Cortex Challenge – The Brain Party Game

Challenge yourself in a fun, quick-thinking game that will test your brain power to the max!

Race other players to be the first to match symbols, correctly remember all objects on a card or find the route out of the mazes, amongst many other tests.

Winning challenges allows you to add pieces to your all-important brain puzzle, which must be completed before your opponents in order to win the game! 

Cortex Challenge is sure to tax the mental abilities or players both young and old! 

We have been sent Cortex Challenge to review as part of Bloggers Board Game Club.

The box is a small compact size so its a great game to take on-the-go, the contents of the box:-

How to play Cortex Challenge

All players compete against each other using the 8 different tests that exercise different brain functions. Each player collects four of their brain pieces to hand, these will be the brain pieces to win throughout the game.

To set the game up, we lay the 10 Touch cards out, then we have a look and touch of them. The quality is great, there is an image on each card and each one you can feel and is quite alike to the real item. I.e. there is a rusty chain, you can rub your finger on it and it has a rough feel just like rust. These cards are really good and very high quality.

Next we shuffle the Test and Challenge cards and put them in one single stack face down. The type of test to come is displayed on the back of the cards so you can prepare yourself for a Challenge!

Tracking – Which entrances lead to the centre of the maze?

Analysis – What colour are the 4 bottle tops making a horizontal, vertical or diagonal row?

Observation – Which color is the faulty robot?

Unique – Which item is unique in colour or shape?

Multitasking – The back allocates a colour to each hand. With the correct hand, raise the number of gingers shown in the picture and at the same time say out loud the number shown in the bubble while striking the card with the other hand.

Touch Challenge – This card allows the player who has won the previous card to go for a Touch Challenge. The other players choose a card from the pack of 10 Touch Cards and hand it face down to the challenger. The player then had 10 seconds to recognise the texture using only their sense of touch.

Combination – Which of the three shapes will complete the star with the colours in the correct order?

Squares – How many squares are needed to fill the empty spaces?

The youngest player starts, so Jake turned over the top card on the pack revealing a maze, we look at the card and try to find the answer. When a player thinks that they have found the correct answer they place their hand over the card and give their answer. Players check the card to see if they are right.

If the player is correct they get to keep the card, if not they the remaining players have a chance to try again.

How to win Cortex Challenge game?

When a player wins a card they put it in front of them face down. A player may have no more than 4 cards at any one time. If the player wants to keep the card they have just won but already have 4, they must give one up. When a player has two cards of the same type (I.e. wins two of the maze challenges) they can then trade these two maze cards, for one brain piece.

Collecting four brain pieces will complete your game and you will be crowned the winner!