Almost every avid gamer I know is familiar with the game “Wingspan”, as it is not only a fantastic engine builder but features some really great card art. What’s one to do however if you don’t have 45-90 minutes but still want to get your bird fix? “One Fowl Swoop”, a game currently retailing on Etsy, may just scratch that itch. The game supports 2-6 players, is appropriate for ages 7+, and has an average play time of 20-30 minutes. “One Fowl Swoop” actually tasks players with getting the least amount of points…yeah, don’t see that a whole lot in the Euro games I play. Before I go any further I’m required by FTC regulations to disclose that I was paid to cover this game, but as usual any and all opinions are my own. The only thing paid for here was my time.
Components & Gameplay
The game itself comes with a 144 cards along with a relatively short instruction booklet. There is also a bonus game / variant which includes “The Forgotten Flock” cards…you’ll want to remove these birds from your first game or at least, until you get a handle on the main game. To set up the game, players shuffle the cards and deal 20 to each player. Without looking at the cards, each player places 4 face down in front of them side by side. Then, players will place 1 card face up on top of these cards. Once done, players are free to look at their remaining 12 cards in secret. Youngest player goes first.
On a player’s turn, they’ll play 1 or more cards into the middle of the table. These cards will either be one or more numbered cards or a single swoop card (not both). Players can play cards from their hand, from the face-up cards in front of them, or from the face-down cards so as long as the face-up card underneath it has already been played in a previous turn.
There are a few restrictions. The cards you play must be of the same number, so if you do play a face-down card, you’ll have to lead with that first and hope you have more number cards to match it. The number you pick must be of equal or lesser value than the cards already in the middle of the table. If you play a card that is of greater value, then you’ll have pick up all the cards from the middle of the table and add them to your hand.
However, players can swoop by leading with a swoop card or playing 4 or more duplicate number cards at once. This effectively wipes the cards in the middle of the table into a discard pile and are no longer in play. The player who swooped goes again.
The round is over when someone plays all of their cards. The player who does so starts the next round. Players add up the points of their unplayed cards and tallies it on a separate sheet of paper. Birds 1-9 are 5 points, Bords 10-12 are 10 points, and swoop cards are 50. Rounds continue until someone hits 500 points, in which case the player with the least amount of points is the winner!
Note: The above doesn’t cover all of the rules found in the manual, but should give you an idea as to how the game is played.
The Review
Let’s get the nitpicky stuff out of the way first. The store page advertises and I quote, “There is no other game like this out on the market!” I feel like this both IS and ISN’T true. The box advertises “2 games in 1″…that second game felt more like an advanced mode as-is typical of tabletop games nowadays. You know, add these dice/cards/things for a more complex game and so on. I wouldn’t call it “2 games in 1”, just a single game with an advanced variant.
For this review I actually looked up the definition of a trick-taking game, which is what immediately came to mind when I started seeing the game in action. A trick-taking game, to put it simply, is a game where one player plays a card and the winner gets to take the cards as a trick, usually scoring points in some way.
“One Fowl Swoop” features an end-game condition to where you need to have the fewest points when one player goes over 500. “Hearts” and other trick-taking games play with similar end-game conditions. There are over a hundred other games out there each with their own spin on trick-taking. “Uno”, while not a trick-taking game, has similar endgame goals. As an aside, I thought it interesting that “Uno’s” draw 4 card was 50 points, the same as the swoop card. Speaking of which, the swoop card felt like a very off-the-wall kind of trump card.
I don’t think “One Fowl Swoop” is necessarily a trick-taking game, but it does feature both direct and indirect similarities to other games I’ve played. I suppose that’s bound to happen when there are thousands of card games on the market and no, I haven’t played them all.
Like I said, I’m being nitpicky.
The art is beautiful and the card stock excellent…pretty much near “Wingspan” in quality. The birds were most certainly easy on the eyes. I loved the little sheet included in the box that educates the user on the various birds included in the game. Who knew the American Goldfinch could eat upside down? More games need to include stuff like this.
One thing I can hone in and was disappointed by was the theme, but not in the way you think. The theme could have been anything…starships, fish, US Presidents…it wouldn’t have mattered. The birds featured in the core game have no special abilities or relevance other than to revolve around a chosen theme. I just wish the theme in the core game were more relevant in some way by adding special abilities related to birds. “But Vince! ‘The Forgotten Flock’ cards DO have abilities on them.” Re-read the last sentence above this paragraph…I did say “core game”. That leads me to…
“The Forgotten Flock” advanced variant was interesting and adds a little more complexity to the game. Each player gets 2 during setup and adds them to their hand. You can play a “FF” card which is for the most part an action card that will also wipe the card value in the middle of the table. I like that they can be picked up again should you be forced to take all of the cards in the middle, though you’ll have to be careful as they are 20 points a piece.
What I loved about this game, aside from the quality, was the strategy and decisions the game forced me to make. Yes, it IS tempting to play all three of the 5’s in your hand…but more often than not I instead chose to be cautious in the event I got hard-locked into playing something higher than the pool showed because I had no choice. This game forces the player to decide what they should keep in reserve so that they can always win the proverbial game of chicken…or just make sure they have a swoop card handy in case of emergencies. Leading with facedown cards is risky as-is, so I typically only played those when the center value was high or there weren’t many cards in the middle of the table.
Since a player has to play ALL of their cards, including the ones in front of them in the array, it can be challenging trying to coordinate your hand to what’s out there in your array. You could go one step further and keep an eye on your opponents’ arrays and see what’s in front of them to get an idea of their possible plays. There’s also a risk-reward mechanic where you can hold really good sets and play them all at once, but you risk ending up with a lot of points should someone go out first.
At the time of writing the price of the game is $23.99, 20% off of the full price of $29.99. I get that the economy sucks, but $30 for a card game is a bit unrealistic (“Wingspan” is about $45-60). One can argue that 144 cards is a lot, but one can purchase “Uno” (142 cards) anywhere for less than $10. Then again, the card stock and art are miles apart from one another, favoring “One Fowl Swoop”. One must realize that indie developers have it harder and thus have to shell out more for production costs, but on the other hand the average consumer doesn’t care…they want the best value for the lowest price. It’s economics. I hope the developer can somehow crowdfund or find a way to bulk produce and drive down the retail cost to $20 or so.
While I sound like I’m giving the game a hard time, I’m really not. When you step back and look the game as a whole, you’ll realize that you have a simple and semi-casual card game. It’s NOT trying to be as complicated as “Wingspan”. It seems to be striving to be a card game that can be played by anyone, young kids and adults alike. In that respect, the developers and by extension the game have succeeded in doing what it set out to do. What’s cool is that you can even combine 2 sets to allow a player count of up to 12, though you’ll need a bit of table space for that.
I wish the game were cheaper and thus more accessible to the average person. At present, the price may scare the casual gamers away. Still, “One Fowl Swoop” is a charming, beautiful, and elegant little card game that I won’t soon forget. You could say that it tickled my feathers, hashtag dad-joke.
Final Verdict: 8/10 (Great)
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Buy The Game: https://www.etsy.com/listing/1114548212/one-fowl-swoop-card-game-family-game
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