Like the carnies of lore, Overworld Games is hoping to attract players to its carnival-themed card game Barker’s Row, releasing on May 2.

Named for the carnival “barkers” who advertised the attractions at travelling carnivals, Barker’s Row is a set collecting game designed by Steven Aramini (Yardmaster, Circle the Wagons).  Players are trying to attract an audience of “rubes” faster than their opponents by collecting sets of highly-descriptive words to advertise attractions like “Lobster Boy,” “Goose-Necked Girl,” or the “Fiji Mermaid.” 

Each turn, players add cards to a communal pool of cards that any player can then use to play their attractions, by matching the suits on the cards.  Each time a player plays an attraction, however, it increases the difficulty of their later attractions, providing a catch-up mechanism for the game.

The game features 3-dimensional cardboard “stands” for players to store their collection of “rubes,” represented by wooden meeple pawns.  The first player to fill their stands with 13 rubes wins the game.

Barker’s Row comes with 52 custom meeples, 36 Barker cards (*editor’s note, box is misprinted), 40 Attraction cards, 4 cardboard stands, 1 strongman tower for scoring, and 4 scoring clips.  The game is playable by 2 to 4 players, ages 13 and up, and takes about half an hour.  MSRP is $39.99.

Overworld funded the production of Barker’s Row through a Kickstarter campaign that collected $53,621 from 1,362 backers (an average of $39.37 per backer).

Overworld plans to release two licensed games this year, including one based on the Ninjak comic (see “‘Ninjak vs the Valiant Universe – The Valiant Card Game’”) and another based on the 1990 sci-fi film Total Recall (see “Overworld Games Can Remember It For You Wholesale”).