The holidays can be a great time to gather the family and connect over some fun and games. In honor of National Card Playing Day on December 28, 2022, I thought I’d review some of our family favorites! Over Christmas, our family always gives and receives many board games and card games. This month we have enjoyed some tried-and-true classics and discovered some new, original card games that I am sure your family will love as well.
Sushi Go Party
We’ve loved Sushi Go for years, but Sushi Go Party is better for our bunch because you can play with up to eight people. This game designed by Phil Walker-Harding and created for Gamewright has a unique gameplay, but I’m also in love with the artwork by Nan Rangsima. Have you ever seen cuter, anime food?
Sushi Go is the first game that I ever played where your hand of cards continually passes! You select only one card from your hand before you pass the rest to the player on your left. Keep selecting cards from the hands as you pass them and hope that you can acquire the food collections that will earn you more points than your opponents!
Quiddler
For those word builders out there, Quiddler is a quicker game than Scrabble! If you’re a logophile, you may find it easier to persuade others to play this easy family card game. Although Scrabble tiles can be fun to manipulate, this is another card game that wins me over with artistic styling!
This game from Set Enterprises gives creation credit to Marsha Jean Falco. To play continue drawing and discarding letters on your turns until you can lay down your entire hand into completed words. Each round your total cards in hand increases. Players can earn extra points for longest word or most word played.
Blink
Blink is a game for the quick! This card game is simply a race between two players. The objective is to play through your entire hand before your opponent which is done by quickly matching and discarding your cards onto the discard piles. Cards can be matched by shape, color or number of shapes represented. As you can imagine, there are no turns taken, both players are just whipping through as many cards as possible.
Phase 10
Most of my readers will be familiar with Phase 10. This family card game sold by Mattel and created in 1982 by Kenneth Johnson turns Uno into a form of Rummy! Each player must complete his indicated phase before he advances to the next one. Miss out on phase completion during a round, and you’re stuck repeating it as your friends advance! But don’t worry. Sometimes people get hung up as the phases increase in difficulty, and you may be able to overtake your opponents and grab the win!
My opinion is that the game is much more fun if you have at least three people playing, but game time increases greatly as the number of players increases. With eight your game could last for hours.
Sabobatoge
My daughter had this on her Christmas wish list, but I admit that it was this video that sucked me in to purchase it! Once again, love the art! You can learn about the game and its creators here.
In this adorable card game, you create your own Boba shop using the menu card to guide you as you complete five drink sets. But at the same time, you are trying to sabotage the other players.
Doomlings
Both Doomlings and Sabobatage were developed during the pandemic and acquired production funding through Kickstarter. Brothers Justus and Andrew Meyer are responsible for developing this card game along with Eric McCoy and Chris Svehla. In Doomlings, you gain genetic characteristics as you draw and play cards. In each “age” or round, players have one turn to add to the traits they are laying down in front of them. Some cards you play have additional actions. The ages themselves have different consequences that apply to all players. Some ages are nice, some are catastrophes. And no one can foresee when the end of the world occurs and the game immediately concludes.
More adorable artwork.
Chronology
Although, I don’t have pictures, this was one of our favorite new card games! Although recommended for 2-8 players, it could easily be adapted to include more people simply by playing as teams. Chronology by Buffalo Games requires players to arrange cards (obviously) in chronological order. But when you play with team members it can be a lot of fun. And you don’t have to nail down an exact date, but simply place the event correctly in the timeline of cards you have before you.
Shuffle Grand Prix
Another fun card game we’ve discovered is Shuffle Grand Prix. In this game, you select your player with unique racing abilities and play distance cards to travel the furthest and fastest for the win.
Past Card Game Reviews
And I haven’t even mentioned some of our past family favorites! You can read about Dutch Blitz and Code Names in The Other Winter Games or Taco Goat Cheese Pizza, The Crew and Two Rooms and a Boom in Six Games I’ll Be Playing In 2022.
Have a wonderful National Card Playing Day! I’d love to hear your recommendations in the comments below! Did you try any of the games I’ve recommended? Be sure to comment and let me know your favorites.
