Avast ye scallywags and ready yerselves to learn about one of the finest treasures to be found across the seven seas! Gather yer crew and get ready to find out who yer true friends are and which are a bunch a shrewd, pillaging buccaneers ready to steal your tricks and glory like the hornswagglers they be!

Aaaarrrrgggghhh!! Let’s get to it lest ye walk the plank!

Okay, still here? I think I’ve exhausted my pirate lingo knowledge, but seriously, if you haven’t heard about Skull King from Grandpa Beck’s games, then get ready to head to Amazon after reading this review because yes, it is that good!

What Exactly is Skull King?

Skull King is a trick taking strategy card game where players will attempt to take the number of tricks they bid and earn points over a total of ten rounds. If a player makes their bid they’ll earn points, if they miss their bid they’ll lose points. The player with the most points at the end of the ten rounds wins!

Yaaaar, what be a trick?

A trick is a card game term that refers to a unit of play where players play a card from their hand. The highest card played wins the trick.

In Skull King there are three main suits (Orange, Green, Purple) and one Jolly Roger suit (black). These suits are each numbered 1-14. When a person leads with a suit, all other players must follow the suit if they have it. Whoever has the highest card in the suit once all players have played will take the trick. The Jolly Roger suit trumps the main suits, meaning a 1 Jolly Roger can beat a 14 in Orange, but a 2 Jolly Roger will beat the 1 Jolly Roger suit. 

That might seem simple enough, but Grandpa Beck takes it a step further and really ups the strategy by adding four types of non-suit Special cards into the mix. 

First there are Pirates! Pirates beat any numbered card played and can win the trick. The first pirate played will win the trick, any other pirate played thereafter will not trump the original pirate. 

Next there are Escape cards. Maybe you don’t want to take the trick and need a quick escape. If you play an Escape card you’ll automatically lose the trick, a valuable card that can mean the difference between hitting or missing your bid.

Then there’s Tigress. There is only one of this cunning card in the deck. When playing Tigress you can choose whether you want her to function as either a Pirate card or an Escape card. A valuable card that gives you options that can help get you keep your ship on a steady path if you play her right. 

And finally there’s the Skull King. Just as there can only be one captain on a ship, there is only one Skull King in the deck. The Pirate Captain is the highest-ranking card in the game and beats all other cards, including any Pirates played for which the Skull King will earn bonus points if he is able to capture any during the round his is played.

It’s these four special cards that really take this game to the next level and takes this from a simple card game to a strategy filled one. 

If you’re familiar with the classic Up & Down the River then you’ll feel right at home with Skull King. Each round players are dealt the number of cards corresponding to the round number. So 1 card each in round one, 2 in round two, 3 in round three and so on and so forth all the way to round ten where players will be dealt 10 cards each. Each round it becomes increasingly difficult to hit your bid and you must employ your best strategy in how and when to use the cards you have been dealt. 

When the cards are dealt and the players ready, the dealer leads the group in bidding. Players will pound their fists in unison three times on the table while chanting “Yo, Ho, Ho!” where on the third pound everyone will indicate their bid by extending the number of fingers equal to the tricks they are about to try and win. The bids are recorded by the scorekeeper and the game begins!

What’s in the Box?

Inside you’ll find 110 illustrated cards, a rules sheet for the original game, a second rule sheet detailing the Legendary expansion, and a score pad. Everything is really great quality and the box is wonderfully sturdy and ready to hold up to numerous trips to be played with friends and family.

There be an expansion?!

Including the Legendary expansion in the box is a great addition. Once you have a good handle on the game and are ready for an added challenge, the expansion adds in a slew of new cards that add a whole new layer of strategy to the game. 

With Mermaids who can capture the Skull King, Loot cards which allow players to form alliances (my favorite!) and the Kraken which destroys the trick entirely (!) everyone will have to adjust and improve their strategies to end the game victorious.

But it doesn’t stop there! The expansion also gives advanced abilities to the pirate cards which is a great way to add personality to the already fun illustrated cards. 

There are also suggestions on how you can adjust and modify the game to suit your needs. I love this because this is something that I feel every family ends up doing to their card games anyway and its one of the fun aspects of the card game genre. 

There are always “house rules” for games and if your family has a favorite card game, the same game might look different played by your friends family! It’s just a fun quirk and I like that its embraced here. 

What Do We Think?

If you can’t tell, we love this game! So much so we even included it on our Gift Guide! 

Skull King is a game that as soon as I opened it, I knew I was going to love it. There is just something comforting and inviting about a card game. It’s nostalgic and satisfying to break the seal on a fresh deck of cards and begin to break them in. This game not only feels familiar, but you can tell it was designed by people who not only love a good strategy game, but also enjoy how it brings families together. My favorite touch on the entire game isn’t actually the game itself, but is found in the rules where it talks about how the player with the lowest score has to do the dishes. 

I mean, how great is that?? (unless you lose of course…)

When I think of my family gatherings, a few things pop into my mind:

-Delicious food
-Laughter
-Conversation
-Warm cookies
-Cards at the table!

In a lot of ways, these have now become the key ingredients for just about any gathering we hold in our own house. Whether it’s with family or friends, few things compare to being able to spend time with those you care about, gathered around the kitchen island or dining table, enjoying a meal, snagging a cookie, and just catching up. And most times these get togethers involve at some point a fun game. Growing up, that game was Canasta and through the years my love of cards turned into a love of board games, but it’s the way they bring people together that is why I play them.

It’s also why I truly believe that on every game shelf there should be some great card games. 

Games like Skull King invite and welcome everyone to the table. We were able to play this game over the holiday with four generations around the table! Making those memories is what this is all about, the game is just a vehicle to help get everyone to the table where we can enjoy each other’s company, some laughs, friendly competition, and, hopefully, a score that gets us out of dish duty!

We highly recommend Skull King! 

A special thanks to the team at Grandpa Beck’s Games for sending us this copy of Skull King. While we did not purchase this game, our reviews and opinions, as always, are our own.

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