Tabletop Tuesday - Exploding Kittens

Welcome to another edition of Tabletop Tuesday - Your weekly exploration into games of dice, cards, luck and more of the Tabletop world.

This week's game...the game of taco cats and flatulent bats that is Exploding Kittens.

Players: 2-5
Time: 10-20 minutes
Genre: Casual Card Game



Exploding Kittens started as an infamous Kickstarter project that exceeded its $10,000 goal in a mere 8 minutes, going on to earn nearly $9 million.  The card game and art is designed by the famous humor website, The Oatmeal.  And a large portion of appeal in this game is indeed the humor, of which you will draw cards with ridiculous cartoons that you can't help but at least chuckle.

The gameplay itself is easiest described as Russian Roulette meets UNO.  Each player starts with a hand of five cards, one of which is a Diffuse card, the only means of surviving an Exploding Kitten.  Meanwhile, the deck will contain enough Exploding Kittens for every player minus one, along with one additional Diffuse card as a saving grace for those lucky enough to draw it.  Each turn, players can play as many cards as they want, of which there are a variety of cards such as skipping turns, seeing into the future, and discarding pairs of cards to steal from other players.  But players must end their turn by drawing a card from the deck, each card drawn increasing the odds of certain impending doom.  Should a player draw an Exploding Kitten and have a Diffuse, they discard the Diffuse and place the Exploding Kitten back in the deck however they want (causing mass suspicion and certain dread for the next players).  Draw an Exploding Kitten and you don't have a Diffuse, you're out of the game along with the Exploding Kitten and your hand.  Last player standing wins.

One of the best aspects of this game is it really only takes 5 minutes or so to learn to play.  A word of advice to new players is that you are not required to play cards each turn.  You can instead just end your turn by drawing cards, which typically ends up being the case more so in the beginning of the game as the odds of blowing up are smaller then.  Plus the more cards you have, the less likely it is someone can steal your Diffuse.  There are also advanced rules for those who want a little more strategy to the mix.  Also, if you get additional packs of Exploding Kittens (or the expansion, Imploding Kittens), you can increase the number of players able to play the game.  Keep in mind that the play time will also increase slightly.  I recommend this game for those who have a warped sense of humor and handle tension well.

If you have any questions about Exploding Kittens, let me know in the comments.  And stay tuned to hear about the Imploding Kittens expansion and other games in future installments of Tabletop Tuesday!