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Running this chilly little card shop is a lot sexier than I thought
Not long ago I ran a spooky plant shop in the excellent detective game weird gardeningnow I run a surprisingly sexy card shop in a cold and bustling place Cardboard King: Card Shop Simulator.
It’s probably a small sample size to make such a sweeping statement, but I’ll do it anyway: all games should be about running a cool little store. This is all I want to do from now on. Run cool little shops. thank you.
I don’t know anything about cards or how to run a card shop, but I learned quickly thanks to my pet parrot’s daily lessons, which I inherited with the shop. Every morning, before my store opens, I have a little time to prepare, so I check my card-related news feed on my computer. Maybe a celebrity in the card game world is about to announce her favorite set, or some religious group has determined that certain types of cards are evil. These are useful news because it gives me the opportunity to buy some cards a few days before they go up in value. Or maybe a brand is planning a reprint and the market is flooded with replicas so I have a chance to sell the cards before the price suddenly drops.
I use my computer to buy new cards and put the cards I want to sell on the counter in the store. I can also put a label on it. There’s a label that lowers the price of expensive cards, which increases my reputation for offering great deals, and a label that falsely states that a card is popular, which makes me extra money but reduces my reputation. (BTW, my reputation is currently “bad” because of my overuse of price tags. I can’t help it. I don’t want to cheat my customers, but I do want to make a lot of money so I can buy more card.)
Then I watch my store fill up with customers, which can actually feel a little busy at times – there can be a “rush hour” on any given day, which means real customers flocking in and rushing to buy Cards on shelves replace those that people buy. A random number of many customers just want to buy something (or not) and leave, but I can interact with a lot of others by branching out a text-based conversation. Many of them are, well, very sexy, and the Kardboard Kings life sim part revolves around trying to improve the state of my relationship with them in brief conversations. I don’t know if I could actually be in a relationship with anyone in Kardboard Kings, but I sure hope so. I already have at least three crushes. Gallery below:
There are also a lot of haptic interactions in Kardboard Kings, which I always appreciate. When the postman comes to deliver the mail, you swipe down to tear each envelope. With another action, you can tear open the card pack, drag and drop cards onto the display, or place your favorites in your own in a binder on your desk. This can all be done with a click or tap of a key, but I enjoy when games make me feel like I’m actually interacting with their objects.
The cards themselves are beautifully drawn, fun to examine (you can see a bunch in the gif above), and have a lot of detail that makes me wish they were real cards I could actually buy and play. Naturally, there are different levels of rarity and value, different collections of various fictional games, booster packs and mysterious legendary cards. I’m not a poker player (unless you count poker), but I really like the cards in Kardboard Kings.
Not only are there sexy people to meet, but also a nice bunch of weirdos like a kid who comes in to buy or sell cards while streaming to his fans (he calls me a baby boomer, even though my character looks like him perhaps 30) There is also a mysterious figure who appeared one night with a rare legendary card.
Potential romance, intrigue, humor, and the general enjoyment of buying cool cards and selling them (while saving some for my private collection)… This little card shop game has me hooked and only play after that for an hour.See for yourself: yes Free demo on Steam I definitely think you should try it.