Have A Tongue-Slapping Good Time with Sticky Chameleons

Compete to be the fullest chameleon in the forest by beating your opponents to the plumpest insects.

Sticky Chameleons by IELLO features a unique game component in the form of sticky tongues that can be slapped out to capture thin cardboard tokens. But are these clever game pieces put to good use?

Gameplay

Each player takes a sticky tongue and the insect tokens are spread out in the center of the table. There are six different kinds of insects, each of which come in five different colors. There are also six wasp tiles.

Every round, two dice are rolled which will result in one color and one insect. This corresponds to which tile represents the plumpest insect this round. Players simultaneously race to use their sticky tongues to try to slap the plumpest insect and stick it to it. If you accidentally attach the tongue to other tokens, you can attempt to detach them by shaking them off without using your free hand. You do not have to detach them, but it might make another slap easier and you do not want wasps attached to your tongue.

If you manage to nab the plumpest insect, you must then use your free hand to detach it and place it back on the table (until the insect returns to the table, other players can try to use their sticky tongues to steal it). Once it hits the table again, the round immediately ends. You then receive a yummy token — unless a wasp token was also attached to your tongue when you captured the insect or when you placed it back down on the table. The first player to earn five yummy tokens wins the game.

Image provided by the publisher.

Review

Sticky Chameleons is an original, unique game. You are not going to find many others like it, and you’ll have a pretty good idea right off the bat what kind of game you are getting and whether it’s a good fit for you or your game group. It’s silly, it’s ridiculous, and it’s hilarious. There’s lots of humor value in slapping the sticky tongues around and trying to nab the right tile while avoiding the wasps, or waving the tongues in an attempt to detach tokens you don’t want.

The speed mechanic of racing against other players works well with the novel sticky tongue component, and is where much of the humor ends up lying. Trying to nab the plumpest insect off another player’s tongue or at least knock it off before they can use their hand to remove it and claim the point, is a fun addition to the rules as well, though perhaps one that is wisest to exclude if playing with children.

Gameplay is very fast, rounds quick, and the game is quite easy to set up and teach. It is worth noting, however, that you want a bit of space to play the game, and to be sure there’s nothing nearby to break if pieces go flying.

It has colorful artwork and an enjoyable theme and the components work well. The rulebook does advise you to wash the tongues after each gameplay however, which is a bit annoying and adds time to tear down.

Sticky Chameleons is absurdly enjoyable and something different. If you think it sounds like a good time, then you will probably enjoy it. It’s original, it’s clever, and great for the whole family.

Pros: Original, ridiculously fun, well executed components

Cons: Need to wash the tongues after each playthrough, you’ll need the right space to play

Disclosure: we received a complimentary review copy of this game.