Traditional Card Game Sections
Barbu
Bridge
Canasta
Clobyosh
Cribbage
Eights
Euchre
Fan Tan
Hearts
Oh Hell!
Pinochle
Piquet
President
Setback
Solitaire
Spades
Whist
Boring Website Stuff
Welcome to Play Card Games.org. This card game information site's goal is to offer a complete guide to playing card game rules of all kinds, but especially how to play commercial and proprietary card games.
Most card game information sites online focus almost exclusively on gambling related card games. That's because gambling-related advertising is very lucrative from an advertising perspective. And even those card game guides that don't focus largely on gambling card games focus on card game rules for games that use traditional decks of cards. Our site is different. We do provide information about traditional card games and gambling card games, but we're more interested in writing about commercial card games (or "proprietary deck card games").
Proprietary Card Games and Commercial Card Games
Card
games that require a special deck that's specific to the game are called
"proprietary card games," or "commercial card games." Examples of
commercial card games include Illuminati, Magic the Gathering,
and Munchkin. "Collectible card games" and "living card games"
are a subcategory of proprietary card games. They require a special deck
in order to play.
All collectible card games are commercial/proprietary card games, but not all commercial/proprietary card games are collectible card games. Collectible card games are also often called "trading card games" or "customizable card games."
For example, Magic the Gathering has new cards becoming available all the time. These cards are collected. But Munchkin comes with a single deck of cards that are specific to that game. There are multiple Munchkin-related games, and they can be combined, but they don't sell individual cards as collectible items.
We've decided to focus more on being a proprietary card game guide because that's our primary area of interest. We love card games of all kinds, but we have a special fondness for some of the more unusual invented games, with their colorful cards and special rulebooks.
Traditional Card Games
"Traditional" card games are those that are played with a standard
deck of cards, which has 52 cards, and are divided into the following:
Four suits with thirteen cards of each suit. The suits include hearts, diamonds, clubs, and spades.
The thirteen cards are ranked. Numbered cards range from one (the ace) to ten. Then there are face cards: jacks, queens, and kings.
Most decks include a joker or two. The joker is only used rarely.
Some card games call for the removal of certain cards in order to create a special deck, while other card games require more than 52 cards. In those games, decks are combined to create a large deck.
Decks of cards are sometimes called packs.
Card Game Rules - Traditional Card Game Activities
Some card game rules apply across almost all traditional card games, but they're so common to these games (like shuffling and dealing) that it's almost hard to think of them as "card game rules" at all. They're almost more like traditional card game activities.
Cutting
Cutting the deck is one way that players try to avoid cheating by card mechanics. The deck is "cut" in half (divided into two stacks) by a player other than the dealer, then placed on top of each other to further randomize the deck.
Shuffling
There are multiple ways of shuffling a deck of cards, but some means of randomizing the cards in the deck is used in almost every game of cards imaginable.
Dealing
Most card games require a dealer to distribute cards to the players at the table. This is called dealing, and the cards that a player in the game gets are called "hands".
Card Game Types
Card games are divided into multiple types, and there are various
schemes for categorizing card games. Some of these include:
Trick taking card games - A trick taking game consists of individual rounds called tricks, in which one player is determined the winner after everyone plays a card. That player is said to have won the trick. Spades is an example of a trick taking game.
Shedding card games - Shedding card games have a goal of getting rid of the cards in your hand before the other players do. Eights is an example of a shedding card game.
Combination card games - These are games where you goal is to form various combinations of cards. An example of a combination card game is Canasta.
Comparing card games - One of the most popular examples of a comparing card game is poker, where you compare hands to determine who wins the pot. Blackjack is another comparing game, where you compare your hand to the dealer's to see who got closer to 21 without going over.
Fun Card Games
This site is obviously a work in progress and will be for a long time. The number of card games we could write about here is just so vast that it will probably never be finished. But one way we prioritize which topics we write about first here is how much fun the games are. If we play fun card games, then we write about them. That's why you'll see pages about Spades, Illuminati, and San Juan before you'll see articles about Go Fish.
Upcoming Card Game Articles
We have the following card game articles in the works. We'll link to them from here as soon as they're live:
- Card Games for Two Players
- How to Play Cards
- List of Card Games (This is going to be the biggest list of card games online.)
- Poker Card Games
- Playing Cards
- New Card Games
- Play Card Games Online
- Card Game Instructions
- Different Types of Card Games
- Playing Poker Games
- Poker Games for Kids