Game Gumshoes Presents: Squirrels The Card Game
GGP: Squirrels The Card Game
MFG: Friendzy Games
#of Players: 2 - 8
Age Range: 6 +
Sug. Retail: $ 21.99 USD
Overall Construction: This is a card game with 162 cards. Yes, this deck is a little more than 3 standard playing card decks worth of cards. The cards are the size of your standard playing cards, but I don't know that I would use a card shuffler on them. For the most part, unless you are using high end casino cards, I never recommend a shuffler. It's probably best to break the deck down into 6 sections and shuffle them together until you get a nice solid mix. They have a nice glossy finish so they will give you a pretty decent shuffle each time you try to shuffle them assuming you are good at shuffling cards.
The box is laid out in such a way that it travels well with a good seal so the cards don't fall out. The Rulebook fits nicely into the box. The rules were easy to follow and there were graphics that showed a number of examples of what they were describing, but when it got to the section called “Gameplay Example” I would have liked to have seen more pictures of what they were explaining. Where it lacks some images, it does offer some Hints/Examples of how to play better.
Gameplay: The object of the game is to have the lowest total points after the last round of the game. Recommended is 3 rounds, but you can determine that based on how much or little fun you are having. I say little because if you do not shuffle the deck right the first time, you will clump the squirrels and special cards.
Set-up: Shuffle all of the cards together and make sure you do it thoroughly. Next, deal 20 cards to each player. They have not looked at their cards yet. All other cards get discarded.
Now Each player will make 4 stacks of 3 cards in front of them. 2 down and 1 face up, and then keeping the other 8 cards as the hand they get to look at, but making sure they don't show to any other players.
During play randomly pick a first player for your first round. After that, the player with the highest score gets to go first.
Cards that are in a player's hand and the cards that are face up in front of them are their Active Cards. The last face down card in a stack is called a Blind Card and also counts as an Active Card if it is the only card in a stack, but has special rules.
During a player's turn they can take an Action by playing an Active Card. This can be by using a Number Card, Wild Card, Push Card, Skip Card, or a Squirrel Card. If they do not take an Action they must pick up the center pile of cards between the players and added to their hands. More on how the pile gets there later. If there is no pile in the center the Action you have to play is to use one of the cards from your Blind. The interesting thing is that this could help, hurt, or just be a play depending on what card is in the Blind. If the Blind card is Higher than the card in the middle then unfortunately you have to take all of the cards in the middle into your own hand. If the Blind Card is the Same Number as the center cards it is a valid play and gets added to the center. If it completes a set of 4 then all the cards in the center get discarded and they pick a new card or cards to be the new center card. If it is lower than the center number it becomes the new number and if you have any other copies of that number you can add them to your Blind Card up to 4 cards.
This is how the cards normally work:
Number Card: Numbers must be played to the center of the table. You can play a solo card or if you have multiple copies of the same number you can play them all at the same time. Since the object is to eliminate as many cards from your hand as possible, this is the better option. Remember you can only do this if they are the SAME number. You don't have to do this, but it depends on your strategy. You have to play a number equal to to less than any number that is already in play in the center of the table. If there are ever 4 copies of the same number in the center, those cards are removed from the game and the person who completed the stack gets another action.
Wild Card: It card be used in place of any number. When you play a Wild you have to say what number it is supposed to be. It helps if you are playing it off of someone else's number as an equal to or using it to throw down multiple cards of your own.
Push Card: This gives you the ability to push all the cards from the center toward another person for them to add to their hand. Think of it like a Draw 4 in UNO. The Push Card is discarded from the game after use.
Skip Card: Bet you can guess what this one does.... Yep, this allows you to skip a player's turn, but unlike other games, you don't have to skip just the next player. You can actually skip the turn of the person you feel is winning the game or the person you just don't like. They will still take all of the disadvantages from any other negative cards played against them from that round, except other Skips, you can only play one per person. The example they give is Pushing cards at someone after they are already being Skipped. Once the turn that has been skipped has passed, the skip card goes out of the game and the player can be skipped again.
Squirrel Card: All Squirrels work the same.... Squirrels immediately clear the pile of nuts. All cards including the Squirrel get discarded and you get to take another turn to start another stack. I advise doing this if the number has gotten too low for you, but you have them Squirrels handy. They can clear the playing field if you don't have a small enough number. Once the Squirrel has gathered and ran off with the nuts you can place down whatever number suits you best.
If you use a card from one of the stacks in front of you, take the card under the one you use and add it to your hand, but you cannot use it until the next turn.
Players continue until the first player empties their hand of cards. After that the other players get a chance to take one more turn, unless someone plays a Skip card on them. Although, special cards cannot be played on the player who went out at this time, only the other players. Like we said above, the game goes for 3 rounds unless otherwise decided differently beforehand.
Yes/No Recommend: One of the things that drew me to this game is the similarity to UNO. That is not to say it is a perfect match or a one on one match because it has enough mechanics to make this a unique game in its own right. I will say though that the same person that likes to play all of the Skips and Draw4 cards on people in UNO are the same people that are going to be gleefully playing the Skips and the Push cards in this game. I will admit that after we got all of the rules down and played a number of rounds it did get easier. First round we struggled with the cards not being shuffled well enough and having to double check the rules to make sure we were all interpreting the rules the same way. If you find yourself struggling too much with the rules: either from the book, from their website, or reading my explanation, I suggest following this link, it is basically from the company, but is not on their website. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6LN_28Mc98&t=8s
Overall: I think this is well worth the price. This is about an average price for a card game of this type and I think there is plenty of replay value with this game. It was an interesting way to combine UNO and trick taking style games. My father-in-law loves UNO and it is very difficult to get him to play other card games. Being able to like the Push to make someone Draw Four, but having it be more aggressive because you can direct it and you can send more cards than just Four tickled him. Also, being able to hold onto the Skip card to give himself the opportunity to go out was something he was definitely able to get behind.
I think a 6+ age range might be a little young. I would shoot for more in the 10+ but I think it all really depends on the intellect and cutthroat abilities of the kids playing. Heck I know some adults who might not be able to get this game. As I stated above we had to go through the game a few times to make sure we were playing it correctly. Don’t be afraid to play the game with your cards face up in the first round, as a practice round, so everyone can be on the same page with how to play it and get some tips from each other on how the strategies best work against each other.
Where To Get It: So this is a fairly new game and as far as I know it hasn't had a chance to get into any big box stores. That's alright though because you can cut out the middleman and buy directly from the creator of the game at this website listed here.
Posted Jul 9, 2025, 11:14 PM UTC