Review

With mechanical parts named Chthonic Grinder, Quantum Vacuum and Vicious Siphon, players might ask what they've gotten themselves into.

In Privateer Press' new stand-alone card game, Infernal Contraption, two to four players take on the roles of mischievous goblin bodgers (think diminutive mad-scientist tinkers with green skin and pointy ears) who are trying to build machines that will deplete the resources of the other bodgers.

The game comes with a deck of 124 playing cards and a nice box that has both the rules printed on it and plenty of room to store the cards.

For starters, there are four different parts cards: contraptions, upgrades, consumables and power sources. Contraptions are the working parts of a bodger's machine that will, when activated, hopefully create an effect that will take parts away from an opponent. Contraptions have to be powered in order to work.

Adding an upgrade to a contraption usually makes the contraption's effect stronger, but sometimes at a cost. Some cards have effects that can only be used once and are then removed from the game. Known as consumables, these always have to be played off a power source in order to work.

Finally, power sources are just what the name implies. These cards are played to provide power to contraptions and consumables so they can be activated.

On the sides of each card are four sockets which allow cards to be connected to each other. The socket types are gears, voltaic coils, steam pipe, alchemical apparatus and universal. Cards can only be played next to other cards if their sockets match. Any sort of connecting socket can be played next to a universal socket.

Every player is given a Power Core card to begin the game, which they place lengthwise (horizontally) on the table. The remaining cards are shuffled and distributed evenly among the players to form their parts piles. Players draw seven cards into their hand from the parts pile. It is with these cards that they will build their machines.

Machines are built in a horizontal line called the "main line." Any sort of card except a consumable can be played into a machine's main line. Cards can also be attached vertically along the top and bottom of the machine. These are called "plugs." Any card can be played as a plug, and consumables must be played as plugs on a power source.

On his turn, a player adds one card from his hand to his machine for free. For each additional card he adds to the machine, he has to discard one from his hand to the communal scrap heap. After adding as many contraptions and upgrades to the machine as he wants (or can), the player chooses an opponent and "flips the switch!"

Proceeding from left to right, the player reads the effects of each card in the machine and resolves them, typically sucking cards out of the opponent's parts pile, stealing them from his hand and busting up his machine. After reaching the last card in the machine, it shuts down. The player replenishes his hand back up to seven cards from his parts pile, covers his head and hopes that the guy he just put through the Improbability Matrix doesn't come looking for a little satisfaction.

Winning is simply a matter of being the last bodger in the game with cards in his parts pile.