Is Spyfall A Game Of Mission? Game Review

I’ve randomly heard that you’re a spy… Is that true?

Now when I say Spyfall, I’m referring to the card game, not the TV series, let’s make things clear!

What we really love about this game is that it is a family-friendly card game, which is absolutely amazing, we love it!

Since the first time we played this game, we can’t get over it. It was love at first sight… Don’t worry, it isn’t just us. We heard lots of people talking and (positive) criticizing it!

The game is pretty special, and so is this article. You’ll definitely find everything you’re curious to know about Spyfall, the rules, competition, our experience, price, and so on…

But what are exactly the details you’re about to read?

About Spyfall?;
The Box’s Design;
The Cards Look?;
What Are The Rules?;
My Game Experience;
The Price & Competitors;
The Extra Packs;
FAQ;
Our Final Word;

What About Spyfall?

Designer: Alexandr Ushan
Publishers: Hobby World, Cryptozoic Entertainment
Release Year: 2014
Game Type: Card Game, Social Deduction
Dimensions: 8 x 8 x 2 inches
Number Of Cards: 240
Players: 3-8
Age Range: 13+
Game Time: 6-10 minutes
Level Of Difficulty: Medium
Amazon Ratings: 4.6 out of 5 stars

How Does The SpyFall Box Look?

Why do you care? You’re gonna play with the cards, not the… Calm down, of course you should care! It creates our first impression, which is truly important!

Oh, how much we love this box! Every detail is awesome and just in its place, starting with that ‘gangster’, that pretty lady, the boss cat and all these cool (whoopsies) guns and suitcases!

We saw the front, we loved the front, but, what about the back? What can we find there?

The back is probably all in one place… All the important details about the game, including the game rules, some cards overviews, designer & publisher’s names, illustrations, and lots more. Who am I talking to, you’re already seeing everything!

What we like most is the storage of the box, all the cards fit really great on it, and you won’t have to damage any of them (because that hurts if you’re a card game lover)…

But How Do The Cards Look?

The box was pretty, we got it. But what about the cards?

If you were concentrating while reading the game details (which I wish you were), you saw that there are 240 cards inside the box, including spy cards, and 30 locations (Service Stations, Carnival, Beach, Crusader Army, Airplane, Circus Tent, Bank, etc.)

I guess you wanna see how they look, don’t ya?

As you got it, these were the locations…

This is how a typical spy card looks, and the cathedral location.

Let’s see how the cards look in the back:

For God’s Sake, what are these plastic bags? Well, you’ll learn later. Be patient!

What Are The Rules Of SpyFall? How Do You Play?

Let’s start with the first things first: The game setup.

Before starting to play, you make sure to take 7 location cards & 1 spy card and put them into the ziplock bags (you do that with all the cards).

In one bag, every card must have the same location ( for example: Airplane). But what makes your card & the other players’ cards unique is the bottom-right role (flight engineer, pilot, coach passenger, and others).

Next, one of the players shuffles all the bags and picks one of them. After opening it (of course), they should take as many cards as it is equal to the number of players (since there are 7 cards in a bag, if you are 5 players, means you’ll have to remove 2), including a spy card that should be at the top.

After shuffling the deck, the dealer deals 1 card to each player, but they can only take a look at their own card. All the players should pay attention to the location on the card (if they’re not a spy) and their role, because after putting the cards face down, they can’t look at the card anymore.

Next, you set a 8 minute timer, and every player ( staying in their role), starts to ask questions. The dealer of the cards usually plays first. Every player in their turn can ask one question to one of the players.

Questions can be like: Is it warm in your location?, How’s the weather? Is it dangerous in your place? or anything you assume can help.

The players should answer based on their role and location. Except the spy, which can answer anything they want, as long as they don’t raise suspicions. (So, the spy can lie as well.)

The non-spies try to ask questions the spy wouldn’t know, in order to mask them off, while the spy asks questions on purpose to find the location.

While playing, if you’re the spy and you think you already found the location, you declare and say the location name. If you’re right, you win that round, if not, the non-spies do.

On the other hand, if you’re a player and during the round you think you revealed the spy, you stop the timer and accuse them. If all the other players agree (except the accused one), you all turn the cards face up, and the round ends. If the accused one was the spy, you (the non-spies) win. If it turns out you were wrong, the spy wins!

If any of the other players don’t agree, you resume the timer, and the game continues normally.

A player can’t accuse someone more than once for a round (during the timer).

If the 8-minute time ends, every player must do their final accusation, the spy must guess the location, and the non-spies must guess the spy. If they guessed wrong, the other team (in our case we have two teams: spy and non-spies) wins.

But remember, if you’re going for suspicions after the timer runs out, you can’t ask any other question about the location. You can just discuss the suspicion.

You can play as many rounds as you’d like. The player with the most votes at the end of all rounds, wins.

But the deal is, how do you get the points? Here’s how:

The spy gets 2 points if no one is successfully accused for being the spy;
The spy gets 4 points if a non-spy is accused for being the spy;
The spy gets 4 points if during the round they stop the timer and correctly guess the location;
Each non-spy gets 1 point for being the non-spy;
The non-spy that accused the real spy gets 2 points instead.

My Game Experience: How Did I Keep My Spy Identity Secret?

Oh, how much I love spoiling the game, it’s my superpower!!!

I chose to test the game with 3 relatives in my family, since all of us were into this mystery stuff, and it was just a good number of players.

Since it was our first time playing it, we decided to take 5 rounds. We started with the core game, of course, and guess what, we LOVED it!

I was the dealer, obviously… Putted all the cards in ziplock bags (including the spy card ofc), and shuffled them all.

Next, I picked one bag randomly, placed the spy card on top, removed 3 other cards (you know, the number of cards should be equal to the number of players), shuffled the cards… huh, take a breath…. and finally dealt one card to each one of us.

Guess who was the spy of this first round? It was me, the lucky one!

I had no clue on the location, I was starting to stress out… No, I had enough confidence. I knew I’d win…

I still laugh when remembering my hilarious answers. This is what they asked me at first:

Are you wearing warm clothes?;
Sorry, but, who are you again?;
What do you see out of the window?

Even though they didn’t know I was the spy, they thought they could catch the spy with these questions. But, no no no, was I that unconcentrated? Of course not!

How did I answer? Well, ‘It depends, I’m kinda having a cold so I keep wearing and taking off clothes’, ‘I am someone you’ve probably heard of’ and ‘I see life, obviously’, were my 3 amazing replies.

They had no clue, definitely…

I wanted to find the location so badly! During the rounds, I started thinking of some questions, some clever ones of course: How long did it take you to get here today?, What are your responsibilities?

Two players (which I asked questions) answered: It took about 40 minutes from home & I make people hate me (okay, this one was funny).

Next, the player on my left asked me: “ Do you think this place is dangerous?”. I had no idea about that place, so I said: “No, I’m brave, I don’t give a damn!”…

Everyone laughed, except the one who asked me the question, because he started suspecting me, and unfortunately stopped the timer and accused me. But, since I was funny and no one ever doubted me, no one agreed, so the game continued…

This round ended somehow… But how? Here’s how! I asked my cousin: What’s the most irritating thing about that costume you’re wearing?, and lucky me, he said that it was so heavy…

This is when I started connecting every information: What’s a professionist that other people hate (kind of), what uniform is heavy? I see something out of the window, so I’m in an office…. It was THE POLICE STATION, and we were talking about a police officer… Of course!!! Everything made sense now.

I stopped the timer 3 minutes earlier, and made my final conclusion… I was right, of course.

This is how I earned 4 points in this round. We played 5 more rounds, I was the spy 1 more time, and no one didn’t accuse me successfully. Was I really that triumphant? You tell me….

As you may assume, I won the game. Except that I kept my spy identity secret 2 times, I also managed to mask off the spy correctly 3 times…

Yes, this is it… We continued gathering together specifically to play Spyfall, and we played it every weekend, until we started to memorize every possible question.

My mom also bought me the 2d edition (as a present), and the DC one as well, since she saw how fun we have while playing it.

Where Can We Get The Game & Does Spyfall Have Strong Competition?

We solved the instructions ‘struggle’, talked about my experience, showed you lots of the cards, but the real struggle hasn’t come yet: Where can we find it, is it expensive?

You can get it on Amazon for a price of $21.99, which we think is totally acceptable, according to how fun the game is & the big deck of cards.

But, does it have competition?? Yes, of course it does. Everything that is good and loved, has some competitors out there…

Here are the Spyfall’s competitors:

1. Aval o n – $19.96

Another game of secret identities, a very good one actually… It’s easy to learn, designed for 5-10 players, recommended for people that are 13 years or older.

Each player is given a specific role, and the purpose of the game is to deduce one another’s identities. There are the good characters and the evil ones! Good wins the game by completing three Quests, while evil wins if they end in failure!

2. Secret Hitler – $35.00

The name is dark, let’s be honest. It is such a mystery, that means lots of fun. Secret Hitler can be played by 5-10 people, usually can be played by all ages, as long as they understand the game flow.

The players are divided into 2 teams: liberals & fascists. The liberals’ goal is to find the Secret Hitler, before he does ‘bad things’. The fascists always try to create chaos!

3. Coup – $5.59

Coup is definitely an intense game, but yet, very enjoyable. It is designed for 2 to 6 players, recommended for ages 14+.

It is less complicated than the other mystery card games, and there are 5 characters inside: Duke, Captain, Ambassador, Assassin and Contessa. You win if you are the last person standing!

Game	Spyfall	Avalon	Secret Hitler	Coup
Details	There are two teams: the spy and the non-spies.	Every player has a specific role.	You’re either gonna belong to liberals or fascists.	You can be one of the 5 characters in the game.
Number Of Players	3-8	5-10	5-10	2-6
Price	$21.99	$19.96	$35.00	$5.59 (on sale)

The Extra Packs (Besides The Main Game)

Okay, we got it, Spyfall’s great! No space for discussion… But, the expansions or the other editions always make the core game better, PERIOD.

Spyfall 2 – $18.88

Number Of Players: 3-12 | Age Range: 13+ | Cards: 240

The Spyfall 2 is a stand-alone, but actually works well with all the other packs. It includes 20 locations, and they are totally new from the main game.

What’s the difference between Spyfall and Spyfall 2? Except that there are brand new cards, the 2d edition is set up for more players, because it includes 2 spies!

This edition was released 3 years after the original Spyfall, which means Spyfall 2 was released in 2017, specifically on the 25th of January!

These are the new location cards:

Spyfall Time Travel – $22.05

Number Of Players: 2-8 | Age Range: 13+ | Cards: 240

Just as in the previous edition, the Time Travel as well, can be played as a stand-alone, but there’s nothing wrong with adding the cards to the main game or the other editions.

It is called the Time Travel edition because all the cards are related to the past or even the future. We may consider it as a fantasy!

It was released 2 years ago, on September 25, 2019. Anyways, here’s the printable rulebook, if you need help with the instructions.

Spyfall DC – $15.99

Number Of Players: 2-8 | Age Range: 13+ | Cards: 196

Firstly, DC means Detective Comics, if you had no clue…

It is called the DC edition because it’s all about DC characters and locations.

This fantasy-world edition was released in August of 2018, and since then, it has become one of the favourite packs, no doubt.

The superheroes do look crazy, to be honest… What’s up with them?? Well, they have gotta be mad sometimes, totally understandable!

There are 20 all-new locations, and, have some patience! Of course you’re gonna see how the cards look:

This DC edition is actually great for parties, especially as a Halloween Party Game!

Note: These were NOT all of the editions. You can also find the Spyfest, Convention Promo Deck, etc., but we chose the best & most famous one to show you!

Our Final Word: Is Spyfall Really Worth Buying?

If you ask us, definitely yes! Did we write this article for nothing??

It has a large enough deck of cards, contains absolutely no offensive content (only if you make it), and can be easily learned if you put your mind to it.

We see it as an amazing game to play on diners with the family because we came to a conclusion that these games (just as kid & teen friendly CAH games), always tend to bring the family closer.

The main game and all the editions are great for every party, game night, family gathering, and basically anything you want to have fun on… It adds to the fun!

Besides all these, Spyfall expands our horizon of thinking, tests our creativity skills, and makes us analyze & give a final conclusion by mixing all the parts of the puzzle!

Cheers to our lovely future spies <3