The Big Pig Game
Evan’s Games
1-4 Piggies (Players)
Playtime: 40 Minutes
Welcome to Big Pig! In Big Pig, a lot of cute creatures live together in one home. Their humans have left without them to go to the movies, so it’s time for the creatures to eat as much food in the kitchen as they can before they come back. The Big Pig Game is a cooperative game by Evan’s Games, who brought us Robo Junkyard and Bunny Party At Maple Valley!
How To Play
Like most of the games by Evan’s Games, Big Pig Game is suitable for children. For setup, players will determine how difficult they want their game to be, and choose the mealtime that is suitable for that difficulty. For example, breakfast is easy mode, while dinner is hard. All of the foods for that meal will be placed on their corresponding spaces of the board (As indicated on the back of the foods). The game’s three decks will then be shuffled and placed on the board. Each player will choose a character, draw cards from the action deck, and then randomly get bonus cards that will mix up play between games.
To start a round, players will draw a Bad Things card. These cards usually throw a wrench in the players’ plans. Players will simply do whatever the card tells them to do. Then, an item from the Item deck is drawn and placed on the “counter.” Each player will get to do one action, such a “Munching,” taking a card, or playing a card. Munching is the amin way to get foods off the board. Each food has a number corresponding to it, and the player can only munch so many numbers at a given time. After every player gets a turn, the car (Those humans who went to the movies are coming home) will move one space towards the house. Finally, the round will be cleaned up and a new one will begin.
The game ends when players successfully remove all food pieces from the table via actions or munching. If they do this before the car gets home, they win together.
Pacing and Interactivity
Big Pig Game has a nice amount of interactivity throughout. As a cooperative game, players will consistently talk each other through actions as they work together. The Bad Things deck and the characters’ special abilities allows for every game to feel fresh. Players will find new ways to work together and use the resources they have to overcome new obstacles.
The pacing of Big Pig Game is fairly consistent regardless of player counts. Whether it’s one or four players at the table, Big Pig Game does well at scaling the difficulties. More players means less rounds to win the game since in theory, the game should be easier with more players. Interestingly enough, there isn’t really much downtime with higher player counts since players are always working together. What also helps the pacing is the cooperative nature of the game when it comes to setting up big plays. The build up to making a big play as a team is full of anticipation, and it all really pays off well if players can pull this off. As a result, Big Pig Game just feels good to play.
If anything slows down the game’s pacing, it’s set up and rulebook. The setup isn’t anything too heavy, but for the type of game that it is, it feels a bit long. Also, the rules are full of flavor, which is nice for the theme but not great for finding a quick rules clarification. Fortunately, most of these issues only affect the beginning of the first couple games of Big Pig Game, so they don’t really hurt the experience too much.
Theme and Components
As always with Evan’s Games, Big Pig Game is absolutely adorable. The little critters are all cute, and the bright aesthetics of the game really keeps everything feeling cheery. Holly Fowler returns to show off her ability to draw the cutest things possible in different styles. Most cooperative games have themes that make things feel too intense. That’s not the case here where players just get to have a good time and pig out. The art goes well with the theme and the gameplay mechanisms.
I reviewed a prototype version of Big Pig Game, so I can’t speak for the quality of the components. However, I can say that the game goes all in on its theme. The characters come with backstories, and every action and rule fits the theme well. Players will actually feel like they are quickly pigging out in a kitchen, which is nice.
Big Pig Game is Great for Fans of…
Anyone who enjoys cooperative games that don’t come with big stakes will likely enjoy Big Pig Game. Most cooperative games involve giant adventures or pandemics, so its nice to be able to just sit down and eat together. Any fan of the previous two Evan’s Games will also like Big Pig Game. Basically, if you like cute stuff and working together, this is the game for you.
