Disclosure: Meeple Mountain received a free copy of this product in exchange for an honest, unbiased review. This review is not intended to be an endorsement.
A Brand Name
I’ve always had a soft spot for John D. Clair games. I have fond memories of getting smoked by my father-in-law at Space Base, nights of pirate galavanting in Dead Reckoning, and shouting at my gambling friends in Ready, Set, Bet. When Clair’s name is attached to a game, my interest climbs, and so do my expectations.
Following in Allplay’s “small box, big game” line of aesthetically pleasing (and space‑saving) packages, Ruins immediately stood out to me, and I had high hopes. Add in the fact that it’s a card‑shedding game, and I was basically sprinting to get it to the table. Over the past year, I’ve grown a real affinity for trick‑taking and card‑shedding titles. Some of my favorites include Scout, Tichu, Linko, and Things in Rings.
Put all that together, and I was expecting a home run. But are these ruins worth exploring or better left untouched? Grab your handy‑dandy flashlight, and we’ll find out together!
Discovery Diving
Ruins plays over four rounds or until a player hits the winning score. Everyone is dealt a hand of cards valued one through ten. On your turn, you’ll play either a single card or a set of matching values. Each play must match or exceed the previous one; otherwise, you’re passing.
Spread across the table are “discovery” cards—clear upgrades that are sleeved into cards you’ve played, boosting their value or granting a special effect. Picking up these discoveries costs “fire” tokens, which refresh each round or through card abilities.
If a preceding player plays the same value, the next player gets skipped. Play continues until someone sheds all their cards and scores first‑place points. Everyone else keeps going until they also go out, earning progressively fewer points as the round wraps up.
If a player has nine or ten points and wins the next round, they’re crowned the victor. Otherwise, any players tied at the top enter a showdown round to determine the ultimate winner.
Ruined
I had pretty high expectations for Ruins, especially since it blends card shedding with card crafting—something Clair has explored extensively in Edge of Darkness, Mystic Vale, and Dead Reckoning. It’s even become its own subcategory on BGG: “Card Crafting System (AEG).” I later discovered that Ruins is also a reimplementation of Custom Heroes, aiming to refine the groundwork laid back in 2017.
And… It’s fine. My first play was a 2‑player game with my wife, and it was god‑awful. In a two‑player setup, the card distribution is so swingy that the better-dealt hand almost always wins. We tried again at higher player counts, and while the experience improved a bit, it still never really lifted off.
I appreciate the attempt to freshen up card‑shedding and climbing, but the ideas feel more tacked on than integrated. The market offers occasional “ah‑ha!” moments where you can sneak past an opponent’s play, but when the market is bad, you’re just stuck. There’s no way to cycle it, and upgrading your cards becomes uninteresting if there’s nothing worthwhile to buy.
Players also flip one base card to its alternate side at the start of each round (a slightly stronger side), but it doesn’t meaningfully add to the fun. The card upgrading ends up feeling more like a gimmick than a strategy.
There are some added “oh’s and ah’s,” like skipping players or permanently claiming a played card for future rounds (all other cards are reshuffled each round). But even these moments feel like distractions meant to mask a fundamentally okay game underneath.
The sleeves and layering cards are excellent quality, bursting with color and pop, but the theme is almost nonexistent.
My non‑gamer friends had a good time, but as someone who plays far too many games, I know there are stronger options out there. Though it’s largely a miss, the game does deliver a few interesting moments here and there, but not enough to save it.
I’d pass on this one unless you’re a big John D. Clair fan. If that’s you, then go explore these Ruins, but do so with caution.
Ruins details
- Designer: John D. Clair
- Artists: Jake Morrison
- Publishers: Allplay, MDCAT
- Release Date: 2025
- Player count : 2 - 5
- Age range : 13+
- Time range : 40 minutes
- Mechanism(s): Hand Management, Ladder Climbing, Layering, Lose a Turn, Ownership
- BGG Geek Rating: 7.11566 - converted to Meeple Mountain scale: 3.5.
- More articles about Ruins.
