Building Links

I have designed a new game using The Game Crafter. It is called Building Links. It is a game that is based on the word game, Connections, that is part of the New York Times Games Application. My version is a card game. Players draw and discard until they get four cards that have a link that connects them. The link can be ANYTHING! For example, 4 cards with 6 letters in each word; 4 cards that all start with P; 4 cards that describe colors; 4 cards that are food; etc.

The first player to reach 40 points is the winner! I play tested this game with a group of friends. We had a great time! The playing pieces are little buildings and players get a building and a poker chip that are the same color.

After the link is stated and the four cards are played, the player gets 4 points. All other players put a poker chip in a bag. The player with the link draws a chip. The player whose chip is drawn must play a card that matches the link. If they can't, they lose two points. If they can, they get 2 points. If they can't match the link the original player gets another 2 points. This factor encourages players to be more creative when finding links.

As usual, this game was designed for a contest on The Game Crafter website. It was called The One Pound Challenge. Games were supposed to come as close to one pound as they could. My game weighs 14.1 oz. I did get 30 votes in the contest, but this was not enough for me to make the semi-finals. Building Links is available for purchase at thegamecrafter.com.