Patchwork will appeal to people who like fast paced games that call for a smidgen of strategy and a lot of luck.  Each player draws seven cards (if you’re playing with only two players) and puts them on the arc-shaped wooden holders.  The cards have fun graphic designs (if you have a friend into design, this is a game for them) that are printed sometimes on both sides of the same card–or two different patterns on one card.  You can only look at the front of your cards and the back of your opponents cards. In other words you don’t get to see both sides of either set of cards…and that’s where the fun begins.

On each move you get two actions — with the goal of collecting four, five or six cards from either your own cards or your opponents.  You do this by getting at least four cards in a row with the same pattern.  Since you can see things that your opponent can’t (and vice versa), the opportunities to score look and are different for each player.  There’s something very cool about that aspect of play.

Apart from really enjoying the game play, I love the wooden card holders–which would come in handy for younger children who often have difficulty holding cards.  We do need to note that while we love the game, earlier versions had wooden arcs that were too rough in our opinion. The company  has successfully addressed this quality issue- making this an Oppenheim Toy Portfolio Gold Seal Award winner.  Visit their site: www.knightweavergames.com.