three of your friends will be racing around the board, looking to collect fireflies who are currently fluttering around buildings. The lightning bugs come as circle tokens that sit on top of the buildings, which still show which buildings are there. The map has more than one of each building, but the glowing circled one will be where the fireflies hang out. There are a set number of fireflies out on the board at once, and each time one is collected, another is randomly added.

This means that everyone will be racing to the same limited number of points on the board. Movement in Lumina isn’t very straight-forward. Along the outside of the board, there are several face-down tiles. You will need to flip up to tiles that are exactly the same to have the option to move there — but even if you get two tiles that match, you’ll need a snaking path that leads to this building to continue onto it. If you are able to move because of a match then you can attempt another match.

This means that as the game goes on and all of the tiles are flipped up, you’ll start to really remember where items are. Soon, I found myself able to move around the map more easily, flipping several matches in a row as I wanted to make it further across the board. These long moves that end at a firefly’s feet feel really rewarding! Once you have completed your turn, all of the tiles are flipped back face down, waiting for the next person to use them to move around. 

Lumina is a great starter game for young families — with an age rating of five and up — as younger players can really enjoy the familiarity of a memory game, added with a bit of complexity as you move across the map.

You can purchase Lumina on Amazon.

Looking to get your friends or family into board games? Check out our list of great, accessible games, perfect for just that, here.