Paperback by Tim Fowers, Game Review

Coming up with the right words in the right situation is how you make it as a writer. The words don't need to be big fancy words, but words that tell the story. Starting out you may not be able to get the fancy words, but you can keep coming up with words to build your career.

Paperback puts you in the place of the writer: creating words, building your career, and looking for fame. You can't even start to earn fame until you get a little further along in your career.

This is a deck building game where players (2-5) start with the same ten cards. There are five consonants (L, N, R, S, T) and five wild cards. Using lettered cards earns you money. Using a hand of five cards you make a word, collect what it is worth, and then buy more cards to build your deck. Play continues until someone completes one of the game ending requirements.

You don't need a huge vocabulary to play Paperback. I played it with couple of different groups with ages starting at ten, which is the low end of the age range given for the game. Everyone enjoyed it, and the balance of the game was good. In two three-player games I as a writer and a friend who is known for his play in Scrabble were defeated both times by the third. That is because there is also a second level of strategy of gaining fame cards.

Fame cards are wild cards in your hand and count for points at the end. You can buy them and it is easier to make words, however, just like all the other wild cards they don't earn you anything for buying cards. So you have to balance the buying of letters and fame.

The game is designed take about 45 minutes. All of our games were under an hour. (We played games with 2, 3, and 4 players).

Paperback was designed by Tim Fowers and was his first release as an independent game developer. His follow up game is reviewed on Utah Geek Magazines website. Both are illustrated by Ryan Goldberry. The artwork adds to the fun feel of the game.

The first time we set up the game it took a little longer sorting out the cards. Learning the game was easy the first time and when teaching it to others. When the game was over, clean up was easy. Thought was put into not only the game, but its storage. The box design made setting up the next time we played quick and easy. The size also makes it easy to take to friends or when travelling.

There are variants you can also play with (themes, awards, and powers) which give additional challenges and goals to work into your word creation and strategy while building your deck.

Having played Fowers first two releases, I'm looking forward to what he is working on for his next game.

First published in Utah Geek Magazine.

If you have any comments, questions, or critiques please leave a comment here or send an email to guildmastergaming@gmail.com.

You can also join Guild Master Gaming on Google+, Facebook, and Twitter (@GuildMstrGmng).