Whether it’s the speedy pattern-matching of Loonacy, the time-traveling strategy of Chrononauts, or the festive rule-shifting chaos of Holiday Fluxx, the folks at Looney Labs are constantly crafting new games that are visually engaging and offer high replay value. They sent us a copy of their newest card game, and we’re happy to give it the full PuzzleNation Blog treatment.

So, without further ado, let’s explore Just Desserts!

Just Desserts employs a similar game mechanic to Looney Labs’ flagship game, Fluxx: collect Keeper cards and be the first to match a pair of Keeper cards to the current Goal card.

In Just Desserts, you’re collecting Dessert cards and trying to match them to various sweet-toothed guests. You see, each Dessert card represents different ingredients that your guests enjoy or dislike. You want to play desserts that a given guest will enjoy, hoping to match each of their preferred ingredients without including an ingredient they hate.

So, for instance, The Little Boy likes chocolate, cookies, and marshmallow, so you need Dessert cards representing each of those flavors. But he also has a favorite dessert: S’mores. If you had the S’mores Dessert card, you can cover all of his favorite ingredients with a single card, adding him to the happy guests you’ve collected, and earning yourself a bonus Dessert card.

The guests belong to six different-colored suits, and to win, you must collect three guests of the same suit or five of different suits.

And the relatively few Guest cards available — when compared to the massive number of Dessert cards you can collect — makes each guest a prized commodity.

The simple game mechanic and wide variety of Dessert cards makes this not only a terrific introductory game for new players or younger players, but also gives the game great replay value, as you try new combinations of sweets to satisfy your picky guests and gather a winning array of cards.

From a puzzle point of view, scanning the various ingredients represented by the Dessert cards in your hand — not to mention figuring out the most economical way to employ them — and secure Guest cards effectively definitely makes for a fun, and constantly evolving, puzzle experience.

The one problem with this game? It makes me hungry.

Nonetheless, Just Desserts is a treat you can indulge in over and over without gaining a pound.

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