Bears vs Babies: A Monster Building, Baby Eating Card Game

It’s time to build a ferocious mutant monster army and go to war against the babies. Fight them on the sea, fight them in the sky, and fight them on land! Never yield! Eat the most babies! And win the game!

Bears vs Babies is a light strategic card game designed for 2-5 players with a playtime of roughly 20 minutes.

Gameplay

Each player starts with a hand of one bear head card and four cards from the deck. The rest of the deck is divided into roughly three stacks and placed on the game mat. The mat also has spaces for the three different types of babies: land, sea, and sky. Whenever you draw a baby card, you always place it face-down in the appropriate pile based on the baby type.

On your turn, you may choose one of three different options. You can take 2-4 actions (depending on the number of players), provoke, or go dumpster diving. When you go dumpster diving, you take any card of your choice from the discard pile and add it to your hand. When you take an action, each action can either be to draw a card from any of the three draw piles or to play a card from your hand. If you draw a card and it’s a baby, you must place it face-down in the correct stack on the game mat and this still counts as your action spent.

Most cards you play will be monster parts. During the game you will be building a monster army. For each monster you must start with the head. Each monster head will be one of the three types (land, sea, or sky) except for the bear heads, which act as wild and belong to all three categories. You can build multiple monsters at a time and have more than one monster of each type.

Monsters can have different body parts added to them, matching the number of stitches along the edge of cards to show which cards can be connected. Each monster body part has a strength number. A monster’s total strength is determined by adding up all the numbers on all its body parts. There are also additional ability cards that you can play, such as one that allows you to swap heads between monsters or hats that double a monster’s strength.

When you provoke, you choose one of the three types of babies and reveal all the face-down cards in that type’s baby stack. All players must now fight these babies. Each player adds up the strength value of all their monsters currently on the table that are of the same type as the babies. Then you add up the value of all the babies that are fighting. The player who has the highest total strength that also exceeds the babies’ strength, wins the babies and place them in his score pile. If no one’s strength exceeds the babies, then the babies are discarded. All monsters that fought the babies, regardless of whether they won or lost, are discarded. The player who provoked the babies does not necessarily have to have any monsters of the type he chose in order to provoke them, but there must be babies of that type in the stack.

The game ends once there are no more cards to draw and everyone has had a final turn. The player with the most points from the babies in his score pile wins the game.

Review

Bears vs Babies is an interesting blend of a light strategy and a lot of luck. You’re unlikely to know exactly how strong each baby is going to be in a stack when you provoke it, so you’re alternating between attacking when you hope you can defeat it and provoking when you’re hoping it will defeat your opponents. There can also be a push-your-luck element, as all your monsters of a type will be discarded when they fight, so you want a baby army to be strong enough to be worth discarding all those monsters, without exceeding your strength.

There is a lot of luck in the game. Sometimes you might be stuck waiting to draw a monster head or bodies. However, the dumpster dive ability helps to ensure you have that option to just go after that one card you really need, especially as the discard pile grows.

The game has an excellent rulebook that teaches you by having you play through several rounds as it introduces new rules. On top of which, the actions you can take on your turn are printed right there on the game mat, which makes it easy for everyone to remember their options as they play.

There is no question that the furry, pet-able game box of Bears vs Babies is one of the best game boxes we have ever encountered. Who doesn’t want something fuzzy to pet? It’s fun and creative and definitely eye-catching and fits the quirky nature of the game well. Meanwhile, the artwork is going to be hit or miss depending on the players. Some people will find it humorous while others are likely to find it a bit unpleasant. But the design does do an excellent job of showing which cards can connect, and the different combination of monster names is enjoyable to read out.

If you enjoy light, luck-heavy card games that still manage to present interesting choices, Bears vs Babies is a creative one with great presentation that’s put together quite nicely.

Pros: Excellent production, blend of light strategic choices with luck of the draw

Cons: Some players will find the artwork unpleasant

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