Play free

A satirical card game · free in your browser

You won the election. Now make sure you never have to win another.

Democracy is a card game, and you are dealing. Pack the Court. Buy the front pages. Keep the generals fed. You lay your cards face down; so does the Opposition. And any card you lay can blow up in your face.

Take office → Today’s coup the same deal for everyone
5
institutions to hollow out
255
cards, all deniable
6
regimes to choose from
12
endings, few of them happy
Broadcasting Council licenses the truth; rival truths pending review Court grows to fifteen judges “for efficiency” The Leader’s portrait now legal tender Parliament votes to hold fewer votes Election postponed pending better results Opposition leader charged with being in opposition Frowning in public now a civic offence

Real games, as the papers printed them

Same year. Two newspapers. One of them is lying.

  1. 1

    Show nothing

    Both sides play face down. You see where the Opposition moved, and who did it. Never what. Paranoia is part of the job.

    The State Gazette The palace’s paper

    Leader signs three laws before breakfast

    Parliament, the streets and the Club were all improved by lunch, the palace confirms.

    The Clarion The last free paper

    Speaker books the large room for Thursday

    Barnaby Quorum would not say what for. He did not need to.

    Year 4 of a game on a computer: the Leader has laid Mandate State Broadcasts in Parliament, Mandatory Morning Exercises in the Streets and Authorize Protest Suppression in the Club; in Parliament the Speaker’s one card lies face down against them
  2. 2

    Turn them over

    One venue at a time, the cards turn up and the die rolls. More clout wins. Any card can backfire and work for the other side. Even yours. Especially yours.

    The Clarion The last free paper

    Court reads the new voting law, word by word

    The judges looked for the Leader’s ID rules in the constitution, and did not find them.

    The State Gazette The palace’s paper

    Judges ask for a second reading

    The palace calls the ruling “thorough” and the reform “merely delayed”.

    The reveal in the Court: the Chief Justice’s Word-by-Word Review, clout 3, against the Leader’s Restrict Voting Access, clout 2, each card’s die rolled beneath it
  3. 3

    Hold what you take

    Win a venue and your cards stay in it, pulling it your way every year until someone digs them out. Possession is nine-tenths of the constitution.

    The State Gazette The palace’s paper

    Foreign hand found behind last week’s photograph

    Investigators confirm the picture was taken abroad, in spirit.

    The Clarion The last free paper

    We printed a photograph. Now we are a foreign plot

    The Clarion’s editors learned who employs them from the State Gazette.

    The reveal in the Newsroom: the Leader’s Foreign Agents Law beats the Editor’s standing The Photograph, 3 to 1, and the screen reads The Newsroom is yours
  4. 4

    Face the voters

    Every four years the country votes. Meet your ambition’s goals and you never have to ask again. Fall short and you try again in four years, unless the voters get there first.

    The State Gazette The palace’s paper

    Parliament renews its confidence in the Leader

    The Court, a spokesman said, “is still reading”.

    The Clarion The last free paper

    Three judges short of forever

    The Leader keeps Parliament and must wait four more years for the Court.

    The election of year 4: six of six deputies, met; three of six judges, short; the term goes on, and the next election is in year 8

The country fights back

Four people stand between you and forever.

An editor with a source in your cabinet. A judge who reads the constitution for pleasure. A speaker who loves procedure more than power. An organiser who can empty a city by Monday. They lay their cards face down, as you do.

  • Vera Byline, a cut-paper editor with a green visor

    Editor, The Clarion

    Vera Byline

    “We print the procurement records on Thursday. All of them.”
  • Ambrose Stare, a cut-paper chief justice in robes

    Chief Justice

    Ambrose Stare

    “Emergencies must be real. The Court will ask for evidence of this one.”
  • Barnaby Quorum, a cut-paper speaker of parliament with a mace

    Speaker of Parliament

    Barnaby Quorum

    “A motion of no confidence has been tabled. It needs a simple majority. We have counted.”
  • Nell Picket, a cut-paper organiser with a megaphone

    Organiser

    Nell Picket

    “On Monday nobody works. Not the trams, not the bakeries, not your ministries.”

Swipe to meet all four →

255 cards · 432 cut-paper pictures

Swipe through all five →

Five of 432. The rest are classified until you play them.

Twelve ways it ends

Choose an ambition. Reach it, or find out who stops you.

Pick the regime you would like to be remembered for: the polite one, the rich one, the invisible one, the loud one, the permanent emergency or the iron fist. Then find out who remembers it differently. Every ending comes with a real country that tried it first, and what stopped them.

Win an ambition and the deck built for it opens: six ways to rule.

Six victories

  • Soft Autocracy the elections stay, the choice doesn’t
  • Kleptocracy the state as a family business
  • Shadow Regime rule from behind the curtain
  • Populist Strongman the crowd loves you, loudly
  • Emergency Rule the crisis that never ends
  • Iron Dictatorship every number under control

Five defeats

  • Voted Out the voters get there first
  • Democratic Restoration the institutions win
  • Media Exposure a story you could not bury
  • Popular Revolution the square fills and stays full
  • Military Coup the generals send a car

The twelfth ending is sealed. Nobody has held on long enough to open it.

An ending after twelve years: Soft Autocracy, won at the election of year 12, with who held what, year by year

Six ways to rule

Pull it off once. Then do it properly.

Every strongman starts with the same Playbook. Win an ambition and the regime you built becomes a deck of its own: new cards, a new Executive Order, and a little extra $FIAT for doing it again. What is inside stays classified until you have earned the clearance.

  • The Playbook

    A little of everything

    The press, the courts, a crisis or two. Everything the textbooks warn about, in roughly the order they warn about it.

    Its own cards · 3

    • A Word With the Bankers
    • The Honours List
    • The Reshuffle

    Fast-track Executive Order

    Opens
    Issued on day one

  • Velvet Glove

    Portraits, pledges, applause

    Nobody is arrested. Everybody claps. The portraits are voluntary, and on every wall.

    Its own cards · 10

    • The Calm Feed

    9 of them classified

    Plausible deniability Executive Order

    Win to open
    Soft Autocracy or Shadow Regime

  • Populist Surge

    The leader and the enemy

    The people adore you. The enemy is everywhere, which is handy.

    Its own cards · 11

    • The Eight-Hour Live Show

    10 of them classified

    Mass rally Executive Order

    Win to open
    Populist Strongman

  • Institutional Capture

    Courts, banks, contracts

    Every court, bank and ministry: perfectly legal, and perfectly yours.

    Its own cards · 6

    • Loans for Shares

    5 of them classified

    Entrench Executive Order

    Win to open
    Kleptocracy

  • Iron Fist

    Police, camps and curfews

    Curfew at nine. Confessions by ten. Order, at last.

    Its own cards · 10

    • The Show Trial

    9 of them classified

    Crackdown Executive Order

    Win to open
    Iron Dictatorship

  • Emergency Powers

    Every crisis, a new power

    The emergency is temporary. So were the last eleven.

    Its own cards · 13

    • The Enabling Act

    12 of them classified

    Rule by decree Executive Order

    Win to open
    Emergency Rule

Swipe through all six →

It has happened before

The satire is fiction. The playbook isn’t.

Every ending is matched to a real case that got there by the methods you used, with dates and sources: 41 of them, from across the world and across the political spectrum.

  • Hungary · 2010–2014

    The two-thirds majority

    Every step was legal under the majority’s own rules, which is what made it hard to stop.

  • Chile · 1988

    The No

    A general promised a yes-or-no vote on eight more years. On 5 October 1988, 56 % voted No, and he accepted the count.

  • United States · 1972–1974

    The tapes

    Two reporters followed the money; a court ordered the tapes released; the president resigned.

  • South Korea · 2024

    Six hours of martial law

    Troops came to the National Assembly. Members climbed the fences, voted it down before dawn, and the court removed the president.

The State Gazette’s front page at the end of a game, written by AI from it: Leader secures independent courts through carefully scheduled appointment process
The State Gazette The Clarion

Your term, in print

Every term ends on the front page.

Win, and the State Gazette prints the triumph, with a flattering photograph. Lose, and The Clarion prints everything else. Either way the story is yours: written from the game you played, the year it turned and the people who turned it.

Every day at midnight UTC

Today’s coup: the same deal for everyone.

One deal, one twist, the whole country playing it at once. Your first attempt goes on the day’s leaderboard. Bring a friend; blame them later.

Play today’s coup →
Today’s coup on the start screen: the day’s ambition, Iron Dictatorship, its deck, Iron Fist, and its twist, Barnaby Quorum holding Parliament from year 1, with the leaderboard beside them

Questions

Is it free?

Yes, all of it. It plays in any modern browser on a phone or a computer: no download, no account, no email.

How long is a game?

A year takes a minute or two. Elections come every fourth year; the easier ambitions are usually decided within three of them, the hardest take longer.

Who plays the Opposition?

The game does, under the same rules as you: the same five venues, its cards laid face down like yours, and every one of them able to backfire.

Is it about a real country or a real politician?

No. It is set in Freedonia, a fictional republic, with fictional characters. The game is about the mechanism, not about any person. The historical cases are real and come with their sources.

Is it partisan?

No. The playbook it models has been used from every direction, and its cases come from Hungary, Venezuela, Russia, Turkey, Peru, the United States, Chile, South Korea and more. The satire aims at the ruler; the facts are not satire.

Can I use it in a classroom?

Yes. It shows how parliaments, courts, the press, the street and the elites constrain power, and every game ends with a debrief: what would have stopped the regime, where the game simplifies, and a real case that went the same way.

Does it use AI?

The art is made in advance and reviewed by hand. AI writes only the newspapers: the clipping after each year and the front page at the end, from the facts of your game. When it is unavailable, an edition written in advance is printed instead.

Is there more after the first game?

Yes. You start with the Playbook; every ambition you win opens the deck built for it, with cards found in no other deck and an Executive Order of its own.

How hard is it?

Four difficulties. On Story you start with a strong mandate and the Opposition lays one card a venue and never bluffs; on Crisis you start with two deputies and play against a 60-second clock.

The leader's faceless portrait unrolled down the front of parliament by workers on ladders, while one small figure in the empty square holds up a single ballot

The people have spoken.
For the last time?

Take office →

Free · in your browser · no account