Ates is an asymmetrical two-player card game simulating a predator and the prey inside them. It employs a standard fifty-two-card deck plus two jokers.

Setup

Both players are dealt eight cards. The predator will then lay four cards—prioritising hearts—to represent stomach walls.

Taking a turn

Each turn, the prey will select a wall and place a struggle card face-down next to it. The predator responds with a card of their own, then both cards are flipped upright. The player with the highest card wins the round and collects any hearts in play (i.e., struggle cards, the selected wall and any hearts stacked beneath it).

Whenever the prey wins a heart, they draw a new card from the deck and store the heart in a separate pile. If they collect eight hearts before running out of cards in their hand, they win the game.

Whenever the predator wins a heart, it is shuffled back into the deck. They win the game if the prey’s hand runs out before eight hearts are collected.

If no player has won, the predator draws two cards and uses one from their hand to replace the wall that was just played against (again prioritising hearts).

Judging a round

Most cards take their face value when determining who wins a turn (King beats Queen; Queen beats Jack; and so on). Aces and jokers are trumps, meaning they have the highest value when used to struggle, and the lowest value if played as walls.

If both played cards of equal value, the player matching the suit of the chosen wall wins. This rule applies for trumps too; e.g., the Ace of Hearts beats anything if the wall is a Heart. If neither player matched, any hearts in play are stored in the wall space to be won in following rounds, while non-hearts are discarded.

Struggle cards must equal or exceed the value of the wall, or they count as zero.

Prey recycling

Once a turn, the prey can recycle their hand, shuffling it back into the deck and drawing a new one. Any hearts discarded are placed in the predator’s heart pile and the prey draws the number of cards they recycled, less one.

Cards within the predator's heart pile are played one at a time underneath new walls as stored hearts to be won following a struggle.

Winning the game

The predator wins when the prey's hand is exhausted. The prey wins when they manage to acquire eight hearts.

Raven invented the game to capture a predator's experience of fighting to restrain and contain prey that had already been eaten but wasn't yet ready to just lay back and digest. Of the many she invited into this trap was Sehnsucht. He was so enamoured by the prey's experience of being ground down, worn out and digested that he offered to build something that could be shared with the whole of the vore community.

Like what you see here? Please let us know! Both creators can be contacted via PM on Eka's Portal using the links above.

If you find something you consider a bug, or you come up with a technical improvement, please contact Sehnsucht in the first instance. Be sure to tell him what you saw, what you expected to see, and your browser version.

More to come!

We have many things planned. Here is a selection:

• Multiplayer over the Internet. Play for fun or roleplay alongside. Put your continued existence on the line with a permavore forfeit!
• In addition to our two wonderful resident AIs we would like to implement new predators and prey for you to... explore.
• Customisation of your avatar.
• Special card packs and backgrounds.
• Gulps, gurles and groans as digestion progresses.
• Accounts, so you can track your games and play them back.
• Permavore mode, where the prey can permanently lose their account to the predator.

Ates is a labour of love but we are encouraged by support of all forms. Please let us know if there's something you'd like to see!

Support

We have recently launched an open beta in an attempt to battle-test the website. We would love to know what you think! Please help us make this the best experience possible.

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