Up to 9 is the digital edition of a card game with rules all of its own — in the same family as Phase 10, but with a joker mechanic you won't find anywhere else. The game is a Norwegian hobby project, built by a single developer and shaped by the players who use it.
The game
The core is easy to explain and hard to put down: nine levels, each with its own contract to lay down, and a race to be the first through level 9. The twist that gives the game its own character is that all 2s and 3s are jokers — while still being playable as themselves. That sets up a constant tug-of-war between spending your jokers now and saving them, spiced up with donating, penalty points and the information hidden in every single discard. The rules are published here on the site in full.
The project
Up to 9 started as a question: can you take the card game off the table and make it just as good online? The answer turned into a complete online game:
- Play against friends, against bots in three difficulty levels, or a mix — up to six around the table.
- Live mode with a turn timer, or turn-based at your own pace; if you lose your connection, the game sits safely on the server.
- A leaderboard, achievements and skins (card backs and name frames) to unlock — purely cosmetic, never pay-to-win.
- A friends list, chat, spectator mode, an interactive tutorial and a practice mode.
- Norwegian and English, on mobile and desktop alike — installable as an app straight from the website.
The game is developed in close dialogue with its players: the in-game feedback button and the Discord server both get read, and many of the features — from smarter bots to a better mobile layout — were built directly on player suggestions. The news page shows how often something happens.
The technology (for the curious)
Under the hood runs a rules engine written in Go — deterministic and event-based, so every game can be verified move by move. The server pushes updates live over WebSocket, the data lives in PostgreSQL, and the client is built in TypeScript. You never see more than you're meant to: your opponents' hands exist only on the server.
The road ahead
Up to 9 is under active development. On the list: native mobile apps for the App Store and Google Play, more achievements and skins — and whatever the players come up with next. Got an idea, or found a bug? Let us know, or drop by the Discord.