Love Letter is another quick deduction card game. The game is for 2-4 players with each player getting 1 card at the beginning of the game and then drawing 1 new card each turn then deciding which of the 2 to reveal and play. Each card has a rank and a special ability, and your goal is to be the player holding the highest valued card at the end of each round. Some cards knock other cards out during the round, so some rounds end before the last card is drawn, but other times all the cards in the deck get drawn (aside from one or more that get removed randomly at the beginning) and at that point, many times the player holding the Rank 8 card is the winner of the round. The game usually lasts about half an hour or less after one player has won a set number of rounds.
In the original game, the game has a medieval theme and the Princess is Rank 8, the highest ranking card, while other cards include Guards, the King and the Prince along with other similar characters. Holding the Princess card represents getting a letter sent directly to the Princess rather than going through an alternate person in order to get your note of affection to her.
In Love Letter: Batman Edition, which I own, it's pretty much the same as the original, except the artwork is totally Batman themed, with Batman being the Rank 1 card that has the ability to call out others and knock them out, and the Joker being the Rank 8 card as the biggest villain in Gotham trying to avoid getting caught. Another change in this game is that when Batman knocks someone out, he gets another token (victory point) in addition to the player who wins each round, so the victory point requirement is higher than the original game.
There are many other themes that have been put onto other versions of the Love Letter game, including The Hobbit and a Christmas themed version called Letters To Santa. Some of the versions have the same cards with different art work, others have new rules. The Hobbit is one of my favorites, although I don't own it currently due to it being out of print, but I'm a big fan of the theme and I like the way the additional cards and even the way that the Rank 3 cards each handle their attack in a different way.
Yesterday I played Love Letter: Batman Edition (aka Batman Love Letter) with Janai and Isaac. We were going to play the game with Beth also, but she was unavailable until after our game was over. (As I mentioned before, they are fairly quick games.) I don't remember if Isaac got any points, but Janai won a couple rounds before I managed to knock them both out and win enough rounds for a total victory.
I recently got a new set of card sleeves to hide the backs of the cards because they were getting some wear that was starting to give clues that are undesirable in that game and I definitely recommend getting some opaque backed sleeves for this game, if not at the start, at least for down the road because that will spoil some fun in the game. Overall, Love Letter, any version, is a great game to have for any game collection and is easy and fun, usually with plenty of laughs in my experience.
