How to Play

Blackout: Hong Kong

1-4 players 75-150 min 7.4 Board Game Geek Rating

Players navigate Hong Kong during a city-wide power outage, working to prevent complete societal collapse. You'll coordinate specialists and manage fluctuating resources to restore stability across the darkened metropolis. Victory belongs to whoever most effectively rebuilds order from chaos, ultimately securing leadership in the post-disaster city while outmaneuvering competing factions.

Published 2018

Blackout: Hong Kong

Get Ready

Setup the game with these step-by-step instructions before diving into your turn.

1
Prepare scout tiles
Shuffle the 48 scout tiles and place a stack of 3 face-down in each of the 16 districts on the board
2
Create objective deck
Shuffle the 72 objective cards and form a Reserve deck (36/21/15 cards for 2/3/4 players), setting Reserves aside
3
Display objective cards
From the Draw deck, deal 9 cards face-up into 3 rows to the right of the board
4
Choose player color
Pick a color, put score disc on '0' of the score track, and put 1 cube on the battery icon on the board
5
Take player components
Take 1 player board, dice distribution card, 5 transport tokens, and 4 HK Dollars
6
Place houses
Place your 5 houses on the checkmark spots on the left side of your player board
7
Set markers
Put 1 0-6 marker and 1 locked marker on their designated player board spots
8
Draw starting volunteers
Shuffle starting volunteer cards (marked with symbol) and place 2 face-up on objective spots of player board
9
Get emergency plan
Place 1 random emergency plan card face-up on your player board
10
Organize player cards
Take your 12 player cards marked with your color symbol
11
Determine start player
Give start player the purple marker and 3 resource dice
12
Initial cube placement
Counterclockwise from start player, each player places 1 cube on an empty colored circle on the map

On Your Turn

What you can do during your turn.

1
Roll resource dice
Roll all dice, re-rolling any matching dice until all show different results, then place on rondel spots
2
Plan your cards
Put up to 1 card face-down on each slot at bottom of player board (4th slot available after unlocking)
3
Activate volunteer cards
Procure resources where the die color sits by placing 1 cube on that rondel space
4
Use transport tokens
Spend token(s) to move 1 space left or right from die position for each token spent (die stays in place)
5
Activate specialists
Receive money, VP, and/or optionally pay resources to perform special actions
6
Complete objectives
Optionally complete any objectives including Emergency plans and Restore Power goals
7
Pay resources
Resources are paid from rondel (battery substitutes for any resource)
8
Meet card slot requirements
Cards in any order from same slot satisfy requirements without being moved
9
Verify scout tiles
Scout tiles must be owned to qualify but are not spent when used
10
Check crisis routes
Routes must be connected by your cubes including both endpoints
11
Move completed cards
Card icon shows destination: hand symbol = your hand, other symbol = left of player board
12
Gain immediate effects
VP symbol = gain VP, dollar symbol = gain money, colored circle = place cube on that/any color
13
Place cubes on map
Must place on specified color adjacent to existing cubes, or pay 1 transport token per skipped location
14
Handle multi-goal cards
Complete goals in any order; place cube on immediate effect when taken; choose to complete after 1st goal or continue
15
Score Restore Power
Complete to gain +10 VP and place 0-6 marker or remove locked marker from player board
16
Choose district
Select a district next to 1+ of your cubes that has scout tiles
17
View tiles
Look at tiles privately if face-down, then optionally choose 1 to fulfill
18
Form search team
Use at least 1 card from hand plus any combination meeting the challenge's search icon requirement
19
Collect scout tile
Place face-up in player area; if duplicate reward type, flip face-down instead for permanent icon
20
Send to hospital
Randomly send 1 search team card face-up to hospital
21
Probe option
Alternatively, use 4 search icons to place lowest value simple challenge tile face-down without taking reward
22
Purchase cards
In turn order, pass or buy 1 card until everyone passes consecutively
23
Pay for cards
Pay $4/$3/$2 for cards in rows with 3/2/1 cards respectively
24
Place new objectives
Put purchased card in open objective slot (3 maximum)
25
Refill empty rows
When a row empties, immediately refill with 3 new cards from Draw deck
26
Discard row cards
Remove rightmost card from each of the 3 card rows (refill empty rows)
27
Sell food cubes
Must sell remaining food cubes for $2 each
28
Sell water cubes
Must sell water cubes for 1 GPS per pair or $1 each cube
29
Discard objective
May choose to discard 1 incomplete objective card from player board
30
Check secured districts
Process any districts now surrounded by one player's cubes
31
Place house
Each securing player places 1 house in the district (use cube if no houses remain)
32
Remove scout tiles
Remove any remaining scout tiles from secured districts to box
33
Score for all players
Each player scores VP based on their cubes surrounding district (1-2/3/4/5/6/7 cubes = 2/3/5/7/10/14 VP)
34
Check hand size
May refresh hand if you have 4 or fewer cards (6 or fewer with completed objective)
35
Return cards
Return slot with most cards to your hand (choice if tied)
36
Execute checkmark actions
May perform actions from board/checkmark area

Winning

How to claim victory.

1
Trigger end game
When the Draw deck runs out, finish the current round using Reserve deck as needed, then play 1 final round
2
Sell resources
Convert all resources on rondel to $1 each regardless of type
3
Convert money
Exchange each $5 for +1 VP
4
Score scout tiles
Score points for face-up scout tiles (1-2/3/4/5/6/7 tiles = 2/3/5/7/10/14 VP)
5
Score cards
Each card in hand and each card in slots scores VP shown in upper right corner (cards in hospital and incomplete objectives do not score)
6
Determine winner
Most VP wins; tiebreaker is most money

watch & Learn

Let the pros teach you with these top videos.

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FULL rules

Looking for the full details? Grab the complete rulebook as a downloadable PDF.

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