Designer: Sergio Halaban (Hart en der Benz, Quartz, Sheriff of Nottingham)

Artist: Eduardo Bera (Crash’em, Medina 2nd Edition, Pasha)

Publisher: Letiman Games (Dino Dude Ranch, Dirigible Disaster, Groves)

Genre/Mechanisms: hand management, set collection, trading

Funding Status: At the time of this posting, Matryoshka is already fully-funded.  In fact, pledges currently total more than 1.5x the initial funding goal.

Player Count: 3-5

Solo Mode: no

Complexity: medium-light

Risk: medium-high

What It’s About: A simple trading and set collection game featuring Russian nesting doll card art.

How It Works:  Matryoshka is played over the course of 4 rounds. Players start the game with 6 cards. They put 2 in their display, then draw 2. Each player then gets 1 turn where they put a card down from their hand, and every other player places a card down next to it in offer. The active player chooses one of the other players to exchange cards with. After each player takes a turn as the active player, players then collect their two cards from their display, combine them with the 6 cards now in their hand, and form a new 4-card display. Each player draws 2 more cards, and the process repeats itself during Round 2. At the beginning of Round 3, players will form a 6-card display, and at the beginning of Round 4, an 8 card display. This partial display of cards, which can change from round to round, serves to give the other players clues as to your entire collection of cards, and opportunities for you to strategically hide certain elements from public view. At the end of Round 4, players lay out all of their 13 cards for final scoring, gaining points for the number of identical cards in each row, and the number of different Matryoshka cards in each column.

Comparisons: Some other trading & set collection games for 3+ players include Chinatown, Colosseum, Mare Nostum, Mare Nostum: Empires, Pit, Ponzi Scheme, and You’re Bluffing!

What Should I Pledge?:
$16 Matryoshka: a copy of the game, U.S. shipping included.
$25 Deluxe Matryoshka: the Matryoshka Pledge with the Deluxe Matryoshka add-on, which includes 2 custom printed meeples and 4 exclusive card sets, each from a different guest artist, U.S. shipping included.
$49 Deluxe Matryoshka plus another game!: choose from either Dino Dude Ranch with the Velociraptor expansion, or The Neverland Rescue Deluxe Edition, U.S. shipping included.

Add-Ons:
None.

KS Exclusives:
None.

All-In Total: In the continental U.S., you’re looking at $25 for Deluxe Matryoshka, shipping included.

Matryoshka completes its Kickstarter on Friday, May 31st and tentatively ships in December 2019.