Minigames:
Rock, Paper, Scissors
Card Game Tips (otherwise known as "Men of the Sea Card Game")

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The Basics	Games Controls
The Objective	Game Tips
How the Game Works

You might have noticed that there are many instances in Xenogears where people challenge you to a really cool card game. The first place where you will be formally challenged is in Thames, and you'll get a rare item if you win. You'll also hear some real-time game voice overs after each card set (like for example, Fei will say "Is that all?" if he wins, and ".. tsk, it's not over yet" if he loses. The funniest is Bart's --- whenever he loses, he'll say "Jerk!!").

Places where you can play:
1. In Thames' Beer Deck/Hall. Talk to the woman surrounded by two men.
2. Thames still, go to the place where the salvaged items are retrieved. Talk to the kid in one of the corners (he seems like facing the wall).
3. Later in Disk 1, find Big Joe hitting on a woman on the Yggdrasil's top deck (Yggdrasil's main exit).
4. In Disk 2, fallen Shevat, enter the doorway behind the main hall's counter (doorway behind a counter where a woman is standing). Find a room where you can find Hans, and then talk to his step child.

Equipment:

You and your opponent both get a deck of playing cards (52 in a
set.) The cards are the same as any playing deck... with aces,
number and the royal cards (king, queen and jack). There are no
suites, however.

The Table:

For your connvenience, please refer to the numbered image below.
The numbers correspond with the following details.

1. Opponent's "library" (unplayed cards) shuffled face-down
2. Opponent's "hand" cards (cards currently in your hand) facing up
3. The middle part is the playing field. It is divided into two, the right and the left playing cards.
4. Your "hand" cards facing up
5. Your "library" shuffled face down

You and your opponent must always have 4 cards in your hands. If
a card from your hand is played, you must pick a new card from your
library to fill in the needed number of four.

Ok, so you can't throw your deck and yell "I win!". You have to do
it in a legal way: according to the rules. Here are the mechanics:

1. Both parties start off with 4 cards in their hands. The arbiter (middle guy) then calls the start of the game, takes one card each from both player's library and places it in the two card slots in the middle playing field. These cards are now in "play".

2. Using these two cards as your starting point, choose a card from your hand with a value succeeding or preceeding the ones currently played. Place the hand card you chose on the respective middle played card it followed or preceeded. For example, if the middle cards are 2 and 5, and you have a 6, 8, 3, 9 in your hand, then you play 3 and put it on the middle card with the value "2". You can also choose to play 6 instead, and place it over the middle card "5". In such case you play a card from your hand, you must draw another one from your library.

3. There are no halts or rests in between. Once the "start game" is called, each player must successively empty his hand using the method above, and there are no turns called. It's basically free-for-all whenever the games starts, so it means your opponent will aggressively play his cards even if you have the correct cards to
play from your hands. This is a game of speed, take note.

4. Sometimes, both players have no cards in their hands that well correspond to the current middle played cards. This means that you and your opponent have no cards to continue on the value chain... so this leads to a deadlock. The arbiter (middle man) then calls the event "One-Two" (he shouts the exact words), and then he picks up the topmost card from each player's library and places it in the middle playing slots. Both players then disregard the last played cards, and starts the value chain again using the newly placed cards.

5. In the case of another deadlock after the "One-Two" event, the
arbiter then calls for another "one-two" until somebody finds a card in his hand to play.

6. In case there are no more cards in both players' library and a "one-two" event is called, then the arbiter will take the leftmost card from each player's hand to be played in the middle field.

7. The first person to empty his library and hand wins.

You must use the directional buttons to make the character you are
using walk to the specific hand card you want to play. If you want
to place the card you're currently stepping on on the right middle playing slot, press the R button. If you so choose otherwise (if you want to place your hand card on the left middle playing slot), then press the L button.

Pressing the X button while walking makes the character run. You can't quit the game unless you reset the game (press L+R+start+select) or reset the whole PSX system by pressing the reset button.

Speed is essential, thus Citan is your best bet. To get the best speed, try running (press the X button while pressing the directional buttons). Also try to stay in the middle when the game starts. This way, you
can easily run to any card.

Sometimes, running right and left and pressing the L or R repeatitively will luckily put the cards in play. Hey, call me a non-thinker, but I usually win this way!! I run left and right, playing cards randomly as fast as I could -- hey, it worked for me!