Cards Against Humanity vs. Joking Hazard
Board games and cards games are more popular than ever. The success of Cards Against Humanity has spawned many games that are very similar, but could any of those ever be better? If anyone can manage to one-up Cards Against Humanity, it’s the dark humor experts at Cyanide and Happiness. We took a look at their new game, Joking Hazard, to see how it compares to the modern party game classic.
Play Style
These card games are pretty different, but based on a similar idea: to make the best combination of cards that brings out the worst in people. Cards Against Humanity focuses on a mad-lib style of play. Each turn, one player is the “Card Czar,” and lays down a card with a sentence or a question. That sentence will have blanks in it. The other players then fill in the blanks with their own cards, which consist of words and phrases. The Card Czar picks the funniest combination, and the person who played it gets a point.
Joking Hazard plays slightly differently, but has the same premise. This game is based off of the infamously NSFW comic series Cyanide and Happiness, and comes from that comic’s creators. The goal is to build a three-panel comic strip. The first panel is drawn at random from the deck. The second panel is played by the judge – a role that rotates each turn, like the Card Czar. The two panels should at least sort of make sense together. All of the other players then contribute a possible third panel – the punchline, basically. The judge picks the funniest combination, and the winner gets a point.
Price
Joking Hazard and Cards Against Humanity are both $25 on their respective creators’ stores, and it’s usually the same or a little less in places like Amazon and Target. For this price, Joking Hazard has 360 comic-panel cards, including 10 add-your-own-words cards that you can use to combine and make ridiculous comics. Cards Against Humanity includes 550 cards that divide into two colors: black and white. You get 90 black cards. These are the cards that the Card Czar plays to start a round. The 460 white cards are the ones that the players place to mad-lib their responses.
However, Cards Against Humanity offers the basic version of the game for free on their website. It’s a cheap way to get the full game and try it out, although it takes a lot of 80-pound cardstock and time to print the game off this way. The free cards are smaller than the usual cards, but this is a great way to try Cards Against Humanity without spending much at all.
Longevity
Longevity is a huge factor in a game purchase, along with the price. If the game stops being fun after a week, it’s probably not worth your hard-earned cash. Both games have the potential to lose longevity depending on how long you play. Cards Against Humanity only includes 90 black cards. Since each round starts with a black card, you’re going to see them all before too long. The white card combinations add some variety, but you still only get 90 possible situations unless you spend more money to purchase the many expansion packs.
Joking Hazard has a slightly higher longevity, since the comic panels can be played in any order. Each of the 370 cards can be played in any combination. While Cards Against Humanity has more cards, Joking Hazard has a higher number of possible combinations that can change the direction of the game.
Expansion Packs
Of the two games, Joking Hazard is the most recent, with a Kickstarter funding the project in February of 2016. Because it’s relatively new, the game only has one expansion pack: Blast from the Past. It’s $10 and contains 50 history-related cards that go back to really horrible times in human history.
Cards Against Humanity has several expansion packs that are available for purchase. It combined all of the regular expansion packs into a Red and Blue version that includes all six expansions. Along with this, there are 17 other booster packs to increase the size of your deck. Each one ranges from $5 to $20 in price but will keep the game fresh over time.
