iBanjo

This is my plug for my friends’ new card game. If you’re not a boardgamer geek, you may want to move on.

We first met Chris and Clare about four years ago, as they were neighbors in our Chicago neighborhood. We were thrilled to discover they were gamer geeks like us, and our two toddlers became great friends too. Clare is an anthropologist, and Chris is an ER doctor. And together they designed a great new card game based on their travels.

This is the story they tell (no doubt retold and twisted a hundred times): for Clare’s PhD field work, they moved to a rural area of the Andes mountains in Bolivia. While Clare did research and interviews, Chris took up a job in a local medicine clinic. One day somebody came into the clinic with a headache, and one of the other doctors sent him away with antibiotics. “Why did you give him antibiotics for a headache?” Chris asked. Answer: “Well, that’s what we had today.” Hmmmmm.

So Chris got inspired. He created a hilarious card game where each player takes on the role of a corrupt doctor. Everyone is dealt a patient with some sort of ailment, along with a hand of completely random “treatment” cards. The object of the game is to play as many treatments on your patient so as to make as much money as possible, but without killing the patient. (It’s tricky, since some treatments help, some harm.) The game is brilliant and hysterically funny, and I’m thrilled they’ve finally announced a professional printing of the game! That’s right, you can order it right here from their site. I’m going to do everything I can to get independent game stores to stock it. 🙂