A couple of weeks ago I was invited down to The London by a friend of mine to help out with playtesting an expansion to the Hotness that is Cards Against Humanity. I'll come straight out with it – I know that it's not a game for everyone, but if you have a group of friends who share an awful sense of humour, this should be a part of your collection. Originally launched back in 2009 and funded via Kickstarter, CAH is a party game unlike any other; it's dirty, vile, horrifying... and downright brilliant.
If you were to look back into CAH's family tree you'd see its gameplay is well rooted in the traditional. Born from the same idea as the clasic Apples to Apples, it's a game about knowing your audience and understanding what they're about. In Apples to Apples, players take turns in drawing a green card that shows an adjective; you'll often find things along the lines of "scary" or "exciting", that kind of thing. Everyone else then chooses a red card from their hands, all of which have the names of things, places, people and such. These are submitted secretly to the first player who then judges them, choosing a favourite that is (hopefully) funny.
Cards Against Humanity takes this as a starting point, kicks it in the balls, vomits on it, then steals its lunch. While the basic idea is the same – one player chooses a fitting card from all those submitted – everything gets very dark very quickly. Rather than single words that will hopefully inspire your fellow players, CAH comes with a stack of Black Cards that pose questions or ask you to fill in the blanks. Questions along the lines of "Why am I sticky?" or "What's that smell?" that can only be answered by handing over White Cards with answers like "Peanut Butter Jelly Time" or "The Amish".
Yeah... you get where I'm coming from. This isn't a game to play with the children. Well, not unless your children are truly awful / amazing* [delete where applicable]
It's puerile in the extreme, filled with gross-out humour but dotted with the occasional explosion of discussion inspired by a particular card combination. In a recent game, we ended up with Quiche being played in response to "What is my superpower?" - cue a twenty minute extravaganza about whether it would be better if your ability was to always be able to make an amazing quiche or you were able to fire bolts of it from your fingertips. Naturally, being incredibly dumb people, we decided that blasting it from your hands would be best the proceeded to work out precisely how it could be possible.
The winning selection takes the Black Card for that round, counting towards their total of Awesome Points. There are no actual rules as to who wins – that's entirely down to you and your friends – so you could use CAH as a quick filler or potentially play until the deck runs out; the choice is yours. I find that it's best to play shorter games, maybe around half an hour or so, just so people's brains aren't too overcome with filth. Plus it means the element of surprise with new cards stays around that little bit longer!
Like I mentioned earlier, you really need to have the right bunch with you to play CAH. It works particularly well with larger groups, hence the Party Game tag, but it's perfectly playable if there's only a few of you. In fact, the rules even provide a way of getting around this; introduce the chance element of a fictional player called Rando Calrissian where during each turn an extra White Card is submitted from the top of the deck. You'd be surprised how many times old Rando manages to win...
Admittedly with it being a product developed by a bunch of guys from the United States there's going to be a LOT of American references in there. While most of them are understandable, it's true that some of the hmour just doesn't translate. With plenty of jabs at conservative (small c!) politicians and the likes of Fox News coming in for plenty of stick, it's a good job that you're always allowed to discard anything from your hand that you don't quite get. Of course, this leaves you open to mockery from your fellow players (it's allowed, it's even in the rules!) but you can play on, safe in the knowledge that you're a better person than them. There's already a Canadian expansion pack available with plans in motion for a British version too, so you won't feel stupid for too long.
Getting your hands on a copy of CAH can prove tricky; although their print runs are growing every time, copies get snapped up in the space of hours so you're best off signing up for notifications on their email list. In the meantime, benevolent devils that they are, you can always put together your own print and play version thanks to the team embracing Creative Commons and offering the game entirely free. Visit cardsagainsthumanity.com and get ready to fire up your printer, but be warned – you WILL end up wanting the boxed version, if only to support the developers that little bit more.
A quick story about them. Just before Christmas they released a festive themed expansion for the US and Canada only on a "pay what you like" basis. In a matter of days they'd sold 85,000 copies of the new set and could've walked out with a tidy profit of a shade over $70,000. No-one would've begrudged them – like I've said, it's a great game and they deserve all the success they achieve – but what did they do with the money?
They handed every single cent over to the Wikimedia Foundation, the group that runs Wikipedia. Awesome.
Despite the fact that many will find Cards Against Humanity an utterly unplayable festival of disgustiness, it's a fantastic game created by Some Officially Good People. If the thought of Kanye West's daddy issues or a raptor attacking your genitals even raises a smile, you owe it to yourself to at least give it a try. You may not want to admit it but this Card Game for Horrible People (TM) could be your next guilty pleasure.
If you were to look back into CAH's family tree you'd see its gameplay is well rooted in the traditional. Born from the same idea as the clasic Apples to Apples, it's a game about knowing your audience and understanding what they're about. In Apples to Apples, players take turns in drawing a green card that shows an adjective; you'll often find things along the lines of "scary" or "exciting", that kind of thing. Everyone else then chooses a red card from their hands, all of which have the names of things, places, people and such. These are submitted secretly to the first player who then judges them, choosing a favourite that is (hopefully) funny.
Cards Against Humanity takes this as a starting point, kicks it in the balls, vomits on it, then steals its lunch. While the basic idea is the same – one player chooses a fitting card from all those submitted – everything gets very dark very quickly. Rather than single words that will hopefully inspire your fellow players, CAH comes with a stack of Black Cards that pose questions or ask you to fill in the blanks. Questions along the lines of "Why am I sticky?" or "What's that smell?" that can only be answered by handing over White Cards with answers like "Peanut Butter Jelly Time" or "The Amish".
Yeah... you get where I'm coming from. This isn't a game to play with the children. Well, not unless your children are truly awful / amazing* [delete where applicable]
It's puerile in the extreme, filled with gross-out humour but dotted with the occasional explosion of discussion inspired by a particular card combination. In a recent game, we ended up with Quiche being played in response to "What is my superpower?" - cue a twenty minute extravaganza about whether it would be better if your ability was to always be able to make an amazing quiche or you were able to fire bolts of it from your fingertips. Naturally, being incredibly dumb people, we decided that blasting it from your hands would be best the proceeded to work out precisely how it could be possible.
The winning selection takes the Black Card for that round, counting towards their total of Awesome Points. There are no actual rules as to who wins – that's entirely down to you and your friends – so you could use CAH as a quick filler or potentially play until the deck runs out; the choice is yours. I find that it's best to play shorter games, maybe around half an hour or so, just so people's brains aren't too overcome with filth. Plus it means the element of surprise with new cards stays around that little bit longer!
Like I mentioned earlier, you really need to have the right bunch with you to play CAH. It works particularly well with larger groups, hence the Party Game tag, but it's perfectly playable if there's only a few of you. In fact, the rules even provide a way of getting around this; introduce the chance element of a fictional player called Rando Calrissian where during each turn an extra White Card is submitted from the top of the deck. You'd be surprised how many times old Rando manages to win...
Admittedly with it being a product developed by a bunch of guys from the United States there's going to be a LOT of American references in there. While most of them are understandable, it's true that some of the hmour just doesn't translate. With plenty of jabs at conservative (small c!) politicians and the likes of Fox News coming in for plenty of stick, it's a good job that you're always allowed to discard anything from your hand that you don't quite get. Of course, this leaves you open to mockery from your fellow players (it's allowed, it's even in the rules!) but you can play on, safe in the knowledge that you're a better person than them. There's already a Canadian expansion pack available with plans in motion for a British version too, so you won't feel stupid for too long.
Getting your hands on a copy of CAH can prove tricky; although their print runs are growing every time, copies get snapped up in the space of hours so you're best off signing up for notifications on their email list. In the meantime, benevolent devils that they are, you can always put together your own print and play version thanks to the team embracing Creative Commons and offering the game entirely free. Visit cardsagainsthumanity.com and get ready to fire up your printer, but be warned – you WILL end up wanting the boxed version, if only to support the developers that little bit more.
A quick story about them. Just before Christmas they released a festive themed expansion for the US and Canada only on a "pay what you like" basis. In a matter of days they'd sold 85,000 copies of the new set and could've walked out with a tidy profit of a shade over $70,000. No-one would've begrudged them – like I've said, it's a great game and they deserve all the success they achieve – but what did they do with the money?
They handed every single cent over to the Wikimedia Foundation, the group that runs Wikipedia. Awesome.
Despite the fact that many will find Cards Against Humanity an utterly unplayable festival of disgustiness, it's a fantastic game created by Some Officially Good People. If the thought of Kanye West's daddy issues or a raptor attacking your genitals even raises a smile, you owe it to yourself to at least give it a try. You may not want to admit it but this Card Game for Horrible People (TM) could be your next guilty pleasure.
