Ace of Spades
- Board's Eye View
- Jun 9
- 3 min read
There's been a recent Renaissance in games built around poker hands, and surprisingly few involve gambling. Soon we'll all know the difference between a straight and a flush, and which of them tops the other, and we won't need to lose our shirts in the process. Benjamin Amorin's Ace of Spades uses poker hands to defeat a succession of enemies in what is essentially a solitaire game, tho' at a push you can play it as a cooperative two-hander.
There's a Western gunslinger theme to the game but your character isn't up against mere saloon ne'er-do-wells. Rather you're having to work your way through a succession of increasingly tough denizens from Hell before coming up against a Big Boss - Lord Overkill. Thematically then it has reminded us of Shadows of Brimstone (Flying Frog), but the game's title also of course evokes the classic heavy metal Motorhead song from 1980.
Ace of Spades uses a standard deck of cards but it comes with a custom version with stylish designs for all the crown cards. You always draw a hand of eight cards from which to form a poker hand of five cards. Additionally there's an enemy deck of 48 large-format cards; four of each numbered card. You choose the difficulty level of the Lord Overkill boss card but all the others are randomised so that you have a face-down enemy deck of 12 cards in ascending order. You have to work your way beating all the enemies before you come up against whichever of the Lord Overkill cards you chose to confront.
Each enemy will have a number representing its life points (5 on the first one you'll face but rising to 50 for Lord Overkill), and to beat an enemy you have to form poker hands of five cards. The damage done to the enemy depends on the poker hand you create, rising from just 1 point of damage for a single pair to 10 points for a straight flush, but additionally any crown cards used in your hand add 1 point and Aces add 3 points. The points scores for each hand are shown on a game mat which has dials to record the enemy's strength, the number of hands you can play against that enemy and how many times you can discard any number of cards from your hand and redraw.
Tho' the enemies get tougher as you work through them, each defeated enemy gives you a reward; either a single-use ability (for example, to use spades as clubs) or a permanent ability that you can use from then on (for example, for your single pairs to be worth 3 points rather than 1 point). Watch out tho' - many of the enemies also come with specific immunities or limitations on what you can play against them...
This all makes for a tough but addictive solo game. With four variants for each of the succession of enemies there's plenty of replayability, tho' even if there had just been one of each the game would still be very replayable because you never know what cards you're going to draw.
Oh, and tho' you're notionally a gunslinger, don't be too quick on the draw. You're only playing with five of the eight cards in your hand so success or failure in the game often depends on the judgement call you make about the three cards to hold over to your next hand...
