It Tastes Like Chicken: A Preview of Nug Nugs

Can you remember all twelve cards and be the last person standing in this party card game? Nug Nugs is now on Kickstarter, and we recently had a chance to preview it.

Gameplay

There are twelve chicken nugget cards numbered one through twelve. You lay them out in sequential order, facedown, like a clock face. The rest of the cards are shuffled and put in the center of the table. A player is chosen to go first and the game begins.

The goal of the game is to avoid "butt nugget" points. If you get ten of them, you are out of the game. When the game starts, you draw a card from the deck. There are four main types of cards. If it is a special nugget, you follow its instructions for either earning butt nugget points or giving them to another player. You then replace any of the cards in the circle with this new nugget. If you draw an action card, you choose any player to earn one point and then choose to either replace a facedown card or play it on top of one, combining the two (for example a stinky nugget can become a clapping stinky nugget). With sauce cards, you choose which player to give it to and it adds points to their total and you then draw again. Penalty cards are the same, except you are the one who earns extra points.

After you have finished drawing, you call out "one chicken nugget to my left" or "one chicken nugget to my right" (or whatever type of chicken nugget is currently in first spot. Depending on what you called out, the player on either your left or right must call out the next chicken nugget and so on, all around the table until all twelve chicken nuggets have been called out. However, if a player forgets a chicken nugget and calls out the wrong one, he earns a point. He then begins a new round without drawing a card and goes directly to calling out "one chicken nugget to my left/right." However, if players make it around all twelve cards without making a mistake, the player who called out the twelfth nugget begins a new round by drawing a card.

The game continues until only one player remains.

Review

Nug Nugs is a great party game. Everyone is always involved and you always have to play close attention as the cards change and players try to remember which nuggets are where. Turns are fast and increasingly more difficult as more and more of the cards change. Also, since cards continually add points to players, even if you’re out early, you don’t usually have to sit around and wait for the next game for too long.

For those who don’t like player elimination, the rules suggest a variant in which you play until the first player is eliminated and then the person with the lowest score wins. In fact, the rules offer a couple of fun variations to mix up gameplay.

The wide variety of different types of chicken nuggets are amusing and it’s fun to see all the different designs the creators came up with, and a lot of the off-beat humor will appeal to children as well as adults. However, some parents may not be entirely comfortable with playing the game with younger kids. Notably, the butt nugget points are kept track of with tokens that feature nuggets shaped like, well, butts wearing thongs. It’s obviously not meant to be taken seriously, but it might not sit well with all families.

If you enjoy testing your memory and quick-fire party games, you’ll have a lot of fun with Nug Nugs. Check it out on Kickstarter and see for yourself!

Pros: Fun memory game with good escalation

Cons: Some content may not be appropriate for all families

Disclosure: this preview is based on our evaluation of an unpublished prototype of the game, which is subject to change prior to publication. While a modest payment was received to expedite the review process, our thoughts and opinions expressed here are honest and accurate.