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Jambo

#12002BGG ↗

2004 · 2-2 players · 45min · weight 2.08 · 8,452 ratings

v2 v3

BGG raw

ID
12002
Name
Jambo
Year
2004
Rank
559
Min players
2
Max players
2
Playing time
45
Min playtime
45
Max playtime
45
Avg weight
2.0756
Num weights
820
Bayes avg
6.64779
Average
6.98425
Users rated
8452
Num owned
10708
Wanting
339
Wishing
1576
Num comments
2653
Fetched at
Sat Apr 25 2026 16:16:03 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time)
Mechanisms (6)
Action PointsContractsHand ManagementRaceSet CollectionTake That
Categories (2)
Card GameEconomic
Description (1594 chars)

From the back of the box (edited for grammar): "Jambo is the friendly greeting Swahili traders offered their customers in Central Africa before colonization. The players are traders in this day, competing to be the first to earn 60 gold by buying and selling tea, hide, fruits, salt, silk, and trinkets. The game is played with cards that allow players to buy and sell goods, help you or hinder your opponent, and others that add a bit of spice to the game. Return to the dark continent where the players alternate turns with up to 5 actions each until one player reaches the goal and wins the game." Original description from Games4You. Players take on the role of merchants offering their wares from market stands. On a player's turn, he has five actions to choose from. Actions can be used to draw cards, play cards, and activate buildup cards. In order to sell wares, the merchants must first lay the wares out, since customers will only buy where all the wares they want are being offered. And since market space is at a premium, players have to think hard about which wares to offer. By owning important buildup cards and properly using the assets of other village inhabitants, the merchants succeed in attracting especially many customers to their stalls, making bargain buys, and messing with their opponents' plans. The first player to reach a set cash level through buying and selling of wares is the winner. The game's attraction lies with the many special cards. Many different combinations are possible during the game, and each game plays out differently as a result.

LLM v2 (wide)

Core verb
spend action point, play card
Decision shape
combinatorial
Reward schedule
mixed:immediate+engine_compounding
Aesthetics
["Challenge", "Expression"]
Core loop pitch
Spend five action points to draw, play, and resolve market cards that buy and sell wares for cash.
Translation difficulty
Easy
Difficulty reason
Two-player card game with deterministic actions and clean state ports easily, but no official digital adaptation exists despite the simple rules surface.
Direct digital port
Port kind
Closest loop translation
none yet
Primitive tags
["five_action_points_per_turn", "buy_low_sell_high_cards", "two_player_duel_economy", "take_that_disruption_cards", "race_to_threshold_cash"]
Confidence
0.7
Extracted at
Mon Apr 27 2026 11:40:03 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time)
Raw v2 JSON (917 chars)
{
  "game_id": 12002,
  "name": "Jambo",
  "core_verb": "spend action point, play card",
  "decision_shape": "combinatorial",
  "reward_schedule": "mixed:immediate+engine_compounding",
  "aesthetics": [
    "Challenge",
    "Expression"
  ],
  "core_loop_pitch": "Spend five action points to draw, play, and resolve market cards that buy and sell wares for cash.",
  "mobile_translation_difficulty": "Easy",
  "translation_difficulty_reason": "Two-player card game with deterministic actions and clean state ports easily, but no official digital adaptation exists despite the simple rules surface.",
  "direct_digital_port": null,
  "direct_digital_port_kind": null,
  "closest_loop_translation": "none yet",
  "primitive_tags": [
    "five_action_points_per_turn",
    "buy_low_sell_high_cards",
    "two_player_duel_economy",
    "take_that_disruption_cards",
    "race_to_threshold_cash"
  ],
  "confidence": 0.7
}

LLM v3 (deep)

Not yet enriched at v3 (deep pass).