We are here to examine the age-old question: is cereal a soup? Apparently, anything can be a soup if you put your mind to it! The Cool Gamer Retirement Home has teamed up to create something exciting and new for the first time ever. We made a card game for you to play at home with friends, family, maybe even your pets. Hopefully, you find yourself here because you own one of our Limited Run Oops! All Soups! decks and found our clever rules card. We hope to help you make sense of this game. It’s a little bit like rummy, and it’s inspired by Palia’s minigame Hot Pot.

Basics

2 – 4 players

Each player will be dealt 8 cards at the start of the round. If any players genuinely believe cereal is a soup, they shall deal first as punishment for their incorrect beliefs. The dealer will then turn over the top card of the deck and place it in a separate discard pile. The player to the left of the dealer will go first. On their turn, a player will draw 1 card, either from the deck, or the discard pile. They must discard 1 card to end their turn.

The goal is to match cards in a kettle. A kettle consists of 3 cards: either 3 identical cards of the same suit, or the 3 unique cards in a suit. The first player to get 3 kettles gets a pot, and wins the round.

The only time a player will not discard a card to end their turn is when the card they pick up completes their final kettle and wins them the game. That player is a true hotpot hot shot. They will play the pot and declare “Oops! All Soups!” Because of course, anything can be a soup if you try hard enough! The game ends as soon as the pot is played, and points are tallied.

Suits

There are 10 suits in the game. 8 suits are standard, and 2 suits are special.

Beans

Cereal

Fruit

Fish

Fungi

Grain

Meat

Root

Cursed

The cursed suit is the first of two special suits in the game. There are only 6 cursed cards in a deck. If you end a round with cursed cards in your hand, you lose 5 points for each card you’re holding. However, if you successfully play a kettle of 3 unique cursed cards, the game ends immediately. All other players lose 10 points! How devious!

Star

The star suit is the second special suit in the game. There are only 2 star cards in a deck. If you have a star card in your hand, it can be played with any two cards of any suit to make a kettle. That’s wild! It can also be used to cancel out any cursed cards in your hand when the round ends.

Points

Whoever plays the pot gets 10 points.

Each kettle played by the hotpot hot shot is worth 5 points.

Each kettle played by non-winning players is still worth 5 points.

Each cursed card left in someone’s hand is – 5 points.

If someone plays a cursed kettle at any point in the game, the round ends, and every other player gets – 10 points. You can still earn points for each kettle played, in the event of a cursed bowl of soup.

Souptember

This is our third annual Souptember, a charity event based around very strong opinions on food categories. This year, we are raising funds for the PCRF. The cards are on a limited printing run and may not be available after October 2024, outside of future charity events. Be sure to follow our blog and find us on social media (@CGRHStreams) to see if we’re bringing these cards back in the future!

Even if September is over, the spirit of Souptember will live on in our hearts.