Mille Bornes is a classic card game, published by Parker Brothers. The game simulates a car race, where you are trying to travel 1000 kilometers before your opponent can. It is traditionally played in two teams of two players.

In order to achieve this, you play milestone cards to travel 25, 50, 75, 100, or 200 miles at a time. However, there's a catch: Your opponents can play Hazards to slow you down. There are Five Hazards - Speed Limit, Stop, Accident, Flat Tire, and Out of Gas.

Each of the Hazards has a Remedy - something that fixes the problem. End of Limit fixes Speed Limit, Go fixes Stop, Repairs fixes Accident, Spare Tire fixes Flat Tire, and Gasoline fixes Out of Gas. In addition, after fixing Accident, Flat Tire, and Out of Gas, you also have to play a Go to get rolling again.

On top of this, there are 4 cards called Safeties. Each Safety fixes a Hazard, and protects you from that Hazard from being played on you again for the rest of the round. In addition, you can play a Safety in reaction to someone playing a Hazard on you, which prevents the Hazard from affecting you at all. This is called a Coup Fourre, which is French for counter-thrust. This earns extra points, and makes it your turn immediately. Right of Way prevents Speed Limit and Stop (And is considered the best card in the game), Extra Tank prevents Out of Gas, Puncture-Proof prevents Flat Tire, and Driving Ace prevents Accident.

Each round is played to 700 milestones in the 2-player game, or 1000 milestones in the 4-player game; in the 2-player game, if you're the first person to reach 700, you can elect to continue on to 1000 (called an Extension), and earn extra points. However, the Extension bonus is given to whoever reaches the 1000 mark first... you may end up giving your opponents some more points!

The total game is usually played in several rounds, to a final total of 5000 points. This can be done in as few as two rounds, but usually takes 4-6 rounds. There are also 3-player and 6-player rules, which are only slightly more complicated.

This is one of my favorite games, and I play it every time I go to a convention. My partner and I win quite a bit. =^_^=

A bit of history about Mille Bornes. It was originally invented in France by Edmond Dujardin, whose company still publishes it today. Mr. Dujardin was inspired by a similar game called Touring, originally published in 1906.

In Touring the game was scored in mileage (1,3,15,30). There was no safeties, nor Stop and Go. but many more things could happen 'Broken suspension', 'Out of oil', etc.

In the U.S. Parker Brothers licensed and translated Mille Bornes in 1962 and Touring was published from 1926 to 1975.

Source: University of Waterloo Elliott Avedon Museum and Archive of Games

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