Suitmatch

In an earlier post, I made the following comments about Suitmatch, a card game I once invented.

I was quite young when I invented Suitmatch, and (although I think the underlying concept is sound), I would advise that anyone wishing to give it a go should bear in mind that it was invented by a child (teenager, really, but the point stands).

I am now going to elaborate on those comments.

Suitmatch wasn’t the first card game I ever invented, but the earlier games are lost in the mists of time. The only fact I recall about an earlier card game of mine is that the royal cards had special properties that reminded Mum of Strip Jack Naked.

I still think Suitmatch was a good idea, and that for my age at the time it was a good game. The idea is original in both the goal and the mechanism, and I’ve certainly played it with people who enjoyed it (such as some of my younger cousins). However, as we age we become more discerning in our creativity - as much so when we’re inventing games as writing songs and stories - and I could no longer recommend Suitmatch to anyone looking for a new game. If there are people out there who still enjoy it, though, that’s cool - I definitely won’t hold it against you.

I vaguely remember simulating a few games several years ago, many years after I’d last played it, and finding to my disappointment that the game really didn’t come up to scratch. At first I blamed the luck of the cards, because in my memory it had been quite a good game, but repeated simulations proved that it wasn’t the cards that had changed but me. Evidently I had become more discerning in the intervening years, so that faults which I hadn’t noticed when I was young now made the whole game inadequate.

The main problem with Suitmatch is that most games last hardly any time at all, i.e. someone wins in just a few turns, far too quickly to generate a sense of satisfaction. Occasionally, unlucky players collect an inordinate number of cards, which is another problem, though a less frequent one. It may be possible to improve the game to overcome these faults while retainining its essence, but this is no longer a task that I’m interested in.

In summary, I’m not ashamed of Suitmatch and I’m happy for people to read the rules and even try it out if they want to. It’s just that when they do, I would like people to know that it was not invented by an adult, and does not meet an adult’s standards. But if you’re the kind of person who enjoys reading stories and poems written by children, then you may enjoy Suitmatch for the same reason.