Card Shark Reviews

👍

collect my cards

Came for the card games, stayed for the drama

meh - don't bother. Save your money. The concept is cool but the gameplay loop is repetitive and annoying.

I was immediately sold when I played the demo on switch. What a ridiculously beautiful game, the art design is top notch, and the narrative is also top tier. The little details of the main character's journal slowly changing as he learns to read and write was so lovely. The card tricks eventually became too much for my small brain though (I am predictable)

Lean how to cheat at cards, help start the French Revolution, cheat the King himself. Unique gameplay, great music and doesn't overstay its welcome. 9/10 for some tedious explanations.

Game has a beautiful artstyle and play system, enjoyed learning individual techniques. Is extremely addicting. 5 stars.

An entirely unique and beautiful game with innovative mechanics and a compelling story. You follow a young mute man in pre-revolutionary France as he learns the ways of card trickery. The card tricks are actually, mechanically tough and the game quite often relies on you paying proper attention to what it is telling you. A few times you'll even have to work things out by yourself. If you a like a challenge then this aspect is definitely a lot of (occasionally frustrating) fun! The game's art is also beautiful, rendered in a hand-drawn and painted style that is lovely throughout. The music is great and the plot is full of exciting twists and turns! Unlike anything else I've seen before, a definite recommendation from me.

I really want to like this game but for all its charm it is overshadowed by frustration and poor design choices. First the good: The art style and overall presentation is beautiful and the gameplay is novel. I really like the concept of using sneaky tricks to cheat your way through card games 18th Century France. The way the game accomplishes this is overall well done and feels like it requires some skill. The problem is that some mechanics are very poorly explained, and then often there is no way to go back and re-learn the different mechanics once you've got through them. The game, it its defence, does give you frequent refreshers on some mechanics but seems to expect you to be playing through in one sitting. If you don't play for a week or so and come back then some essential elements may be forgotten with no way to re-learn them, or even provide suitable explanations. On several occasions the game wanted me to do something but I had no idea what buttons or movements on the controller would accomplish it, and no instructions were provided. After the failing the same sequence 10 times over with no idea what I had to do I would give up. It's still worth a look if the setting and premise appeal, but be warned that it can be irritating with these frustrations. I'd get it on sale if anything.

Meh...It's not bad, really. I just didn't get much excitement out of it. The game is essentially a series of minigames where you are instructed on how to correctly input for a given trick, and then you do so. Here's an example: Down, Up, Up, Up, Up, Up, Up, Left, Down, Down, Down, Up, Up, Up, Right, Down, Down, Down, Down, Y, B, A. You see that? That's one of the input strings for the final trick. It comes a long way from the beginning where it was just: Right, Y, Up, Down. Again, its not a bad game, but...I just didn't feel much for it. It's not tricky enough to be a puzzle game, its not dexterous enough to be a challenging game, its not silly enough to be a fun game, its not random enough to where you need to actually remember all of these tricks, and even when using the tricks you only use them 3 - 4 times before the round is over and you never really use them in the game again. I wasn't bored, and I took the time to finish the game, but I'm not much compelled to give it another playthrough.