G@mebox author Ralf Togler writes about the game:

Far away from mankind there lives a nation named the Fehjenjhara high above the grounds in the luxuriant woods. These fantasy little people are living in the trees, nibbling sweet nectar, talking about the newest stories or courting with the Fehnjenjhara-woman, the fairies. But unfortunately these women are not very easy to be filled with enthusiasm, because they are very spoilt and demand a lot of surprises like feathers, mushrooms or beautiful stones to be mated.

In Feenbalz each player takes over the role of one Fehjenjhara-man and tries to impress as much fairies as possible by bringing them collections of stones, mushrooms and so on. At the beginning each player gets five cards with these presents. Five more cards are placed face-up in the middle of the table to form the drawing stock. On each card there is a symbol (the present) and a number, representing the value of the card. In addition to this each card has a specific colour. The aim of the game is to offer a fairy a collection of at least three presents (cards) with the same symbol (e.g. stones) or the same colour and to impress her more than all other players.

In their turns the players have the choice to draw two new cards (up to a hand of nine cards) or to exchange one card by symbol, colour or value with all other cards with the same characteristic in the stock. So if one player chooses to exchange one stone and there are three other stones in the middle of the table, he gets all three cards. Finally the player can begin a courting round.

If he feels strong enough he can declare to court and places a collection of his choice face-down on the table. Each player then has the chance to place a collection himself. When all players have made their choices a fairy is drawn and the value of each collection is determined (the values of each card are added up). Most fairies have special preferences and an aversion, thus giving some presents bonuses and other minuses. For example a fairy could hate stones (those presents then have a value of 0) and love especially green presents (this cards could get a bonus of 1). After all players declared the value of their collection, they have the choice to place more cards to improve the value of their collection (of course these cards must fit to the collection). At the end the player with the highest value wins the court and takes the fairy. All cards on the table are put aside and the game continues.

There are some collections and condition, which guarantee the winner of a court to get another fairy for free (for example if his collection is the only one and has a value of at least ten). Some other collections win the court automatically.

Depending on the number of players the game ends when one player gets his fifth or sixth fairy.

To increase the interaction between the players 10 more cards can be mixed up with the presents. These cards allow the player who draws one such card to do an action that normally is forbidden. For example there is a card to block a player in a courting round etc.

Feenbalz is a nice little game and more than an alternative to other card games. The game play is very fast and well balanced, even if the luck has a great influence in the game. Even if played without the 10 more cards, there is enough interaction to entertain you a whole evening. The design of the cards is sweet and funny, although I always thought fairies to be much prettier…. The game is also distributed by KRIMSUS KRIMSKRAMS KISTE, so there should be no greater problem to get a copy of it.