Love Letter Card Game - Prove Your Worth to the Princess! Deduction and Player Elimination Strategy Game for Kids and Adults, Ages 10+, 2-6 Players, 20 Minute Playtime, Made by Z-Man Games

I really didn't expect much from this game, first off because it's so simple, and secondly, because it's about people sending love letters to a princess. There are very few cards, so if you want them to last it might pay to put them in deck protectors. Most card games you're only going to be handling a given card so many times because there are tons of cards, but in this game you're going to be handling every single card almost every time you play, so the wear and tear isn't spread out as much. It's cheap, so you could just buy a new set when it gets worn, but that's wasteful, right? Princesses are a scarce resource and must be treated accordingly. Basically, in this game you're trying to court the princess. You're handing love letters to various people she knows, each of them with various levels of access to her. A palace guard has less access than her dad, the king, so a letter in a guard's hands isn't going to be as convincing to her as having her own dad give it to her. You're basically trying to get your letter to the person with most access to the princess before the round ends, which involves drawing and playing cards to increase your own position or to knock other people out of the round. Whoever wins the round gets to go first next time, since the princess talks about them at breakfast the next morning, which gives them the advantage. Seriously, that's in the rules. It's adorable. If you like games with a lot of player interaction, this is a great one. Rounds go quickly, and the subject matter is pretty light-hearted so even if somebody totally screws you over it's hard to get too bent out of shape about it, which can definitely happen in games where you have a lot more invested in any given hand. It's fun, quick, easy to learn, and small and cheap enough that you can buy a couple of copies and put one in your car or whatever. That's really nice if you ever end up getting stuck waiting somewhere with a friend (or a potential friend, if you're an extrovert) and the battery in your phone dies so you actually have to talk to the meat-sacks around you or die of boredom.

Love Letter is one of the best cards game I've ever played. It is a fast-paced game of luck and deduction for 2–4 players. Its setup is quick and the gameplay is simple for anyone and everyone. The game contains 16 game cards, 4 reference cards and 13 wooden tokens of affection (red cube in this version). In Love Letters the players compete for the heart of the Princess by trying to pass her a love letter, while keeping other players’ letters away. The setup is easy, players shuffle the 16 cards and form a drawing deck. The first card is removed from the game (with 2 players 3 extra cards are remove), and each player get one card from the drawing deck. On her turn, a player takes the top card from the deck and play one of the two cards in her hand by playing it face up on the discard pile. Then the card effect is applied and either a player is knocked out of the round, or the turn passes to the player on your left. At the end of the round if only one player is left he or she gets a token of affection, if more than one player is left, the player with the highest value card gets the token. A player wins the game after winning a number of tokens based on the number of players. The cards: The Guard (1) – guess a non-Guard card and choose a player. If that player has that card, he or she is out of the round. There are 5 Guard cards. Priest (2) - Look at another player's hand. There are 2 Priest cards. Barron (3) - compare hands with another player. The player with the lower value card is out of the round. There are 2 Barron cards. Handmaid (4) - ignore all effects from other player cars until your next turn. There are 2 Handmaid cards. Prince (5) - choose any player including yourself to discard his or her hand and draw a new card. There are 2 Prince cards. King (6) – Trade hands with another player. Countess (7) – if you have this card and the kind or prince in your hand. You must discard this card. Princess (8) – if you discard this card you are out of the round. Thus, a player has to find a good balance between powerful cards with high gain, but can make him or her a target, but may give him or her a gain, and weaker cards that may cost him or her the token of affection. Overall, love letter is a great game, with a high replay value. It is not expensive (usually goes for around $8 on amazon, with a retail price of $12), and is lightweight, which means you can take it on the road. More game reviews @instagram (https://www.instagram.com/the_review_board/)

Love Letter is fantastic. It is great on every level. The game is pretty simple to learn. But has a lot of strategy. It also is rich in theme. But plays fast. Two thumbs up. The game has a lot of theme to keep you involved. All the players are suitors trying to get the Princess to accept your letter and fall in love with you. The magic number is 4 tokens in a 4 player game. The card you have in your hand is the person who is carrying the letter. Even the princess herself can carry it for you. (But if she gets caught with it she will throw it in the fire! Mechanic wise if you discard the princess you are out of the round) But will the token be yours? Be the last person standing! The game play is simple. Eight different cards. Each has a different action. But they printed on the bottom of the card what it does if you forget. The game does eliminate players each round. But the game plays so fast it doesn’t create an issue where someone has to sit around and wait for a long time to get back in. The game plays in 15 – 30 minutes. So it isn’t a game you will play all night. But it is good filler for a longer game. I love my deep strategy games, it’s true. But this game is still awesome. It’s nice to throw down on a game that’s easy but surprisingly has a good amount of strategy. May not be the best game ever made. But easy to learn. Fun. And cheap. What’s not to love? Weight: Light Learning Curve: Low Replayability: High

I must have the absolute worst luck, as I was often eliminated from a round before I even had a chance to play by someone randomly guessing my card. Despite only making it through about a third of the rounds I tried to play in, this game is fun. With just 16 cards in the deck, and multiple ways to eliminate players from any given round, rounds go extremely quickly, which is great to keep things moving and get people who are eliminated back into play. The goal is to win a set number of rounds by having the highest valued card at the end of the round. You draw one and discard one each time it's your turn. The ability written on the card that you discard activates when you discard it (discarding it essentially means playing it). The catch is the the higher the value of the card, typically, the more dangerous it is to hold it. For example, holding the highest valued card (the Princess) has the activated ability of you being eliminated from the round if you discard it. So why don't you just always hold onto it? Because other players have multiple means of making you discard your card. Through about thirty played rounds, only twice did someone who drew the Princess to start the round survive until the end, and one of those two times, the "trade cards with your opponent" card was played, causing them to lose the round anyway. Overall, the game is phenominal in how simple and quick it is, with almost no learning curve and a bonus card for each player to summarize all of the rules and the abilities of each and every card (a very nice touch). As I said, I was often eliminated quickly, but was playing just a minute or two later when the next round started. The only negative thing I have to say about this game is the cardstock. The cards feel cheap and flimsy. My cousin has a tendancy to idly flip and bend the card in her hand while waiting for it to be her turn, and she very quickly marked one of the lowest valued cards. As others suggest, I would recommend purchasing protective sleeves, however, it really shouldn't be up to the buyer to protect cards that are meant to be shuffled from getting damaged by being shuffled. I'd gladly pay a few extra dollars for this game if it was printed on regular playing card strength cards. Five star game printed on two star cardstock = 4 star review.

I can not say enough about how much fun this game is to play. You play a series of hands that last from 10 seconds to 2 minutes max. The bag for the game is small and easy to take to any place. PROS: 1. Fast game play 2. Easy to learn (all the information is on each card so no need to have a rule book to play) 3. You only hold one card at a time (no massive hand of 13 cards to manage) 4. Cards are very decorative 5. Incredibly addictive (a friend learned the game and insisted on playing 50 hands). It has that amazing just one more time quality to it. I had to buy a second game because my daughter took mine off to college to play. 6. A rare combination of luck and skill. You can't always win with good card playing, but you will never win a series without skill. You have to know how others are thinking and playing to truly be good at this game. But it is simple enough to just play without any thought if you just want to kill some time with friends. 7. Who doesn't love an inexpensive game! CONS: 1. You play so many hands with these cards that they get quickly worn. I hate to say it but you really need to laminate the cards or put them in come kind of sleeves, because you play the cards so many times in 5 minutes they do wear-out quickly (not the best thickness to these cards) and if you can identify a card by its worn pattern the game is meaningless (there are only 16 cards - a marked card will be easy to track). 2. The scoring blocks are very tiny and we are constantly looking for these little red cubes. This system is lame, but completely unnecessary. You can keep score on paper or use any other chips to keep score. I recommend buying some heart charms instead at a craft store. It is much better (larger) and the game is called, "Love Letter" after all. But if it keeps the cost down, I guess it is O.K. just realize at some point you are going to need replacement scoring counters. 3. Only a 3-4 player game. There is a two player version that works, but as the fun is in guess someone's next move it starts to get predictable with just two players. The 16 card total makes more than four players not possible.

Ah Love Letter...I wish that I could write a love letter to you delivered by your Princess. This game is amazingly fun for such a simple game. My kids and I play it incessantly and I doubt it'll ever stop. I play the game with buddies over game days, family when visiting, and in our house. It is such a versatile game. I find that when the kids and I are looking for a quick 5-10 minute filler before going to school we pick up Love Letter and play a round or two. Which in my opinion is so much healthier than watching television in those times. The game plays quickly enough to grab a game here & there but is intricate enough to provide many hours of fun. It's easy to explain to new players and if they don't get it after the explanation, one round through is sufficient to grab the majority of the game. I liked the game so much that I created a copy for myself to play with a buddy at work...it was actually a running gag. We had created a paper chess board & paper chess pieces and would play chess at work. Then we built another board and would email moves to each other over the day. However, we ended up enjoying the game so much that I bought another copy to keep at work. The fact that the game is so small made it another easy candidate for backpacking trips. During winter hikes I'm able to keep it in my chest pocket, when not hiking with a jacket I end up keeping it in my pack. Even with the cards being paper cards, i've yet to bend any of them by keeping them either in my pack lid or else in other areas that prevent bending. Overall, I love the game, it's a lot of fun and continues to be a hit in our house.

It took only one time playing through this game to learn the system. There are four handy cards which have the information about actions to take on a player turn and the card values and quantity. Note that there are two ways of cheating in this game that are easy to do and hard to discover in a 3 or 4 player game. The rule book mentions these two cheating methods the easiest would be failing to discard the Countess if one draws the King or Prince; the other method is failing to discard one's card if an opponent draws the Guard and rightly guesses one's card in hand. The rules are simple: Draw a card, then discard one of the two cards in hand, using the effects on the discard immediately. The player(s) remaining at the end of the round show their remaining card, the card with the highest point value is the winner and that player receives an affection token. The winner of the game would be the first to 4, 5, or 7 tokens (depending on number of players). Players can be knocked out of the round by various card effects, so if everyone else is knocked out, the remaining player wins the round, no matter the score on the card they possess. An example: in a two player game, player one has the Countess. He or she draws the Prince, forcing the discard of the Countess. Player two possesses the King, then takes a turn drawing the guard and adds to the hand, discarding the Guard and using the effect. Player two, having the King, guesses that player one has the Prince. Player one discards the Prince and the round is over with an affection token going to player two. Note that one can see two easy ways of cheating in this round: player one discarding the Prince instead of the Countess, or player one denying they have the card that player two guessed. In either instance, at the end of the round, the cheater would probably be discovered (unless several more turns passed). The game contains a small rule book that does a good job explaining things. The rules are also on the Alderac website. Just search Alderac AEG Love Letter. I highly recommend this game for anyone who wants a fun, luck filled game. It is not a strategic game, and the rules are simple with a short learning curve. It's not Dominion, or Catan of course; but it is short, easy, and fun for all ages.

One round will only take a few minutes but you will want to play over and over. The goal is to knock your opponets out of the round while not getting eliminated yourself and if you make it to the end of the round you need to have the card with the highest value to win. There are so few cards that everyone can easily learn the unique powers (and rules) that each card has in no time and those powers are so well designed and simple that it makes for a very fun and different experince everytime you play. Here is an example: My daughter draws a Baron card which allows you to compare the other card you are holding to any other players card. The player with the lowest card value is eliminated. She chooses me and I have the King card (value 6) which only two other cards (out of 16) can beat. I think my chances are good then discover she is holding the Countess (value 7), I'm eliminated, bummer. The next round, I'm dealt the Countess and draw the Baron. Ah Ha! payback time. I choose my daughter and expect to elminate her only to discover she was dealt the Princess (value 8) and I elminate myself. The game is awesome and it's affordable. I would highly recommend buying it before they stop making it one day.

Quick to play, easy to learn and teach, great details in the accompanying booklet - one of the best portable games I’ve played.

Es un juego bastante rápido y sencillo de entender. Las partidas no duran más de 5 minutos y son bastante ágiles y movidas. Tendrás un montón de risas y buenos momentos tratando de eliminar a tus rivales y conquistar el corazón de la princesa. Está recomendado para 4 jugadores, pero con algunas adaptaciones de las reglas se puede estirar hasta 5 o 6 (máximo). Aunque las instrucciones vienen en inglés, solo necesitas nivel básico para entenderlas o buscar las reglas en español, pero es bastante sencillo y muy divertido. Ampliamente recomendado.

A fun and fast game for four people. Its a game that requires deduction to figure out what card the other player holds. Each round takes 4-5 mins to play. Perfect filler game.

Just what I wanted. Ordered on Friday and arrived on Sunday.

very intriguing name and so unique. Great way to spend time with friends and family.