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National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game: Rules and Instructions for How to Play

National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game: Rules and Instructions for How to Play

Objective of National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game

The objective of National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game is to create patterns in the Christmas lights that match your pattern cards.

Setup for National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game

  • Randomize the Light tiles and place them face down in a stack where all of the players can reach them.
  • Reveal two Light tiles and place them face-up next to one another in the middle of the table.
Starting Tiles in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game
  • Shuffle the red and green Pattern cards separately. Deal two red and one green card to each player. Players can look at their own cards, but should keep them secret from the other players.
Pattern Cards in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game
This player will have to create sets of lights that match the combinations at the top of these three cards.
  • Return the remaining Pattern cards to the box.
  • The youngest player starts the game.

Playing National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game

Starting with the first player and moving clockwise throughout the game, each player will take their turn. A player’s turn consists of two actions.

  1. Draw a Tile and Place It
  2. Score Pattern Cards

Drawing A Tile and Placing It

You will begin each of your turns by drawing one of the Light tiles. You will look at the tile that you drew and decide where you would like to place it.

Drawn Tile in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game
The current player has drawn this tile from the pile. They will decide where they will place it in relation to the other light tiles.

Normally you will play your Light tile next to one of the tiles already played to the table. You can play a tile anywhere as long as it touches another tile either vertically or horizontally. You may not play a tile if it only touches another tile diagonally.

There are a couple special Light tiles though that can be played a little differently.

+ Light Tile in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game

+ Tiles

+ tiles can be played like any other Light tile. They also have a special ability that allows you to play them on top of any tile already played to the table.

Playing A + Light Tile in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game
The current player decided to play the + Light tile on top of a tile already on the table.
Broken Wire Tile in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game

Broken Wire Tiles

Broken Wire tiles are played like any other Light tile (excluding + tiles). You can play it horizontally or vertically next to any other tile.

Broken Wire Tile Example
The current player played the Broken Wire tile. This will end the string where the wire is broken.

The one catch with a Broken Wire tile is that you don’t have to play it yourself. If you want to play the tile you can. Otherwise you can decide to pass it to one of the other players. The only restriction is that you can’t pass the Broken Wire tile to a player that already has one in front of them. If all of the other players already have a Broken Wire tile in front of them, you must play the tile.

The player that you pass the Broken Wire tile to has to play it on their next turn instead of drawing their own tile.

When you pass the Broken Wire tile to another player, you will draw a new tile to play yourself.

Scoring Pattern Cards

After you play a tile to the table, you will look at the Pattern cards in your hand. You are looking at the patterns on the top of the cards to see if you can find a matching pattern on the tiles played to the table.

If you have a card in your hand whose light combination exactly matches a combination of lights on the tiles in the middle of the table, you can score the card. The lights have to be in the exact same order as pictured on the card, and they need to be on the same light strand. You will place the Pattern card face up in front of you. If you have multiple cards that you can score on your turn, you can turn them all over on the same turn.

Completing a Three Light Pattern Card
For this Pattern card a chain of lights featuring a green, red/orange, and a purple light needs to be made. Above this card is a string of lights that would qualify.

You can score a Pattern card with the tile you just placed, or you can use tiles previously played to the table. You cannot score a Pattern card until you have played your Light tile though.

Completing A Four Light Pattern Card
To complete this card a set of lights need to include a purple, orange/red, blue, and yellow light. Above this card is a string of lights that fits the requirement of the card.

Winning National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game

The game will end when one of the players have scored all three of their Pattern cards (all of them are face up on the table). The player that completes all of their Pattern cards first, wins the game.

Winning National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game
This player has completed all three of their Pattern cards. They have won the game.

If all of the Light tiles have been played and no one has completed all three of their Pattern cards, the game goes to the tiebreaker. The player that scored/turned over the most Pattern cards wins the game. If there is still a tie and only one of the tied players completed their Pattern card with four lights, that player wins the game. Should the tie still not be broken, the tied players will share the victory.

Components for National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation Twinkling Lights Game

Year: 2020 | Publisher: Funko Games | Designer: Funko Games | Artist: NA

Genres: Family, Pattern Recognition, Tile Placement

Ages: 8+ | Number of Players: 2-4 | Length of Game: 20 minutes

Difficulty: Light | Strategy: Light-Moderate | Luck: Moderate

Components: 35 Light tiles, 14 Pattern cards, instructions

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