Garden Variety is a card game of gathering critters and wildflowers to match the die result as many times as you can, while also being careful of the mischievous gnomes. Taking only 10-15 minutes, it’s a simple game that anyone can learn and play, and it can be played with 2-5 players. The game is published by Unstable Games.
What’s in the Box?
- 54 Cards
- 1 Custom 6-sided dice
How’s it Play?
This is a card game where the first player rolls the die, and the result of the die roll becomes the rule as to who wins the cards used for that round. Players play one card at a time.
The die might make one of the following rules:
- The card closest to 0 wins
- The card closest to 3 wins
- The card closest to 5 wins
- The card closest to 7 wins
- The card closest to 10 wins
- Chaos – Reroll the die after all cards are played to determine the round rule.
After the die is rolled with one of the above results, each player plays a card. Players each starts with 5 cards in their hand. There are critter cards you can play that have a number from 0-9, some rare cards have a 0 or 10, and you need to decide if it’s a 0 or 10 when you play it. If there is a tie as who who is closest to a number, you use a color based pattern for the logic. Blue beats red, red beats green, green beats yellow, and yellow beats blue. If this logic doesn’t make sense, because it’s a green and a blue card for example, then whoever played it first wins.
A wildflower displays a number 0-9, and if you tie with another layer according to the number, then a wildflower always beats a critter card. The last type of card is the gnome card. These add a little mischief into the game. When you play it, immediately use its listed effect – and they can be very powerful if you play them at the right time.
After determining who wins by comparing cards from the first player to the next player and so on, the player who wins takes the used cards from everyone to place is a pile for scoring points later. Everyone then draws back up to 5 cards in their hand. The player who won the last hand rolls the die and another hand begins. This continues until a player has no more cards in their hand to play, then the game ends immediately.
Players count the number of cards they have gathered for their garden, and the player with the most cards wins the game.
The Verdict
This is a fun little trick taking rock paper scissors game where you want to try to play a card close enough to a number, but then you battle it out with other players trying to do the same. The cards number from 0-10, so you are bound to possibly tie with another player, which just makes for a comparison as to who wins.
In addition, the gnomes are fun to have and play because you can possibly steal other player’s cards to win that round, or make it so another player doesn’t win – probably the player who always wins games when you play against them. Other gnome cards let you change the rule for the round or play another card so that you are actually closest and win.
The game is more lucky than strategic, but it’s a fun game that I have enjoyed playing with the kids. They have liked the game, too, as the rules are easy to understand for younger kids. The luck factor comes with the roll of the die, as well as the cards you get in your hand. You do have a choice between the 5, so you are still affecting the game, but a lot of times the choice is not complicated one.
My kids like the art and theme of winning a trick to place it in your garden. The icons on the cards give you a heads up as to what you beat with your color, and who beats you. It’s a 54 card game, and I would have liked to see a little more variety of cards that let you beat other cards. For example, instead of having just critter cards and wildflower cards that beat them, add in a rare ‘automatically win’ cards, but then have the 0 cards beat the ‘automatically win’ cards. Overall, this is a fun, easy game for children and family to enjoy, and it’s small so you can take it on trips!
Images via Unstable Games
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