Gloom at a Glance

• In Gloom you make your family miserable while heaping happiness on your opponents.
• Featured on Tabletop with Wil Wheaton, with more than 300,000 games in print.
• Its dark Victorian flavor is a fan favorite, while transparent plastic cards make point calculations easy.
• Available expansions include Unhappy Homes, Unfortunate Expeditions, Unwelcome Guests, and Unquiet Dead.

I hope you have a morbid sense of humor, because we are about to play an award-winning card game named Gloom.
— Wil Wheaton, TableTop 

Misery Loves Company: The World of Gloom

When your family is made up of serial killers, crazed circus folk, and demonically possessed sociopaths, misery comes easy. In Gloom, players control these misanthropic misfits. The goal? To make your characters as miserable as possible before allowing them the sweet respite of death. Along the way you'll make other players' characters horribly happy. Players narrate their characters' misfortunes and mishaps, creating unique stories of suffering in each game. May the most miserable soul win!

A Sad State of Affairs: Gameplay Basics

In Gloom, each player places negative Modifier cards on their family members to make them delightfully depressed, and positive ones other players' cards to keep them horribly happy. Untimely Deaths lock in points for good or ill.

The award-winning gameplay uses unique transparent cards that stack on top of each other to conceal and reveal the Self-Worth scores from the cards below. The easy scoring and evocative, gloomy art are guaranteed to endlessly entertain players. The game ends when one entire family has shuffled off this mortal coil. The winner is the player with the lowest score, whose family was the most miserable in life! 

Awards

• 2012 Featured on TableTop with Wil Wheaton.
• 2010 Family Games: The 100 Best.
• 2006 Origins Award Winner – Traditional Card Game of the Year.
• 2006 GAMES Magazine’s Games 100 List – Family Card Game category.
• 2005 InQuest Gamer Fan Award Nominee – Best Card Game.
• 2004 OgreCave's Christmas Gift Guide.

Contents 

The Gloom 2E core game cards are made from post-consumer recycled PET as of the 2024 reprint. In addition to recycled plastic cards, we continue to use recycled paper content, and maintain our general policy of avoiding disposable plastic wrap, substituting a paper band around the decks, and sticker tabs to seal the box.