15 Self-Contained Card Games That Use Unique Decks

Honestly, one of the games that constantly comes up whenever it’s game night. The art in Mythic Arcana is beautiful, and the rules are written right on the cards, so picking and choosing which gods to include in your pantheon is very newbie-friendly. As you roll dice, you summon mythological gods from the communal card river, hoping to create a pantheon before your friends.

A two-player narrative card game, I Guess This Is It is a melancholy meditation on breaking up. You are given a series of cards that prompt you to explain moments within your past relationship, attempting to leave on good terms. Great for roleplaying out your favorite breakups in fandom—Han Solo and Luke Skywalker, Xena and Gabriella, Louis and Lestat, Izzy Hands and Edward Teach. The whump awaits.

SolForge Fusion is the closest game on this list to a self-contained deck builder. By combining two half-decks into a complete deck, players summon creatures and cast spells which can evolved if played in a certain order. There’s also a digital database that allows you to play online.

Aurora is a tabletop roleplaying game for 2-6 players. It asks players to craft their own oracle deck as they create a story, making this a game full of mementos and care as you use art to inspire your narrative.

Hearts Blazing is another favorite of my friend group and while we’ve only played it through twice, both times have left such a lasting impression that we talk about this game, and our characters, all the time. Each player embodies an archetypal character and gets a deck of cards with episode tropes for that character. As situations—described as episodes—come up, players use their deck to decide who gets to narrate the episode and what stories they want to see played out. Incredibly clever and self aware, Hearts Blazing is a fantastic game, and it’s available as a free print and play version on DriveThruRPG. (I found my physical copy at the Indie Press Revolution table at a convention... but it might be completely out of stock at this point!)

This card game is so good at causing despair that it almost caused my friend group to break up over a friendly game we played over dinner. It was very fun and also infuriating. In Gloom, players control a family of misanthropic misfits and attempt to make thir characters “as miserable as possible before allowing them the sweet respite of death... Players narrate their characters’ misfortunes and mishaps, creating unique stories of suffering in each game. May the most miserable soul win!”

While Gloom may have tried to break the group chat up, The Mind brought us back together. A very intense, almost silent game, The Mind is a collaborative bluffing game that uses an incredibly simple deck to play out improv exercises in a way that makes every new level frustrating, but in a way that also makes everyone say “let’s try again!”

Incredible in premise and execution, “The Price of Coal is a card-based prompt-driven storytelling game about coal miners and their loved ones in West Virginia, 1921.” It has beautiful illustrations and is a historical reinterpretation of the months that lead up to the Battle of Blair Mountain. A truly unmissable, poignant game.

Perfect for monster lovers and spooky season, Campy Creatures, a game of deduction and bluffing, is a “head-to-head card game.” As you capture humans for experiments you attempt to out-trick your opponents with a set of colorful and vibrant cards that wink at classic creature features.

This game is kind of like playing telephone if everyone’s on speakerphone and you are going through a tunnel and also the car is about to explode. Spaceteam is wonderfully chaotic and charming, and if you’re not into physical games (who are you people??), you can get this in app form.

I might be one the last people you might expect to shill for a movie-tie in board game (that’s a lie, actually, the Jaws board game is genuinely a perfect game), but there’s something about Stranger Things: Attack of the Mind Flayer that works really, really well. With some backstabbing and betrayal, this game allows you to play collaboratively until it’s time to turn on your friends... or rescue them.

Okay, I’m really stretching the premise of this slideshow, but so what. Illimat is an incredibly cool trick-taking card game that incorporates custom tarot cards, an extra suit of cards, and a witchy looking playmat. It’s fun to play, easy to learn, and while there is some math involved, only the best card counters can really get an advantage. There’s also an expansion coming out soon! Oh, and did I mention this is based on the discography of the the Decemberists? Truly, a weird and wonderful little game.

Full disclosure: as a contributor to this game, I’m definitely biased. But I love Campfire. It’s a nightmarish little storygame where players use prompts on cards to tell a horror story. With those unique prompts and a token system to encourage your friends to come up with ever more weird and wonderful plots, Campfire is collaborative and naturally addictive game of fear.

One of the cleverest games I’ve ever played, Legend Has It uses the books already on your shelves to help inspire the story you tell using a symbol-based card deck. It’s an impressive bit of game design, and creates a mythos of the stories that you already know and love.

This one is for all the nerds who love a tactical card game. (It’s me, I’m nerds.) 3000 Scoundrels is a mix-and-match bluffing game of desperados and strange out-of-this-era technology. It’s a fascinating game that take wild, wild west bullshit and ramps it up in a game that desperately wants you to outbluff and out play your opponent. With tons of possibilities, it’s really an incredible bit of game design that is endlessly playable.

Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel and Star Wars releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about House of the Dragon and Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.