Introduction
Playing cards have been a popular form of social and individual entertainment for centuries. In modern times, playing card games have evolved into a multi-billion dollar industry, spanning worldwide influence. This guide will assist you in creating your own playing card game by detailing the three important stages of the creation process: Design, Playtesting, and Printing. It is primarily tailored to hobbyist or amateur game card designers interested in creating a card game. Whether you’re making something for fun, a school project, or looking to take your first step into independent game production, this guide will have curated, relevant information to assist you.
It is recommended to begin reading this guide in the “Get Started” section, which will detail key terms while reviewing common playing card games you might be familiar with. This section is critical to ensure understanding of the current landscape and terminology of playing card games. The rest of this guide offers information for various steps in the process of creating a playing card game. Just starting out? Follow the chronological process of Design, Playtesting, and Printing when navigating this guide.
Databases and Search Terms
When looking for information on card games, consider using the following resources:
ERIC: For using TCGs in an educational environment.
PsycINFO: For information about the psychology behind collection habits, reward mechanisms, and other gameplay mechanics.
JSTOR: Useful for historical, cultural, and sociological studies of games.
Information on search terms is included throughout this guide at various points depending on topic. However, when conducting a general search, consider these tips:
- Remember to contain exact search terms in quotation marks.
- Using the AND, OR, and NOT modifiers can be rather helpful to get the information you’re looking for:
- AND: "trading card game" AND design
- OR: "trading card game" OR "collectible card game"
- NOT: "card game" NOT poker
- Use parenthesis to contain advanced search logic: ("trading card game" OR "collectible card game") AND (design OR mechanics)
- Consider using Truncation to not accidentally leave out valuable results: gam* → game, games, gaming
- Be careful with this; you may get more results than intended.
- Finally, consider using proximity operators to find results with words close to each other: "game design" AROUND(5) "card"
Similar techniques are useful when searching traditional search engines, like Google. As you'll learn in this guide, there is a lack of standardization of terms relating to card games, so using multiple search terms will likely be necessary. For example, consider searching with both "living card game" and "expandable card game." Different sources will use different terms (and sometimes interchangeably).
With Google in particular, you might have luck limiting your search using the "site:" feature. As you'll learn throughout this guide, there are only a few websites that are both knowledgeable and reliable. Consider using something like "site:https://boardgamegeek.com/wiki/" to search the BGG wiki.