Use Your Clux Capacitor to Go Back in Time in Chicken Time Warp

You are the best chicken scientists in your field! Unfortunately, while working on time travel, you accidentally ended up stuck in a time vortex (it could happen to anyone). The good news: there is a way out. The bad news: only one chicken can take it.

Chicken Time Warp is a light card game with a quirky theme and minimal rules. Turns are fast and time is ticking, but it might just be reversible.

Gameplay

There are eleven timeline cards, which you lay down in a row in the center of the table, facedown, numbered ten to one, with the final escape window card at the end. Each player has a chicken character card dealt to them and the gameplay cards are shuffled and four dealt to each player. The rest of the gameplay cards are then set on the table as the draw pile.

On your turn you must turn face-up the next timeline card in the line, starting with the highest numbered one. You may then choose to play a gameplay card, and then must draw a card. Gameplay cards have effects such as swapping cards with other players, drawing extra cards, or peeking at someone’s hand.

If you draw a ‘you are dead’ card, you are temporarily out of the game and immediately place your chicken above the most recently flipped timeline card, unless you have a clux capacitor card in hand, which saves you from death. The clux capacitor card can also be played normally on a turn. In both cases you flip the three most recent timeline cards face-down, essentially going back in time. If a player’s chicken card is above a timeline card when it is flipped down, they are back in the game and no longer considered dead. You can also draw 'time slips away' cards, which means that you remove the highest numbered card from the timeline. If a player’s chicken is above a timeline card when it is removed from the game, the chicken is dead for good and the player eliminated from the game.

The goal of the game is to have the escape pod card in your hand when the escape window card is flipped face up and play it on your turn.

Photo provided by the publisher

Review

Chicken Time Warp is a very silly game; it knows it and it totally embraces it. The theme is ridiculous (it’s hard not to chuckle at the idea of time traveling chicken scientists, after all) and the cards are entertaining (especially the ‘you are dead’ cards, which come up with some ingenious ways you meet your demise).

The time travel element is really well done, and the way it is utilized to bring players back to life is clever. There’s a fun hand management aspect, particularly centered around the clux capacitor cards. You want to hold onto them for bad draws, but you also need them to stave off the final timeline card being flipped, as you don’t want other players to have an opportunity to win.

Rules are super light, and it’s a game that’s very easy to teach newcomers to the hobby or those who don’t typically play a lot of games. Kids are going to enjoy it as well, and it's family friendly (with the possible exception of one 'you are dead' card that some parents might wish to remove).

There’s certainly a lot of randomness in the game, and some players just aren’t going to like that. There is also some player elimination which isn’t ideal, but the game is really light and silly, and it’s not designed to be taken too seriously. If you enjoy card games like Fluxx or Exploding Kittens, Chicken Time Warp will likely be a hit.

Pros: Silly good fun, humorous artwork, super light, good implementation of time travel mechanics

Cons: Some players will not enjoy the randomness or player elimination

Disclosure: we received a complimentary review copy of this game.