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28

A Kerala trick-taking card game played on your TV, with your phone as the controller.

  • 4 players
  • Multiplayer
  • Plays in the browser

28 (Twenty-Eight, also called Irupathiyettu) is the trick-taking card game played across Kerala and South India, for exactly four players in two teams of two, with partners sitting opposite. The table, the tricks and the scores are on the big screen; each player holds their cards on their own phone, so nobody sees your hand.

How to play 28

  1. The pack has 32 cards: Ace, King, Queen, Jack, 10, 9, 8 and 7 in four suits. In every suit the Jack is highest, then the 9, Ace, 10, King, Queen, 8 and 7. Jacks are worth 3 card points, nines 2, aces and tens 1 each: 28 card points in all.
  2. Everyone gets four cards and bids on them: how many card points your team will win. The first bidder must say at least 14. Each player in turn bids higher or passes, up to 28, and three passes in a row end the bidding. To bid over your own partner you must say 20 or more.
  3. The highest bidder chooses the trump suit in secret by hiding one of their four cards face down. Then everyone gets four more cards. Deal and play go round the table anticlockwise.
  4. Follow the suit that was led if you can; the highest card of that suit wins the trick, and the winner leads the next one. While the trump is hidden it has no power. A player who cannot follow suit may ask for the trump: it is turned face up and that player must play a trump if they have one. From then on the highest trump wins. Trump-suit cards played before it was shown do not count as trumps.
  5. While the trump is hidden, the bidder may not lead the trump suit unless they hold nothing else, and may not reveal it on a trick where someone else led that suit. If the hidden card is the only card the bidder has left, it is turned up and played.
  6. The bidding team needs at least as many card points as it bid. A bid of 14 to 19 wins 1 game point or loses 2; 20 to 24 wins 2 or loses 3; 25 to 28 wins 3 or loses 4. A hand stops as soon as its result is certain.
  7. The first team to 4 game points wins. Otherwise the team ahead when a hand ends after 6 minutes wins; a level game gets one more hand if it is not yet 7 minutes.
  8. Every turn has 20 seconds (8 seconds for a player who has let the clock run out twice in a row). If time runs out, the player passes (the first bidder opens at 14), the bidder hides the lowest card of their best suit, or the player plays the lowest card they may play. A player with only one card they may play plays it automatically.

Controls

Your phone shows only your own cards, with the ones you may play lit up. Tap a card to play it. To bid, set the number with minus and plus and tap Bid, or tap Pass. The bidder taps a card to hide it as the trump. An Ask for trump button appears when you cannot follow suit.

Tips

  • Bid on Jacks and nines: they are the highest cards and carry most of the points.
  • When your partner is sure to win a trick, give them a point card. When the other team is winning, throw your lowest card.
  • Ask for the trump when you hold a trump and the trick is worth winning.
  • Rules follow the standard game as described by John McLeod on pagat.com (Twenty-Eight). Left out: the second-round raise to 24, redeals, the pair (marriage), Thani (playing alone), doubling, and the six-player and 56 forms.

Start 28 in three steps

  1. Open play.codewithshamil.com on a TV or laptop and press Host a game.
  2. Connect each phone to the same WiFi and scan the QR code on the screen.
  3. The first player picks 28 from the menu on their phone.
Play 28

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