River Black 2025

River Black is a compact, 10-minute solo card game played with a standard 52-card deck. In River Black, the player manages three parallel "river" stacks, attempting to navigate card values toward a target sum of 21 while avoiding the risk of busting past 22.

Each round features a blend of card placement and tactical manipulation across three phases. The player draws and assigns four cards between three shores and a central port. The suit of the card placed in the port triggers an ability that alters the board state—such as flooding a channel with fresh cards (Clubs), filtering cards through the deck and river (Spades), recycling discards upon scoring (Hearts), or shifting cards sideways across streams (Diamonds).

After resolving the port, shore cards wash into their respective rivers to be evaluated. Hitting 21 awards a generous payout of scored cards (with an extra bonus for a two-card blackjack), while maintaining a low-value five-card trick scores the entire river. Players can also opt to safely cash out a single card on totals between 18 and 20, or hold out for a better setup—risking a complete wipeout if the total exceeds 21.

—description from the designer