Can You Escape? The Slasher – A Trick-Taking Horror Game Review

The Slasher, A throat-cutting trick-taking came

A palpable buzz has been gathering around The Slasher, the latest small-box title from Jelly Jelly Games. The critical consensus emerging from board game forums and early reviews points to a uniquely tense experience, one that masterfully blends the constrained mechanics of trick-taking with the visceral thrills of the slasher genre. Its official listing promotes a “cooperative trick-taking horror” game—a premise that, upon examination, is not merely accurate but understated.

This is a game that genuinely gets the heart pounding. The design is fiendishly clever, condensing a truly cinematic sense of pursuit and survival into a mere 44 cards and a handful of chilling components. The following review dissects how these elements coalesce into such a compelling whole—evaluating whether the game truly conquers its ambitious premise or ultimately falls victim to its own sharp ambitions.

Can You Escape? The Slasher – A Trick-Taking Horror Game Review

The cover of The Slasher is iconic. A Bowie knife, raised by a gloved hand, is about to cut us down. The font used for the words below leaves no doubt: this is a homage to slasher horror movies. And without spoiling too much, it definitely is one of the games that do justice to its genre. Perfect to be discussed at a horror page, even if the Ginger Nuts are usually known for books, movies and interviews. Whether you’re a seasoned board gamer or a casual player, be assured that this small card game is worth checking out for every horror fan.

Run, Run, Run! Or: The Flow of the Game

The Slasher is a cooperative Trick-taking game for two. If you are not familiar with cooperative trick-taking games, you might wonder how this works out. The idea most likely dates back to The Crew (2019) and is currently very popular with the beautiful The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring – Trick-Taking Game (2024). Like most great ideas, the core concept is pretty simple:

We still play a set of tricks, but instead of gathering the most or a specific number of tricks, we have to meet a condition set by the mission or our characters. Every 4 has to win a trick, the tricks have to be shared as equally as possible, a player may only take one or zero tricks, etc. In The Slasher, the area cards set those conditions for each turn and determine whether we win or lose. If we fail to meet the conditions of three cards, we are caught and die a brutal death. We can take a risk or two, but we should be aware of the conditions. 

Cooperative trick-taking games are popular because trick-taking is a relatively constraining mechanic (we have to answer a colour if possible), yet still allows for meaningful decisions. This is an excellent choice for a slasher adaptation, as the mechanic itself evokes the feeling of suffocating restriction while still allowing for snap decisions, just like in an actual horror movie.

A two-player trick-taking game like The Slasher needs a special twist to be interesting, as we lose the dynamic of a larger group and our tricks are reduced to only two cards. The slasher provides a very elegant twist: the cards’ colours determine the subsequent search for items. Each red card is potentially damaging, green cards can prevent this damage, and yellow cards allow us to draw items. As a thematic addition, white cards change their effects based on the player’s health, which automatically increases the risk. 

The search itself is simple: We flip over as many cards as our tricks allow for and hope not to draw into the killer card that’s hidden between the 12 items. If we avoid the killer, we take one item. These help us in further rounds or can be one of five escape cards. If we get 4 or 5 of them (depending on the difficulty), we win the game. As a thematic side effect, every item taken increases the future chance of drawing into the killer.

With the killer mechanic, the outcome of the game is definitely luck-dependent. We can have sessions where we run into the killer again and again, while he might hide under the deck on other nights. There are design choices that mitigate that a bit, but randomness is definitely something that the game uses to further support the Slasher-feeling.

How Does it Play Out?

After one or two turns, the flow of the game becomes very clear. Once you have taken the few symbols to heart, the game plays in under half an hour and with barely any questions arising. Still, there is some tactical depth to it that always makes it challenging. To achieve this feeling, the game neatly combines very original and innovative mechanics. There is some brilliant game design at work!

And then there is the thematic side. Sure, this is not like watching a slasher flick or immersively reading a horror book, but this game bleeds its theme (pun intended). The split-second decisions of the tricks, the tension of whether we draw into the killer or avoid him this turn, our declining health, and, last but not least, the graphic design.

Let’s talk about the latter for a second. The Slasher does not use much spectacular artwork. We have some relatively simply illustrated items, the iconic killer and somehow blurry locations; the core element – the numbered cards – are just numbers with minimal additional rule information. What makes the game pop is the general graphic design.

Everything is dark (but all game elements are clear), some grain on the cards gives it a used 80s/90s B-Movie style, and the cover resembles a worn-out VHS cover. In addition, the few game elements (44 cards and 3 tokens) are of high quality: The cards are thicker than usual, which gives it a great haptic feeling, and the bear trap tokens are just brutally fun to flip over. 

Escaped alive – First Impression.

After some plays, I am utterly impressed by the game. The mechanics are clear-cut (another pun intended) and leave no room for confusing interpretation. The decisions are interesting and the tactics complex enough to make the game replayable. It is impressive what depth this game can put into 44 cards. Surely, if you are a hardcore gamer looking for a very tactical game, you might be disappointed. The three difficulty levels might challenge you, but in the end, there is always a lot of luck involved in whether you can escape the killer or not.

In my opinion, it’s the perfect game for two horror fans to play in between a movie night or on a cosy, stormy evening. You do not need to be a hardcore gamer to enjoy The Slasher, but you should be open to learn some rules. But be assured that you will be familiar with the game once you lose your first one. Good luck, teens, you will need it!

Information

The Slasher (Jelly Jelly Games 2025 | Board Game Geek)
2 players cooperative, ~30 minutes playing time
game design and artwork by K. Takahashi

Horror Features on Ginger Nuts of Horror

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