The Amazing American Circus from Juggler Games and Klabater is a collectible card game circus sim strategy game on PS4. Learn more in our The Amazing American Circus review!

 

The Amazing American Circus from Juggler Games and Klabater is a collectible card game circus sim strategy game on PS4. Your task is to take a rundown circus and do whatever it takes to bring it back to its former glory. You’ll need to manage your resources as you improve the acts in order to mesmerize a rather jaded and bored audience that is certainly not in the best mood. There are more than 15 circus acts to recruit and train, as well as 100 modifications for your circus caravan, and you’re going to need to make every single one count! You’ll be helping the different acts improve their skills so that you can have a shot at winning The Amazing American Circus competition, which has a grand prize of $100,000!

You’ll be using a collectible card game system for your circus acts, which gives this one a bit of a Slay the Spire vibe, which is definitely a good thing! There are over 200 hand-illustrated cards in The Amazing American Circus, so there will be lots of ways to customize your hand as you try to find the right combination for each scenario. Playing the right card at the right time can win the audience over, but if you’re not careful, you might screw things up and make the whole situation even worse.

 

You’ll have artists for each of your performances. Up to three artists can be part of a show. They will be playing to an audience, which must be entertained. Unfortunately, each one of said audience members will have different abilities and actions that will make your job harder. You will have cards to represent the tricks that your artists can perform. These can be used to woo an audience member, protect one or more of your artists from the audience’s actions, or to perform actions such as shuffling your hand into the deck so that you then draw one card for each shuffled card.

Every card will have a vitality cost, which acts as the game’s way of balancing things out. Cards can also affect the Finale bar when played – more on this in a bit. Each of your artists will have a focus value, which you can see on the bar below them. If an artist’s focus reaches 0, one of their cards will be scrapped from the deck while their focus recovers. If all of that artist’s cards are eliminated from the deck, then they will be removed from the show while also lowering your overall vitality by one point. If all artists are removed, then the show will end up in failure. In order to complete a performance, you will first need to impress your audience before you can finish the show with a Finale. As mentioned before, each card will have an effect on the Finale bar, either increasing it or decreasing it. Once the audience is pleased, and the Finale bar is full, it will be time for one final act to end the show on a high note.

You’ll have to take your circus on the road to visit as many cities as possible in order to boost your revenue based on the cost for the show and the ticket prices you set. You can also spend some extra money on having a parade to promote the show, put up some posters, or spend on advertisement so that more people learn about it. Traveling from city to city will require that you also budget for the food that your performers will need to eat during travel, so be sure to keep an eye on their satisfaction, health, and nutrition bars!

 

For every show, you can select which artists will perform based on who is added to the show’s poster. Shows are split into up to three acts, and you also need to select a misfit. Misfits will play a role that activates at the start of each act, and the more slots for misfits there are on a poster, the more acts you will need to perform for that show in particular. Once a performance is over, your artists will be rewarded with experience points. Once they obtain enough, they’ll level up, which will give then give them access to new cards or will improve the cards they already have.

Artists can also obtain gifts after each performance. These cards can either be boons or hoaxes. Boons will offer positive effects, while hoaxes, as expected, will have a negative effect. If an artist is under the effect of a hoax, you can check the recovery wagon to try and heal them in order to remove it. To be able to remove a hoax, you will need to pay the corresponding cost.

You will need to add more and more artists to your troupe so that you can expand what your circus can do. Be sure to always check the recruitment wagon to see which artists are available. Each area you visit will have different artists for you to hire. Before you add someone, check their cost, class, quirks, and artist cards to see if they’re a good fit for your project. You have limited space in your circus, so if you want to hire more artists, you’ll have to invest in upgrading the recruitment wagon. Sometimes you might want to spend some of your money to train your artists. Doing this will allow them to either gain a new card or to improve the effects of a current card.

 

Artists are human, and they need to be satisfied and fed if you want them to give it their all during the next show. You can take care of this by visiting the cookhouse wagon, where you can use the available recipes for cooking something for your artists, as long as you have the required ingredients. The price of ingredients varies from region to region. Each dish will have a different effect on an artist’s satisfaction, health, and nutrition. You can upgrade the cookhouse wagon to unlock more recipes.

There are many trophies to unlock during your time with The Amazing American Circus since it has a full trophy list with a Platinum trophy. Your first trophy to pop will be for completing the game’s tutorial. After this, there are trophies for traveling through each region in the game, for impressing each of the special characters that you’ll meet, for getting your first successful show after the tutorial, for failing a show after completing the tutorial, for getting each of the artist classes to max level, for getting a misfit, for completing your first finale, traveling to a city without having enough food for the journey, for progressing through the game’s story, and for eventually beating the game.

The Amazing American Circus is a fun collectible card game circus sim strategy game that will keep you entertained for hours. It has you overseeing several systems as you try to make ends meet, boosting your bottom line so that you can hire new acts, remove quirks, boost skills, and keep your troupe fed and happy. The Amazing American Circus is out on PlayStation 4 with a $19.99 asking price.

Disclaimer
This The Amazing American Circus review is based on a PlayStation 4 copy provided by Klabater.