Connect 4 Card Game: Rules for How to Play

Setup

Shuffle the Mission cards. Deal two cards to each player face down. Players can look at their own Mission cards, but they shouldn’t show them to the other players.
Place the rest of the Mission cards face down in the middle of the table to form a draw pile.
Shuffle the Connect 4 tiles, and place them face down on the table to form a draw pile.
Take the top Connect 4 tile and flip it over. Place this tile in the middle of the table. This tile is the start tile.
The youngest player starts the game.

How to Play Connect 4 Card Game

To begin each of of your turns you will take the top Connect 4 tile and flip it over. You then have to decide where you want to place it on the table. When placing a tile it must be placed next to at least one tile placed on a previous turn. The tile must touch at least one side of another tile.

Placing a tile — The four tiles in the top left were placed correctly since they share at least one side with another tile. The tile in the bottom right corner was played incorrectly since it doesn’t share a side with another tile.

When choosing where you want to place a tile, you will look at your Mission cards. You are trying to recreate the pattern from one of your cards. There are three different types of patterns that you will try to create in the game.

Four in a row missions require you to get four circles in a row of the same color. You can get four in a row horizontally, vertically, or diagonally.

Some missions require you to get four circles of the same color in a square shape.

Completing a square Mission card — This player has a red square Mission card. On their turn they played a tile which created a square of four red circles. The player has completed their Mission card.

Finally some missions require you to get four circles of the same color in an L shape. The shape can be oriented in any direction.

Completing a L shape Mission card — This player played a tile which created a L shape with green circles. They have completed their green L shape Mission card.

If you complete a mission on your turn, reveal the completed Mission card to the other players and place it face up in front of you. You will then draw a new Mission card to add to your hand. You can only complete Mission cards on your own turn. If one of your missions is completed on another player’s turn, you do not get to set down the Mission card.

Some cards have a power-up printed on them. When you place one of these tiles, you can choose to take a special action on your turn. See the Power-Ups section below for more details.

After you have played a tile and potentially completed a Mission card, your turn ends. Play passes to the player on your left.

Power-Ups

When you play a tile card that has a power-up symbol on it, you can choose to take a special one-time extra action on your turn.

Should you play a tile with the above symbol (top right), you can choose any tile already played to the table that isn’t completely surrounded by other tiles. You can rotate the chosen tile in any direction you want.

When you reveal a tile with the above symbol (top left), you can place the tile on top of any other tile in play.

Tiles with the above symbol (top right) allow you to choose one tile in play and remove it from the table. You will place the tile you removed on the bottom of the draw pile.

If a circle is all four colors (bottom left), it is wild. Players can choose what color it is for the rest of the game.

Winning the Game

The first player to complete four Missions cards wins the game.

Winning Connect 4 Card Game — This player has completed four Mission cards. They have won the game.

Variant Rules

If you would like to tweak the gameplay, you could choose to use the following rules.

You can choose to play without using the specific Mission cards. If you complete four in a row (same color) horizontally, vertically, diagonally, in a square or a L shape; you will take one of the Mission cards to indicate you placed four circles in a row. The first player to collect four cards wins the game.

Another way to play the game would be to have each player have the Mission cards face up on the table. This allows the other players to see what missions you are trying to complete.

Finally you can play the Connect 4 Card Game where you draw two tiles at the start of each of your turns. You will choose one tile to play and you will return the other tile to the bottom of the draw pile.

Components

55 Connect 4 Tiles
24 Mission Cards
Instructions

Year: 2016 | Publisher: Hasbro | Designer: Richard Heayes

Genres: Card, Family, Tile Placement

Ages: 6+ | Number of Players: 2-4 | Length of Game: 15 minutes

Difficulty: Light | Strategy: Light | Luck: Moderate

For more board and card game rules/how to plays, check out our complete alphabetical list of card and board game rules posts.

Written By:

Eric Mortensen

Eric Mortensen is an owner and head writer on Geeky Hobbies since 2014. He is an avid board game player and collector with over 3,000 board and card games in his collection. Since 2014 he has written more than 1,100 board game how to play guides.