Saddle up, cowboy and get ready to make the wild wild west just a little bit wilder. In Blasting Billy, you and other members of Billy’s posse will be collecting loot. Banknotes, coins, jewellery, gold nuggets and diamonds are all up for grabs. Pilfer a part of the loot, but make sure that Billy doesn’t spot you. If you have more loot than Billy, he’ll shoot faster than the speed of light. Can you survive this Mexican Standoff?
Blasting Billy is a quick and simple, deductive bluffing game in which two to five cowboys divide the loot after a big heist. In turn, players each choose whether to play one of their three cards for themselves, give it to Billy, or put it away. When the draw pile is empty, the riches are counted. If, for a particular type of treasure, you have a higher score than Billy, he mercilessly shoots you down and your score for that treasure no longer counts. The last outlaw standing with the highest score wins. If all players have been shot by Billy, the player with the highest remaining score wins.
There are several cards in increasing values and in different colors. On the back of a card you can see what color and treasure will be depicted, but not the value of that specific card. All cards for Billy are played face down and for players only the first card of a color will be played face down. Players must, based on limited information, decipher and guess what other players have collected. By bluffing, you try to fool other players. For example, give a lot of low value cards with Billy to make other players believe that they are safe.
Blasting Billy does not have any unfamiliar game mechanism. We know this mechanism from, among others, King’s Breakfast. Nevertheless, this fast paced game full of deceit is extremely entertaining and has an appropriate theme. Like real outlaws and sharpshooters, players try to study each other under the threat of a possible firefight. If you see spot the strategy of another player, you can try to mercilessly halt them. However, you will need the right cards to do so as luck is a mitigating and surprising factor. For the Lucky Lukes amongst us!
What do the others think:
What the game does very well is that you are always busy reading the other player. In this way, it really is a kind of standoff.
Chris
The game becomes more fun when it is played more often in a row: you read the opponent better and can therefore better assess whether the accumulated pile of cards actually contains a large number of points.
Per
