Stamp Showdown, Final Days!

Hey, folks. This is a reminder that James Ernest’s Stamp Showdown (from Four Suit Studios) is live on Kickstarter for just two more days.

Stamp Showdown is a polished-up version of our classic game Lamarckian Poker, a clever bidding game where players build the best poker hands by trading cards with the pool in the center of the table. It’s clever and fun, and you can even play it with a standard poker deck.

That’s Four Suit’s approach: Clever, lightweight games with cool custom poker decks. Their first game, River Rats, is a strategic cooperative poker game for 1-4 players. Stamp Showdown will be their second, and we hope to work with them again soon!

Please take a look at the campaign before it closes on February 12. And help us bring Stamp Showdown to life!

In Other News

New Video: Making Cold Comfort. Cheapass designer and guinea pig Rick Fish had to ask, “Wait, when did it snow?” and yes, James shot the bumpers for this Cold Comfort video more than a year ago, back when he still had all his teeth. The newest video in the Lecture Hall explains all the steps of assembling your own copy of Cold Comfort. Make and play your own copy today!

New Pairs Deck: BJ Becker’s Antique Fruit Pairs deck is now available from DriveThruCards. This is a lovely hand-painted deck suitable for all of our Pairs variants. Speaking of variants, we’ve added a few copies of the Pairs Companion Book (2017) to our Web Store. This booklet was included with the Deluxe Edition, and we found just a few more of them lounging in the basement.

New Pairs Game: Venture. Oddly, Venture didn’t make it into the 2017 Companion Book, so we’ve chosen it as our latest update to the “new format.” Venture was originally included with the Professor Elemental deck, and it was co-designed by James Ernest and Daniel Solis. And speaking of Professor Elemental, we’ve got just a few of those original decks in the mix at the Shop.

Coming Soon

Next Weekend: DunDraCon. If you’re in the Bay Area, drop by DunDraCon Feb 13-16, for a presidential weekend of gaming. James has no responsibilities at this show, just like last year, so he’ll be parked in the Protospiel room testing new games and old. The newest game on the list is Hard Pass, a new game with a poker deck (looking at you, Four Suit). The oldest? A surprisingly satisfying update to Bleeding Sherwood, one of the six Pearl Anniversary games in 2026.

Also in the works at Crab Fragment / Cheapass Games:

• Starbase Jeff: We’re printing it at DriveThru and then cutting it at home! More details next month.

• Possum County Bake-Off: It’s “The Judge” with a twist: A cooking game with a Pairs deck, plus a side deck of recipe cards that change the rules.

• Bad Assassin: This is in final testing and will be coming soon to our patrons, and shortly thereafter to the world!

• Rochi: Sonia Lyris’ gorgeous Tarot-style deck for this unique gambling game is in final art, and testing this weekend!

• So Much More! We have too many games to keep track of.

Thanks as always for following Cheapass Games and Crab Fragment Labs, and we’ll see you at the table soon!