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Cheapass Games

It all started in 1996 when James Ernest picked up a new game and said, 'This costs too much." Though we've diversified our product line with Computer Games, Color Games, and Hip Pocket Games, Cheapass Games still manages to produce a few games in the familiar black-and white boxes and envelopes. These are the games that started it all, and the games that keep on coming.

Kill Doctor Lucky (1997): Our first board game is still one of our best, now in a new 'Director's Cut' format with designer commentary, a second board, and lots of great new variations.

Captain Treasure Boots (2005): This full-color board game in a black and white envelope features high-seas adventure in tiny little boats. Sail the seas uncovering buried treasure and improving your ship, then run your booty home for big points and glory. A game of gathering stuff and shooting people, in the classic Cheapass tradition.

The Big Idea, Semideluxe Edition (2004): This game may be the most fun you can have with nouns and verbs. Challenge your friends to invent wacky new products like Disposable Pants and Enigmatic Beer. Whoever makes the best sales pitch (and the best investments) wins the game! Also available: The Big Idea: More Cards, a 64-card expansion from late 2004.

Jacob Marley, Esquire (2004): Uncharacteristically, we only brought out one board game in 2004, and it was one we'd originally slated for 2003. Jacob Marley, Esquire is a game about working in young Jacob Marley's office, lending his money to the trustworthy folks of Victorian England. Score the most points with the boss and you'll become his friend for life (and maybe even beyond).

Chief Herman's Next Big Thing (2003): The follow-up to the very successful Chief Herman's Holiday Fun Pack, this $6 envelope contains more than 20 original games, including board, card, dice, and even billiards games, plus two hilarious unplayable games and an insightful article about game design.

One False Step for Mankind (2003): An intricate and gorgeous board game about Gold Rush towns racing to the Moon. The first Cheapass Game with full-color boards!

Freeloader (2002): Join your friends in a contest to beg, borrow, and steal the leftover goodies of six of your richest neighbors.

Captain Park's Imaginary Polar Expedition (2002): Captain Park was a fraud and never left London. Now you're following in his footsteps, pretending you're somewhere else.

U.S. Patent #1 (2001): Everyone is a scientist and you've all invented time travel. Not all at once mind you, but it doesn't matter who did it first. It matters who makes it to the Patent Office on opening day.

Devil Bunny Hates the Earth (2001): A weird sequel to a weird game. You're a taffy machine in Devil Bunny's candy factory, trying to clog your own works with squirrels.

Unexploded Cow (2001): Two problems with a common solution: mad cows in England and unexploded bombs in France. A perennial favorite.

Witch Trial (2001): Take part in America's budding legal system by persecuting those different from yourself. This is the game that got us in trouble with the religious left.

Chief Herman's Holiday Fun Pack (2000): A collection of more than 24 glorious original games, narrated by the inimitable adventurer Chief Robert Wadlow Herman.

James Ernest Writes off Another Trip to Vegas (2000) (out of print): Circumnavigate a block of funny casinos buying sweepstakes tickets and cheating at poker in this elaborate gambling game.

The Great Brain Robbery (2000): The Zombies at Friedey's have to rob a train full of brains in the Old West. Okay, maybe they just feel like it.

Save Doctor Lucky (2000): A sequel to our best-selling Kill Doctor Lucky, set aboard an unspecified but doomed ocean liner. Give the Doctor your life vest before it's too late!

Fight City (1999): A two-player card game with just a little customizability, both original decks are now available in a single box. It's a city, and they fight.

Deadwood (1999): The classic Cheapass Game of bad actors acting badly. Traverse the Deadwood back lot making terrible movies and setting yourself on fire.

Devil Bunny Needs a Ham (1999): Still remarkably popular despite its tenuous connections with reality: Race to the top of a tall building while Devil Bunny knocks you off.

Spree: Classic Edition & Spree: Hong Kong Edition (out of print) (1999): A clever and remarkably cheap little board game about looting a shopping mall with several of your closest friends.

Bitin' Off Hedz (1998): Race your dinosaur brethren to the top of Skull Island and be the first to go extinct. A mindless and very popular game, now with extra variant rules.

Get Out (1997): The oldest game in the catalog that's still unchanged. be the first on your block to get a job, get an apartment, and get out of your mother's basement.

Cheapass Games Expansions:
We make few sequels, and even fewer expansions, but here are a few you can look at:

Another Day, Another Dollar (2001): Four separate expansions for the Deadwood board game. Each pack contains 15 new cards including Scenes and Special Effects.

Save Doctor Lucky on Moon Base Copernicus (Out of Print) (2002): It's 100 years after you saved him, and now it's time to do it again. On the Moon. Contains new boards for Save Doctor Lucky.

Older Games in PDF:
In 2004, Cheapass Games began releasing its older out of print titles as "orderware," free PDF versions for which, if you like them, you're asked to make a $10 order for something we still make. A pretty good deal, since you were going to order that stuff anyway.

Bleeding Sherwood (1997): Robin Hood has been stealing gold from the rich nobles of England and redistributing his ill-gotten loot to the people who deserve it even less, the poor. You and your cohorts are savvy Nottingham merchants, selling useless junk to the newly enriched peasants of Sherwood Forest. This elegant and often misunderstood bidding game was the first Cheapass Game to fall under the axe. It's clever, it's quick, and now it's a PDF.

Huzzah! (1997): You and your friends are performers at Ye Merrie King James Faire, a renaissance festival that's fallen on tough times. They are only keeping one act next year, and even though you really hate working here, you're even less in love with being fired. Ironically, it's nearly impossible to please the crowds and the director at the same time, so you'll have to pick your favorite angle and play it by ear in this quirky board game about showmanship, competition, and shouting "Huzzah!"

Ben Hvrt (1997): Outfit your chariot, hire the best driver, and thwart your friends in this comical chariot racing game from 1997. This one's not available for free (yet) but you can purchase it for $5 from RPGNow.com. Help us justify our decision to put it there and buy it today, or hold your breath and perhaps you'll find it here tomorrow.

Renfield (1999): Ever wonder what the gravediggers from Parts Unknown are doing on their days off? Of course not. But the answer is this: They're playing Renfield for money! This out-of-print game is now available in free PDF form, since reprinting it was completely out of the question. It's a trick-taking gambling game with pictures of shovels, corpses and bugs. What's not to like?

The Cheapass Games Double-Secret Website is (c) 1997-2006 by James Ernest and Cheapass Games.
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