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The Plot Thickens - A Storytelling Card Game

Build a creative, interwoven tale with your friends!

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The Plot Thickens - A Storytelling Card Game

The Plot Thickens - A Storytelling Card Game

The Plot Thickens - A Storytelling Card Game

The Plot Thickens - A Storytelling Card Game

The Plot Thickens - A Storytelling Card Game

Build a creative, interwoven tale with your friends!

Build a creative, interwoven tale with your friends!

Build a creative, interwoven tale with your friends!

Build a creative, interwoven tale with your friends!

Brigette Indelicato
Brigette Indelicato
Brigette Indelicato
Brigette Indelicato
1 Campaign |
Philadelphia, United States
$10,031 USD by 221 backers
$9,856 USD by 216 backers on Nov 12, 2016
Overview
The Plot Thickens is an engaging, collaborative storytelling game of unlikely characters, unbelievable plots and a mad rush to make it all fit together. It's a creative game that's enjoyable for young and old, casual and serious gamers!

The Plot Thickens is a collaborative game where players create a tale that intertwines in ways no other storytelling game has done before!

Whether you're looking for an energetic, easy-to-learn game to play with your family and friends, or you're a more serious gamer with a love for storytelling and RPGs, you've come to the right place. Even if you're not great at improv or storytelling, the collaborative nature of the game makes it easy to weave a fun and interesting story.

Every game is unexpected! You'll create unusual, imaginative and wonderful tales with any group of storytellers you bring together - whether they be strangers or old friends.


You are a character in a Detective, Sci-Fi or Romance story (or any combination of the three!), and the plot is in your hands. You will craft an improvised narrative from a hand of 5 cards, each representing a person, place or thing in your story. The object of the game is to tell a creative tale and interconnect narratives as much as possible, using “plot points” that you will earn. At the end of the game, the player with the most plot points out gets to decide how the story ends, while the player with the most connections to their cards gets to name the story! You decide how long you'd like the game to be, by playing a quick game of 3 chapters or a longer more convoluted game of 6 or 7 chapters.

In The Plot Thickens, players are rewarded for using other players' story cards and bringing their character together into an epic, or hilarious, tale. Everything you do is canon to the one story you're all building. Didn't name your character? Well, someone else can! Every game is a new and unexpected adventure.
 


One of the most fun features is the ability to mix editions! Want to tell the tale of an alien love triangle in a space station on the edges of the galaxy? Mix Romance and Sci-Fi! How about space mobsters from another dimension? Sci-Fi and Detective! What about lovestruck pickpockets on the run from a private eye? You guessed it - Detective and Romance!

Whether you want a space opera, noir thriller, or cheesy romance novel, you can mix things up and let your imagination run wild!

We recommend Ages 10+ for Detective and Sci-Fi, and 17+ for Romance. 
 

 


Choosing your Character

Each player gets 3 Person cards at the beginning of the game. Choose 1 Person card to be your character for the game, and to tell the story from their perspective. Shuffle the unchosen cards back into the red deck.

Story Cards

Now that you have the character that you’ll be “playing”, you need words to build your story. Deal out 1 new Person card, 2 Place cards and 2 Thing cards to each player. This is separate from the Person card you chose to be your character. You should have a hand of 5 cards, and your character Person card down in front of you.


Playing Story Cards

You will use your hand of Person, Place and Thing cards to tell a story. You can use the words literally or figuratively, and you can use any number of the cards in your hand. Add as much flair and description as you’d like. Here is an example of how it works, and how you lay your cards out as you go:

In this example, we introduced the beginning of the story using cards in our hand, as well as revealed and named our character. Once you are out of cards or ideas, you say “meanwhile...” to pass the turn on to the next player, clockwise. As you tell your tale, place cards down as you say them, in the order they come up in the story. You can use as many or as few of your cards as you want, but you want to use as many as you can.

The second chapter works the exact same way, but you lay the next chapter just below your last chapter so everyone can still see your earlier chapter's words clearly to connect to later.

Plot Points
For every story card played (not including your character), you get a plot point. In the example above, we played 4 cards, so we got 4 plot points. The plot points have other uses as well, but the main purpose of them is to Thicken The Plot.

Thicken the Plot
Use other players' cards by incorporating that person, place or thing into your story. When you use a word, put one of your earned plot points on the white area of their card. You can only put one plot point per card, and you cannot put plot points on your own cards. In order to use another player’s word, you must reference the card in the specific context the player used it. For example, if a player put down “file” and explained it had evidence to a murder, in order to use that “file” card, you must be referencing the same file. You can connect to another player’s character card as well as the story cards they’ve used in their chapters.
 


End of the Game
At the end of your final chapter, don't worry about wrapping up the story - that is the Main Character's job! After the last player's final chapter, each player counts their color plot points on other players' cards. Whoever has the most plot points on other people's cards is deemed the Main Character and gets to end the story however they want. Unused plot points don't count!

Whoever has the most plot points on their own cards from other players is deemed the Author, since they contributed elements that everyone wanted to connect to. They get to name the story whatever they like!

There are a few other rules, like "Writer's Block" and "Edits", you can download the full rules here.
 


Since we came up with The Plot Thickens we have tried to share it with as many people as we could. Not only did we get amazing feedback that ultimately resulted in the game it is today, we met wonderful, interesting people along the way. We gained so many amazing stories created in the game and real-life experiences from interacting with so many game designers and playtesters. We want others to have their own experiences, make their own stories, and have a ton of fun along the way!

We are looking to hit a funding goal of $8,000 to meet manufacturing minimum quantities and cover production of a high quality, professionally manufactured game.​

We are also excited to be one of five finalists in the Hasbro Gaming Lab challenge! We need to get 100 unique backers to qualify to win, after which we'll be judged on other criteria. 


 

 

“I had a blast playing this game. It was fast, fun, and really got my brain buzzing.”
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"My favorite game of the day! Wish we could buy it now!"
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"Please dear god, tell me you have found a publisher for this game. I need it."
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"I played this at Unpub recently, and it was, without a doubt, my favorite game there. The character Mr. Tootytoot the loan shark shall forever live on in my memory."

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"So glad to have met you all and been able to play this game. It is truly inspired work. I am waiting in line to buy or pledge for it as we speak!"
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"I'm just going to hand you my wallet, and you can take whatever you need out of it."
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"I really liked everything, down to the color choices and box design. I like the cooperative storytelling. It was a lot of fun to weave the stories together"

 

 

 

Brigette Indelicato
Brigette is a graphic designer and designed all of The Plot Thickens game elements, from every single card in the game to the paperback novel-inspired design of the box. She loves problem-solving through design, and really enjoyed connecting with other people in the gaming community through developing this game. Her favorite part of playtesting and promoting the game at conventions and events was creating strange, wonderful tales with people she never met before.

Thomas Rochelle
The board game expert of the group, Tom collects and plays a new game every month to stay on top of innovations. The mechanics of The Plot Thickens, as well as the rulebook, were brought about from his experience with some of the best, and worst, game manuals. Tom's favorite part about creating The Plot Thickens was testing it with so many people. Being able to hone it to what it is from testers' valuable feedback made all the work worth it!

Mike Callahan
Mike created the hilarious puns found on the character cards and also targeted what themes we would ultimately launch as our flagship genres. His love and knowledge of low-rent pop culture tropes created the core feel of the Plot Thickens. With Mike's direction we crafted what words were included in each edition.Mike's favorite thing about the Plot Thickens is seeing people react to the unusual tales that come from so many unexpected places.

 

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  • Get in touch with us by email with any questions or concerns!


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The Plot Thickens: Romance

$20 USD
Receive one copy of The Plot Thickens: Romance edition.
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July 2017
20 claimed
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The Plot Thickens: Detective

$20 USD
Receive one copy of The Plot Thickens: Detective edition.
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July 2017
34 claimed
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The Plot Thickens: Sci-Fi

$20 USD
Receive one copy of The Plot Thickens: Sci-Fi edition.
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July 2017
34 claimed
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Complete Set of 3 - save $5!

$55 USD
Receive all three editions of The Plot Thickens (Romance, Detective and Sci-Fi).
Estimated Shipping
July 2017
67 claimed
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Special Custom 3 Edition Set

$125 USD
Receive all 3 editions of The Plot Thickens, plus 15 custom word cards to add new elements! (The 15 cards can be distributed between the editions however you like.)
Estimated Shipping
July 2017
7 out of 10 of claimed
Ships worldwide.

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