The Chinese climbing game where 2 is king: beat each play with a better single, pair, triple or poker hand, and go out first to keep your penalty count low.
Four players each play for themselves, with a standard 52-card deck and 13 cards each. Play goes anticlockwise.
Cards rank from 3, the lowest, up through ace, with the 2 highest of all. Between cards of the same rank the suits run diamonds, clubs, hearts, spades, from low to high.
The player holding the 3 of diamonds leads each deal with a play that includes it. Each player in turn must beat the last play with a better one of the same number of cards, or pass. Passing never stops you playing later in the same round. When everyone else passes, the last player clears the pile and leads anything.
Big Two is a climbing game that probably originated in coastal China around 1980. It became very popular in Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taiwan, the Philippines and Singapore, and it has since spread to some western countries.
It goes by many names. In Chinese it is Da Lao Er ('big old two') or Choh Dai Di, and in Taiwan it is also called Bu Bu Gao Sheng ('step by step rise higher'). In the Philippines it is Pusoy Dos, 'poker two', and in the English-speaking world Big Two, Big Deuce or Deuces. All of these refer to the fact that the 2 is the highest card rather than the lowest.
Almost no two descriptions of Big Two agree completely, and house rules vary widely. The rules here are the basic game as described by pagat.com, played over five deals with its penalty-point scoring.
Big Two is a free browser version of the traditional Chinese card game, with CPU opponents, a new daily deal every day and online leaderboards. There's nothing to download and no sign-up.