It’s kind of funny to say out loud that a game about silently sorting cards can be one of the most engaging things you’ll play all night, but here we are.

In Take Time, designed by Alexi Piovesan and Julien Prothière, and published by Libellud, you and your group are working together to organize the cards in your hands without speaking. In the centre of the table sits a clock, its minute hand pointing to one of several segments around the clock’s edge. On your turn, and without saying a word, you place one card face down into any segment. Once everyone has played all their cards, you flip everything over and count up the values in each segment, moving clockwise. To succeed, each segment has to be higher than the last, AND no segment can exceed a total value of 24.

Before each round, before anyone has even looked at their cards, there’s a brief window where you’re allowed to talk. You can discuss the puzzle ahead of you, throw out ideas, make loose plans. Maybe everyone agrees that a certain segment should aim for a specific value, or that everyone should prioritize a particular constraint by placing the perfect card into the right segment. It feels collaborative and clever, right up until the moment you pick up your cards and realize the plan falls apart instantly. Like, if one of the segments needs to have the lowest card in the game, and you decided that whoever has a 1 will go and place a 1 there, but no one has a 1 in their hand. So now you’re stuck in this silent standoff where nobody wants to be the first to break from the plan, and trying to figure out a way to communicate contingencies within the restrictive communication system. Maybe you’re holding a 3, it’s not impossible for a 3 to be the lowest card, but are there really no 1s or 2s out there? If you place your 3 somewhere else, are you dooming the round before it even starts?

There are small allowances for communication. Depending on the player count, you’ll be able to place three or four cards face up, giving your teammates just a sliver of information to work with. But for the most part, you’re left with nothing but instincts, vibes, and whatever shared understanding you’ve managed to build with the group. At its core, Take Time is about silently sorting cards together and hoping it all lines up. And it’s magical.

There’s a special kind of tension that builds in games like this, the kind that fans of The Mind or The Gang will recognize instantly. Everyone is locked into their own little world, staring at the information in their hand, trying to intuit what everyone else might be thinking, and then slowly, cautiously, committing to a play. When the last card hits the table, you’ll start the big reveal with bated breath. Sometimes your gambits work, and sometimes you fail together. But when it works, when everything lines up and the sequence holds, there’s this shared moment of disbelief that leads into euphoria. You didn’t communicate, not really, and yet somehow you managed to pass the test.

Take Time builds on the gameplay foundation of silently sorting cards in interesting ways. There are forty different clock configurations in the box, each one a new puzzle to overcome as they gradually introduce new constraints. Some might require specific values in certain segments, or restrict where your highest and lowest cards can go. Others might demand that only certain suits appear in particular sections, or that your first card be placed in a designated spot. As you move further in, the game starts to twist the formula in clever ways, even asking you to play your cards from left to right, adding a spatial element that feels reminiscent of games like Scout or Bohnanza.

There’s also a surprising amount of deduction at play. The deck is small, just twenty-four cards split between two suits. So information starts to emerge if you’re paying attention. If you see several high-value cards already revealed in one suit, and you know what’s in your own hand, you can start to piece together what might still be out there and where it’s likely to land. It’s subtle, but it gives you something to hold onto when everything else feels uncertain.

Which probably brings me to my biggest criticism of Take Time. If you play with dumb people, it’s going to be much, much harder. And I saw this as the dumb person at the table, I’m the fellow who plays trick taking games based wholly on vibes. The Crew is a challenge because I’m not counting the cards, I’m just doing what feels right in my soul, much to my companions’ consternation. Take Time feels slower, though. You’re only playing 3 or 4 cards each round, depending on your player count. This shrinking of responsibility does make me play smarter than The Crew, but I can certainly feel outclassed or that I feel like I’m missing what my friends are trying to tell me with their card placements.

Sometimes the challenges feel heavily dependent on the cards that you’re dealt. There are rounds that click into place naturally, and others that feel like an uphill battle from the start. There is a small mercy rule built in, though. If you fail, you’ll be allowed to have one more face up card the next time you attempt the same challenge. Sometimes you need all the help you can get, but sometimes you sail through challenge after challenge with nary a problem. There have definitely been lots of moments where even all the extra information the game can afford wasn’t enough to get us across the line.

But the highlight of Take Time, every time, is that reveal. The furrowed brows, the little sighs as people place their cards in what they perceive to be non-ideal locations. Then the collective pause and “Well, let’s see!” before everything flips. You count it out, one segment at a time, and sometimes, for a brief moment, it feels like it could go either way. When you had given up hope, but then a tricky segment passes muster, it feels incredible. When it doesn’t, Take Time is still compelling, but we’ve never ended a game night on a loss. A failure just means we HAVE to try again.

Take Time fits so neatly into the end of a game night. After finishing up something heavier, something loud or competitive, Take Time is a refreshful respite. It’s as simple as shuffling up a small deck of cards, pulling out the next clock challenge, and working together in near silence. It’s light without feeling trivial, and thoughtful without being demanding. As all good coop games do, it leaves you with a feeling that you worked together and achieved something.

And it doesn’t hurt that it looks great, too. The gold emboss on the cards is simply stunning.