I chose to play Spoons, a party game designed for groups of 4 to 13 players older than 8 years old. The creator of the game is unknown, but in the 1970s, the Spoons card game was marketed as a set designed by Michael Ferch and Janique Crepeau (BoardGameGeek). The game uses the standard 52-card deck and a set of physical spoons where there is one less spoon than there are players.
Spoons is a social game that is dependent on physical reflexes, chance-driven opportunities, and last-man-standing win conditions. These mechanics foster challenge and fellowship through forming social loyalties. My team’s game is based on a twisted version of Duck, Duck, Goose where players scramble to grab eggs and eliminated players use revenge cards to sabotage their way back into the game. Our game benefits from mirroring with mechanics from Spoons to encourage competition through luck-based and reflex-based play.
A core dynamic that our game and Spoons depend on, is the players’ rapid responses to a trigger condition. Generally played around a table or on the floor, players are seated in a circle formation and are tasked with matching 4-of-a-kind (Bicycle Cards). When they have a matching hand, the player scrambles to grab a spoon from the pile – alerting others to also scramble. Similar to our game, the mechanic of having fewer goose eggs than there are players encourages the dynamic of quick reflexes. In turn, this dynamic fuels the aesthetic of challenge. Players are not only tasked to find 4-of-a-kind, but they must also pay close attention to the behaviors of other players and immediately grab for a spoon.
Spoons uses soft-elimination before the final elimination which engages the penalized players to continue even more rounds. Only when a player spells out the entire “S-P-O-O-N” word, will they be eliminated from playing. I was surprised to observe that this mechanic did not discourage the player. Although my team time-blocked our playtesting, a team member urged us to keep playing despite having to add a letter to their spelling of “S-P-O-O-N.” Perhaps the action of writing a letter caused less, or no, anxiety compared to the thought of losing a life or health in other games. Additionally, when a player realized they were one card-shift away from winning a round, they became even more determined to play more rounds (Fig 3). The balance of tension and chance kept players engaged despite the mindless flipping and passing of cards.
Our own game uses a similar mechanic – when a “Wild Goose Chase” card is pulled, all must scramble for eggs. The person without an egg becomes an eliminated player. Our game differs from Spoons by shifting more agency to the eliminated players with revenge cards. The revenge cards are an opportunity for eliminated players to intentionally target and sabotage uneliminated players to gain revival back into the game. The revenge cards prevent disengagement of eliminated players by encouraging dynamics like planning ahead and being strategic with their social alliances (Hunicke, LeBlanc, Zubek). Our game builds a twisted and multi-layered aesthetic for fellowship through the frequently shuffled alliances between eliminated and uneliminated players. Some revenge cards even force players into actions like dancing and singing – feeding the aesthetic of expression (Hunicke, LeBlanc, Zubek). Here are some example revenge cards written by Barry Cheung and Jenny Tao:
Us Against the World: Pick an active player. They must sing any song(s) of their choosing until the end of the turn or they are eliminated.
Do You Need a Duckter?: You can revive another eliminated player.
Lastly, our version of Duck, Duck, Goose mirrors the mechanic of quick-paced, mindless flipping and passing of cards from Spoons. In Spoons, players can partially disengage during the repetitive flipping and passing cards. At the same time, they are also partially engaged enough to stay reactive and grab spoons. Similarly, our game relies on fast-paced flipping of duck and goose cards from a shared deck – drawing a “Wild Goose Chase” card was the trigger for the egg grab. While both games allow players to lean into the aesthetic of submission, the ratio of submission-friendly cards and challenge cards allow for well-timed hooks that keep the players alert just enough (Hunicke, LeBlanc, Zubek).
While our game’s design shares many similarities with Spoons, it incorporates the goose chase – a tagging mechanic from the original Duck, Duck, Goose. This adds physical challenge, but it may disrupt the flow state that Spoons does so well in its intentional role-assignment. In Spoons, each player has their own task of completing a 4-of-a-kind whereas our game triggers the egg grab by chance. Our game shifts higher agency to eliminated players through revenge cards – creating the aesthetics of fantasy and expression. Although these aesthetics were missing from Spoons, it doesn’t mean Spoons is a weaker game. Our game leaned into geese-themed roleplay so the additional aesthetics of fantasy and expression were appropriate. Both games have their own strengths and weaknesses, and by playing Spoons, our team gained a deeper understanding for the interactions we wanted to shape in our own game.
Hunicke, Robin, Marc LeBlanc, and Robert Zubek. MDA: A Formal Approach to Game Design and Game Research. Northwestern University, 2004. https://users.cs.northwestern.edu/~hunicke/MDA.pdf. Accessed 10 Apr. 2025.
“Spoons.” Bicycle Cards, The United States Playing Card Company, https://bicyclecards.com/how-to-play/spoons. Accessed 10 Apr. 2025
“Spoons.” BoardGameGeek, https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/1692/spoons. Accessed 10 Apr. 2025.
