Hip Pocket Games

Hip Pocket Games are a line of small card games from Cheapass Games. All of the games consist of a small deck of cards packaged with a sheet of rules in a ziplock bag. Although the brand name and packaging suggest portability, many of the games in the series require players to use many markers in several colors. Several of the games involve elements of tile placement and area control. Some, as indicated with an asterisk below, were previously released as a typical Cheapass envelope edition. The dates listed are specifically for the Hip Pocket Games edition.

Changes from Previous Editions

The original 1997 envelope edition of The Very Clever Pipe Game contains 120 cards with black borders. The Hip Pocket edition contains only 48 white-bordered cards, including some new pipe configurations. The Hip Pocket edition also modifies the initial deal to 9 cards, but the players must discard 4 of them, reducing the likelihood of a poor starting hand. Both versions support 2 to 4 players.

The 1998 envelope edition of Safari Jack supported up to 4 players and had black-and-white cards. The Hip Pocket edition is often referred to as Safari Jack Remix (as it appears on the Cheapass Games website), however the title on the game's packaging remains simply Safari Jack. It supports only 2 players and has full-color cards. The rules mention that two copies of the Hip Pocket edition may be combined to support up to 4 players.

The gameplay and deck distribution of The Big Cheese have not changed since the original 1998 edition. The Hip Pocket cards have the same artwork but are smaller with a light gray background and a black circle behind the numbers. The Italian version by Red Glove features completely different artwork.

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