10 great trick-taking and climbing games from 2024
Plus, 10 honorable mentions — because, well, why not?
Well, hello! I promised earlier this month that I’d be writing about my favorite trick-taking games from 2024, and here I am. I’ve done it — 10 great trick-taking, climbing and shedding games, plus 10 honorable mentions. I’ve never been great at writing short.
This ends — at least I think — my end-of-year lists for 2024, which is just as well, because it’ll soon be March. It’s a bit wild how fast the year goes, isn’t it? It’s especially interesting, because we’ve yet to really hit the ramp-up of 2025 releases. I’m curious what that looks like this year. Hmm.
Well, let’s just get to the list, shall we?
Bacon is a climbing game that thrives at one of those rare, difficult-to-hit player counts — six! At six players, you’ll form teams of three. The trick play in Bacon is easy to follow: You’re playing melds and trying to help your team go out first. You get more points the earlier your team goes out, too. As a team game at six, it’s tremendous. At four, it’s good. It’s also interesting played in a three-player game, but that does feel somewhat like a different game altogether. Designed by Sean Ross, illustrated by William Harris, and published by Allplay.
Crisps has yet to see traditional publication, but this was one of my most-played games in 2024. It’s a simple climbing game for two players wherein you play singles, sets, runs, and runs of pairs. The cards aren’t suited, so you’ve got a load of cards in-hand to make really substantial runs. The game’s twist comes that every round, both the winner and the loser will be adding a card to their hand. The winner gets to choose between a face-up card and a face-down card, and the loser gets the other. If you can keep cards in your hand for a late-game run, you might just be successful — but the allure of going out in the early game might be too strong. Designed by Shreesh Bhat.
Gachapon Trick is a trick-taker that combines set collection, trick-taking and the excitement of blind box toy collection. The winner of each trick must buy a toy card from those available — and if they’re feeling like gambling, they also get to buy a toy card from the top of the deck. You’ll earn points for sets of toys, and the whole time, you’ll be itching to win another trick just for another chance to build on your collections. But if you’re not careful, you’ll end up out of money — and then you can’t buy your obligatory toy, and the winner of the trick transfers to the next-highest player. Designed by Daniel Newman, illustrated by Sai Beppu, and published by New Mill Industries.
The Ghost Lift is a climbing game about ghosts going up and down elevators. It’s simple: You’re playing sets of cards of the same value. But sometimes you’re playing in ascending order and other times you’re playing in descending order. Some of the cards played indicate a direction change, and they might make it easier for somebody else to play — or harder for you. I hope this someday gets a reprint with cards with rounded corners. Designed and self-published by Ridge Gear.
Odin is a climbing game in which you’re not playing traditional sets or runs, but you’re playing groups of cards that comprise a number higher than the last set played. You might play, say, the blue 7, 5, and 3 cards, but you could be beat by 7, 5, and 4 of another color, or 7, 7, and 7 of various colors. Each player that beats another set will take a card from the trick and add it to their hand. That last bit makes it a very interesting game, and you’ll have to carefully consider when you beat a trick. Designed by Yohan Goh, Hope S. Hwang and Gary Kim; illustrated by Crocotame; published by Helvetiq.
Rainbow is a trick-taking and climbing game with sets and runs, and while you must follow the type of combination, you don’t have to play a stronger combination. The cards played to the trick will go to the middle of the table, which become points to be claimed in the next trick, with players claiming pairs of cards in order of combination strength. It’s a simple little game that’s approachable for a lot of audiences, but that twist is interesting and twists your thinking about what you’re playing in a really satisfying way. Designed by Mito Sazuki, illustrated by Sai Beppu, and published by Allplay.
Seers Catalog is a climbing and shedding game in which you’re playing melds (singles, sets and suited runs), but rather than trying to be the first player to shed your hand, you’re trying to have five or fewer cards in your hand at the time that somebody is out of cards. If you manage that, you’ll get points equal to the lowest value card in hand. And all that’s interesting enough, but there’s another consideration: Once you hit that mark of five or fewer cards, you are obligated to play melds if you’re able, and you can’t pass. Add in some special ability cards that you’ll work through and some wilds, and you’ve got a fascinating game on your hands. Designed by Taylor Reiner, illustrated by Rob Loukotka and Christine Mitzuk, and published by Bezier Games.
Spring Cleaning is a climbing game with a growingly common idea: You can’t rearrange your hand, and you’re playing melds only as they exist in your hand in order. If you can’t play, you’ll draw a card from the deck, then you’ll offer a card from your hand in front of you. Anybody following a meld can use any card from any player’s offer. This is one of my favorite two-player climbers, and it’s really great with larger groups, too. Designed by Jonathan Cox, published by Little Dog Games. The print run has ended, but it’s still available at Tricky Imports.
Vivo is a neat little trick-taker in which you’re constantly shifting between must follow, must-not-follow, and every stage in the middle. Anticipating the various ways you’ll need to play your hand becomes a fascinating tactical exercise. Designed by LEO, illustrated by Higawind, and published by VicVillage in Japan.
Xylotar is a must-follow trick-taking game with a really great twist: Your hand is entirely face-down, and your neighbor has sorted it numerically for you. Each card’s suit is on the back of the card, so you’re not left with no information, but you’ll have to exercise your inductive and deductive powers to succeed. Plus, each suit has a different maximum value, so you’ll have a little more information on which to operate. Designed by Chris Wray, illustrated by Davi Comodo, and published by Bezier Games.
Ten honorable mentions
Call of Yeti is trick-taking game about finding cryptids, which is cool, but the best part of this is bidding system. Other players could have an opportunity to force your bid higher, though, which will make you scramble. Designed by Yuki Sakashita, illustrated by Tori Hasegawa, and published by Power9 Games.
Cheez-Tricks is competitive trick-taker with round-specific objectives that you’ll want to avoid — unless you think you can meet every objective. Designed by Mauricio Torselli, illustrated by Luis Felipe Ruiz. Self-published. Available at Tricky Imports.
Elephant Ball Balancing Act is a trick-taker I didn’t love the first time I played, but sometimes, I think about it. There’s a difficulty in the balance here, which I guess is the point! Designed by mori!, published by 4tousei.
Kansas City: The Trick-Taking Game is a game with a fixed-bid system and a really fascinating opportunity to upgrade cards in your hand to trump. But you can’t win too many cards! Designed and self-published by Chris Wray, illustrated by Megan Russell.
Lunar is a trick-taking game in which each player has two hands — one of suits and one of numbers. What! It’s pretty cool. Designed by Masato Uesugi, illustrated by A. Giroux, and published by Allplay.
Mlikuro makes the honorable mention list not because it’s not a great game, but because it’s basically a re-theme of an already great game, Trick-Taking in Black and White. Designed by Tsutomu Dejima, illustrated by Satoshi Takahata, and published by Korokorodou.
Pies is a trick-taking game where players draft pie cards from the played cards in an effort to build point-scoring sets. Designed by Matthias Cramer, illustrated by Wendy Hollender, and published by Allplay.
Prey is in a Milkuro-like position — it’s a reimplementation of the really great Double Side Play. Good game, but an honorable mention. Designed by TORU II, illustrated by Sai Beppu, and published by Allplay.
Rocket Punch is a trick-taker with robots! It has some interesting ideas — probably too many — but I really like the idea that you can’t play cards of the same rank to a trick. Designed and illustrated by Nagi-an, published by Goraku Shuzou.
Torchlit is a dungeon-themed trick-taker where you’ll bid on the number of tricks you’ll win, and the points you earn for that bid depends on the number of monsters in that area of the dungeon. The player who plays the lowest card each trick will fill the dungeon with monsters from the trick, with one card from each suit entering being placed. Designed and self-published by David Spalinski, illustrated by Phil Rynda and David Spalinski. It was also published by Little Dog Games.
Thank you, as ever, for joining me at Don’t Eat the Meeples. I’ve just had a birthday, and I’m once again the product of two primes. Neat, right? (That’s me coping, I think.) Here’s hoping we play some trick-takers this weekend.
Next week: Why we need simple games