Pyramid Review: Big Aisle, Small Cart

Pyramid Review

Big Aisle, Small Cart

Published by Placebo Press

Written by Eric Kriser & Chuck Wilhelm

Illustrated by Stephanie Brandl

72 cards & rules; $5.95

Big Aisle, Small Cart is the card game of Japan's number one grocery combat show: Happy Fun Shopping Battle. Falling into the Cheapass Games design and price bracket, it comes complete with a deck of seventy-two cards and a four-page A5 rules leaflet. The game is parody through and through -- from the title (does it remind you of a certain anime themed RPG?), through the type of Japanese games shows we have goggled at on the television, to the unintentionally absurd translations found on the supermarket shelves of Happy Fun Shopping Battle!

For three to six players, the objective of Big Aisle, Small Cart is to be the first contestant to fill their shopping cart with five items of different suits, while battling to prevent the other competitors from doing the same. This is done through the cards; the actual act of hurrying around a supermarket in search of the right item off the shelf is not actually part of Big Aisle, Small Cart, which in some ways is a pity, though there is probably room for a game of trolley to trolley combat in this vein on the shelves of your friendly local games store . . .

The cards come in two types -- Items and Specials. Each Item card has two suit symbols upon it. The first represents its actual Suit that counts towards winning the game, and the second its Stop Suit for use in shopping cart combat. The . . .

This article originally appeared in the second volume of Pyramid. See the current Pyramid website for more information.




Article publication date: June 28, 2002


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