Several new card games have hit Kickstarter, and Tasty Minstrel Games has another pay what you want campaign that worked so well for them with Coin Age. There's an interesting mix of game companies and independent designers seeking funding, so here's a list of our favorite Kickstarter projects for January 2014.
Villages (Fridgecrisis Games) – An easy rummy style card game in which players draw cards to try and collect sets of three or more of the same color. Villages has fun 8-bit artwork and a competitive twist. You gain gold by laying down sets on your turn; however other players can try and steal cards from you by sending out attack cards, which you must then defend against.
Burgoo (Tasty Minstrel Games) – A new pay-what-you-want-campaign from Tasty Minstrel Games, Burgoo is a quick game for two to five players in which everyone plays chiefs, working together to make a stew. You win by putting the most ingredients into the stew and sampling it more times than the other players.
Four Tribes (Grey Gnome Games) – A two player game in which you attempt to supply villages with their needs in order to convince them to join you rather than your opponent. A free print-and-play version is currently available online and the designers are playtesting a four-player variant of the game.
Scribes Arena (Fredrick Chan) – A fun looking word guessing game with an unexpected fantasy twist, in Scribes Arena every player comes up with three separate words and then attempts to guess their opponents’. Spells and special abilities bring an added level of strategy to gameplay while still keeping the rules simple.
Choose Your Crew: Pirates (Kynan Hale) – In this card game, each player tries to build a crew of sixteen pirates. The first player to have a full crew wins the game. There are additional cards to help you sabotage other players as well as steal pirates from them such as a Kraken card and spiced rum. Players can also trade with each other — but be careful, because you might not always get what you were asking for.
DuCo (Game Salute) – To help import DuCo to the US, Game Salute is running a small-scale campaign for this matching game. Players score points by playing cards and attempting to match colors and shapes. The first player who scores fifty points wins. By allowing the players to rotate already placed cards and overlap edges, the game adds a new layer to gameplay.
Mischief Nights (Over Night Games) – Inspired by the card game The Great Dalmuti, in Mischief Nights players try to get rid of all their cards as fast as possible. Some cards have special abilities that can be played at the beginning of each new round. The player who goes out first is named the Pumpkin King for that round and gains tokens. After six rounds the player with the most tokens wins the game.
Full disclosure: unless otherwise noted, we have not seen or played any of the above games. Our assessment of each is based on the information given on the crowdfunding project page.
