This holiday season, I’m going to review a different module, game or supplement every day. I haven’t sought any of them out, they’ve been sent to me, so it’s all surprises, all the way. I haven’t planned or allocated time for this, so while I’m endeavouring to bring the same attention to these reviews, it might provide a challenge, but at least, I’ll be bringing attention to some cool stuff!

Foul Play is a 13 page game by Hendrik Ten Naple, with art by Em Acosta. In it, you play geese making life hell for unsuspecting humans. You’re going to need a lot of six-sided dice for this game, I warn you.

This is a game of slapstick, so basically if you want to do something a goose could do, do it, and if it’s weird, roll a d6 pool with the usual success ranges. Your geese have knacks, but more importantly they have spite which you can expend to succeed at difficult tasks. Items are on sticky notes on the table, and you can pick them up and use them to achieve your goal (you’re a goose: you have a beak, not inventory). Spite also doubles as currency for resistance (so yes, this goose game appears Forged in the Dark), and when you’re out of spite you go back to nature.

I love that the game comes with a location, but that you can also write your own. This is a pick up game, I shouldn’t be doing prep. I think making your own based on your workplace with your colleagues would be a joy though. All games should come with a location.

Em Acosta’s art is perfect for the game, the layout is an irreverent use of the Explorer Template that lanes the sidebar for bold headings and for hand-scratched notes on play or examples. It’s spacious and easy to read. As a book, it is nigh on perfect for its goals, but…I wish it wasn’t a book.

I’d adore a version of Foul Play that was a deck of cards, because it feels like the biggest barrier to playing this is the bucket of dice, despite there being a certain pleasure to throwing fistfuls. I feel like in a different format, this would be a perfect game to keep in your bag for an odd occasion. I don’t think it would suffer for being redesigned to fit in a deck of cards — there are plenty of games that replicate this math in a card deck — and if they added a location or two that’s an excellent value proposition. The character sheets are cards already, basically.

As is though, Foul Play is quick, simple, goofy fun. I don’t have a lot to say because it’s not a deep game, it’s aiming for hijinks, and succeeds. This is Honey Heist but better and for a new generation. It’s a great way to spend an evening with your friends.

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