Back in February, you may recall that another Steam Next Fest was held on Valve’s venerable digital distribution platform. During that event, among all the various game demos I downloaded, one demo stood out to me. You might also be aware that I wrote about my initial thoughts on the game demo in question about a month after that particular Next Fest concluded.

The game I’m referring to is known as Card Shark. After having generally enjoyed much of what its demo showed off a couple of months ago, I’m pleased to report that I’ve been given the opportunity to review the full game today. I’ll do my best to avoid repeating much of what I’ve already said in my article on Card Shark’s demo. However, I suspect I’ll still have to reiterate certain things here and there.

The game takes place in southern France in the year 1743. You play as an unnamed servant boy who suffers from a neurological condition that causes seizures and renders him completely unable to speak. At the start of Card Shark’s story, you live and work under the watchful eye of a generally abusive patroness who seems to rapidly switch between mocking you, shouting at you, and occasionally treating you like a normal human being.

As a servant of your mistress, your duties largely involve tending to the customers who visit her establishment as best you can without being able to actually speak to them. You mainly do things like pour wine for any patron who requests a drink. As it happens, this is exactly how you end up meeting the man who will change your life forever: the Comte de Saint-Germain.

He visits your place of work, overhears your patroness shouting at you, and asks that you pour him something to drink shortly thereafter. While you’re doing that, he explains that he sees untapped potential in you. You see, the Comte de Saint-Germain is a con artist in need of an accomplice to take under his wing. He asks if you’d like to make some extra cash, and then (assuming you agree) proceeds to elaborate further on his plan.

“I’m going to play a game of cards tonight and I’m going to win – thanks to you,” he explains. On the surface, his plot takes advantage of your status as a humble servant. It’s likely that no one who opposes the Comte de Saint-Germain in a game of cards will think twice about having you periodically refresh their glass of wine. You’ll come to realize that this implicit trust (or at least nonchalance) presents several types of perfect opportunities if you’re careful.

For example, the first thing you’re taught is that while you’re pouring a drink for your newfound mentor’s foe, you can sneak a peek at their cards and use an agreed-upon method of signaling to the Comte exactly what he’s up against. If you do this correctly, the Comte will know what your opponent’s hand of cards contains and how to bet in order to win the round. In these cases, your method of alerting the Comte is by using your cloth to wipe the card table in specific ways based on your opponent’s hand of cards.

The methods of assisting the Comte depend largely on what type of game of cards he’s playing and how many opponents he has. Card Shark never actually mentions any rule sets for games of cards by name. As such, the circumstances mainly determine what your roles and duties are at any given time. In my experience, these changes in circumstances can mean you’ve got a lot to remember. It can become overwhelming if you’re not careful.

To its credit, Card Shark features an accessibility option referred to as “Hint Mode” in case you find that you need it. This feature can be toggled on or off in the game’s options menu, though it’s unavailable if you’re playing on the hardest difficulty setting. While the Comte is engaged in a game of cards, “Hint Mode” allows you to press your R button whenever you need a reminder of certain bits of information. It can tell you, for example, which suit of cards is most numerous in your opponent’s current hand and, thus, what you need to signal to your mentor.

I tried not to rely too heavily on this “Hint Mode” feature, but I found time and again that the game threw so many different sets of rules and duties at me as I progressed that I ended up having to use it more frequently than I would have liked. Of course, it isn’t the game’s fault that I have an absolutely terrible working memory when it comes to things like this. That’s why I’m grateful for the presence of Hint Mode. I know I would’ve performed much worse at the core gameplay loop without it because I could rarely remember an important piece of information or how to do something.

One reason I’ve had to rely so often on Hint Mode thus far is that it can be hard to get a good enough look at your rival’s cards while you’re pouring wine for them. The haptic feedback on the Switch’s analog sticks is helpful here because it allows you to pour the wine more slowly and give yourself a bit of extra time to have a look at everything you need to see. However, I would strongly suggest being careful when employing this strategy. You’ll want to avoid accidentally under-filling or overfilling their glass so as not to attract unwanted attention, as you might expect.

Speaking of attracting negative attention, something major you’ll have to contend with is the possibility that those who face off against you and/or the Comte in any games of cards will likely grow increasingly suspicious that the two of you might be cheating. Of course, you are indeed trying to swindle them, so you’ll have to act quickly in order to win the game before their suspicion meter fills to capacity. You can keep track of how close they are to figuring out your scheme via the meter at the bottom of your screen.

Should an opponent’s suspicion gauge fill completely, they’ll typically either summon the police and have you arrested or see that you end up on the wrong end of a pistol. If you’re lucky, you’ll be taken into police custody and one of the Comte’s friends will be able to pay your bail, but it’s unwise to count on that happening. There are worse fates, of course, all of which constitute a “game over.”

As a matter of fact, the game demonstrates the suspicion mechanic at the beginning of the game by showing that the entire reason you fled your original place of work and joined the Comte full-time is that his first opponent was able to put two and two together. The fellow unintentionally fatally shot your mistress in his ensuing fury rather than either of you, so you decided to join forces with the Comte before getting the heck out of Dodge, so to speak. I’d say that’s a pretty efficient way of suggesting that you really don’t want to draw any unnecessary ire or attention.

The suspicion mechanic is essentially the bane of my existence within Card Shark. The best example I can provide as to why I say that is as follows. You’ll eventually reach a point in the game’s story where the Comte will begin slipping a second deck of cards into your pocket periodically when you pour him a new drink. You’ll then have to move to a back room out of sight and quickly remove certain cards you picked out from that new deck so that duplicates of those cards aren’t in play.

That’s on top of having to remember which cards you selected to become duplicates in the first place, though Hint Mode can help with that. The longer you take to do this, or virtually anything else the Comte asks of you during a game, the more quickly your opponents will become suspicious. I find that it can be quite difficult for me to do as the Comte asks in anything resembling a timely manner in most circumstances I’ve encountered thus far.

Even assuming I do manage to complete the various cheating mini-games decently quickly, the opponent’s suspicion meter has usually filled enough by then to leave me at a considerable disadvantage. This means I have to be even faster during the rest of the card game, which can become a vicious cycle that never ends well for me. However, that brings me to what I see as another point in the game’s favor.

While you’re en route to any of your various destinations within France, the Comte will often teach you a new technique. This usually involves new cheating mini-games and more rules you’ll have to remember and execute as well as you can. Card Shark seems to know it’s throwing a lot at its players and expecting most of that knowledge to stick, though. That’s indicated to me by the fact that the game allows you to practice any new or existing mechanics as many times as you’d like, no matter how long it takes. The Comte has seemingly infinite patience for this sort of thing, which I find quite nice.

That being said, however, I encountered a small handful of mini-games and other gameplay mechanics that I’ve practiced several times each, yet I still can’t seem to fully wrap my head around them. I honestly think that’s more of an issue with the way my mind works to comprehend things like this than it is with the game itself. As far as I’ve played up to this point, Card Shark has always explained every new technique it has introduced quite thoroughly, but a complete understanding of some of them still eludes me.

Overall, I enjoy Card Shark for what it brings to the metaphorical table. I just sorely wish I were better at its various gameplay mechanics. A different game that springs to mind for me because of how many different rules it throws at its players is Papers, Please. The main difference between Card Shark and Papers, Please is that the latter has a constantly up-to-date rule book that you can reference whenever you need to, though doing so does kind of make me feel like I’m cheating. I feel a similar way about this title’s Hint Mode, though there’s no shame in needing certain accessibility options.

My final word on Card Shark is that if you think your working memory is sharp enough to keep up with everything this title will throw your way, then I certainly recommend you give it a whirl. Just remember that practice makes perfect, and this game will give you every opportunity you could possibly need to improve at it. I honestly think more games could learn a thing or two from this title, and I’ve most assuredly enjoyed the time I’ve spent with it. If you’d like to try out Card Shark for yourself, there’s currently a free demo available on Steam.

A Nintendo Switch review key for Card Shark was provided by Devolver Digital for this review.

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Card Shark

$19.99

8.5

Score

8.5/10

Pros

• Core Gameplay Loop Gives You Several Opportunities to Practice New Mechanics
• Helpful Accessibility Options
• Getting the Hang of the Core Gameplay Loop Can Provide a Sense of Accomplishment

Cons

• Even With Practice, New Mechanics Can Be Difficult to Master
• Game Expects Players to Remember Many Rule Sets