Ready Set Bet has players betting on horse racing in real-time.
Can anyone beat number 7?
You and your friends head to the races for a day of cheering, jeering, and betting on your favourite horses, whose fates hang on every roll of the dice.
Ready Set Bet Game Overview
Quick Rules Summary
A horse race plays out either by rolling dice and moving the relevant horse on a board, or letting an app do it all digitally for you.
Players have betting tokens they place on a board to place bets for the different numbered horses, their positions, as well as other more complicated options. Such as “Horse number 3 will beat finish a head of every blue horse” (for example)
When 3 horses cross a red line, about three-quarters of the way down the track no more bets can be made. When the race finishes, players gain money for all their winning bets and then lose money for their losing ones.
After each race, players get the choice of two special cards that give them their own ability or a way to earn extra winnings.
How do you win?
After 4 races, the player with the most money wins.
Main Mechanisms
Real-time betting of course. The horses move on a roll of 2D6 so obviously 7 has the lowest odds. But, the less likely the number, the further it moves if those numbers are rolled back to back. This can lead to exciting races.
USP
I know there are plenty of horse racing games but I have no idea how many are real-time. The app does a good job of rolling the dice, moving the horses and giving you a bit of commentary.
Theme
Yep, just a day at the races.
Setup
Lay out the board and fire up the app. Give each player their betting tokens. Each round, new cards are laid out at the top of the board and a new card is added to the bottom of the board. These give you extra ways to bet as mentioned earlier.
Components & Artwork
Everything is fairly standard with little to no art to speak of. The horses are ok but they stayed in the box as we used the app.
Ease of Teaching
This is easy to teach if everyone knows horse racing. Terms like Win, Place and Show don’t mean as much as 1st, 2nd and 3rd.
Similar Games
I know of a few horse racing games but I haven’t played any. I guess Downforce is the closest as a motor racing and betting game.
Ready Set Bet Review
Positives
A fun game that gets players on their feet and shouting.
The racing is really tense, especially if you’ve invested in one that’s near the finish line.
Negatives
The odds are the same for every race so it’s literally Number 7 vs the rest.
As the odds don’t change betting early is pretty pointless, other than to take that betting space before anyone else but it’s just a guess at that point.
The player cards are really unbalanced. One player had a very useful ability to bet after horses had crossed the red line, I had two that only paid out if 7 didn’t win which it mostly did.
Summary
As random as it is, it is a really fun game to play!
Jesta ThaRogue