John Kovalic Looks Back On Over Two Decades Of Munchkin

It’s hard to believe Munchkin, the classic card game from Steve Jackson Games, is old enough to drink (in America). Heck, it’s almost old enough to rent a car. What started out as a lampoon of a certain style of Dungeons & Dragons where gaining loot and breaking the rules wins out over storytelling and character development has gone on to become a card game classic.

“We're coming up on Munchkin's 25 year anniversary in 2026,” said John Kovalic, whose art style defined the game for over 20 years. “The entire landscape has altered. It's a completely undiscovered country now, with seemingly thousands of games released every month. Munchkin definitely came out at a grand time: when the industry was starting its phenomenal growth and it was easier to get noticed.”

Part of the appeal is the game’s simplicity. It also encourages players to play mercilessly and by setting up such high trickery for such low stakes becomes a game that creates memorable stories from how things go down. It’s one thing to have a D&D session collapse in rule arguments; it’s another for players all trying to bend the rules to laugh when it all comes apart in a heap and they pick up the pieces to try again.

“When Munchkin first launched,” said Kovalic, “I believed Chez Geek would be Steve Jackson Games' breakout mainstream hit. Munchkin's success caught me absolutely off-guard. But a couple of years after it was released, Munchkin Cthulhu sold out, and had to be reprinted almost immediately.”

The game has gone on to spawn multiple expansions in multiple genres like science fiction, horror, spies and more. It’s also gotten into the lucrative franchising game like elder siblings Monopoly and Clue. There are sets for everything from Marvel to Critical Role. All of these sets are compatible with the original, meaning players can mash up genres very quickly and very strangely.

“At this point in Munchkin's life,” said Kovalic, “I've pretty much every card in the basic set memorized. Now, having drawn more than 8,000 cards for the system. That's an estimate - I actually stopped counting around 7,500 a year or two ago. There are a LOT of cards I have very little if any memory of.”

To help jog Kovalic’s memory and to celebrate almost 25 years of the game, Steve Jackson Games is releasing the Munchkin Big Box. This is a deluxe edition of the game featuring new cards, old cards, accessories and more. All lovingly illustrated by Kovalic. It functions both as an entry point for new players as well as a place for long-time fans to stash all their cards.

“Someone at Steve Jackson Games - possibly Steve himself - said ‘Every other classic game has a big box edition - we should do one as well!’”, said Kovalic. “But I'm not sure any of us had any expectation at all that it would blow away both the Ogre and Car Wars Kickstarter campaigns and become Steve Jackson Games' most successful crowdfunding campaign by far.”

Folks who pick up Munchkin Big Box will find the following inside:

• Over 700 cards, all illustrated by John Kovalic, including:
  • Munchkin core set
  • Munchkin 2 – Unnatural Axe
  • Munchkin 3 – Clerical Errors
  • Munchkin 6 – Double Dungeons
  • Munchkin Bosses
  • Munchkin Side Quests
  • Munchkin Side Quests 2
  • 50 brand-new Munchkin cards
  • 40 customizable blank cards
• Five bookmarks with in-game bonuses, including one in memory of Munchkin Czar Andrew Hackard
• 28 illustrated card dividers
• Two gameboards
• Six 19mm dice in a variety of colors
• Two double-sided Kill-O-Meters
• 12 upgraded wooden meeples featuring Spyke and Flower
• A Spyke enamel pin
• Munchkin stickers
• A redesigned, consolidated rulebook

Every artist looks at their own work with their most critical eye. Even something as classic as Munchkin.

“I've always wanted to redraw the entire initial releases,” said Kovalic. “My art's grown and developed over the years - it's actually hard to get worse at cartooning if you keep at it - but Steve calls these first few sets "iconic." But I had a lot of fun with some of the new cards that were added, as well as redrawing the BOSSES and SIDE QUEST expansions, that other (better) artists had drawn.”

 

[Staffan]

We mix sets.

We did the Good, the Bad, and the Munchkin plus Star Munchkin for Firefly, Conan and Cthulhu for Sword&Sorcery,

The problem with mixing Munchkin sets is that things get diluted so it gets harder to get synergies. It's been a while since I played the game, but IIRC the original has a Sneaky Bastard Sword that only Thieves can use, and there are other cards that require other classes and/or races to use. If you're only playing with the OG game, there's a reasonable chance of getting cards that work together, but if you're adding more sets the chance of that goes down.

I believe they made an expansion called Munchkin Blender to deal with just this problem, basically putting in more cards that let you cheat and use things you're not supposed to.

 

[ProfessorDetective]

The problem with mixing Munchkin sets is that things get diluted so it gets harder to get synergies. It's been a while since I played the game, but IIRC the original has a Sneaky Bastard Sword that only Thieves can use, and there are other cards that require other classes and/or races to use. If you're only playing with the OG game, there's a reasonable chance of getting cards that work together, but if you're adding more sets the chance of that goes down.

I believe they made an expansion called Munchkin Blender to deal with just this problem, basically putting in more cards that let you cheat and use things you're not supposed to.

Yeah, I tend to stick to specific genres (usually with the numbered expansions, but still). Bites, Cthulhu, Zombies, etc.

Personally, I'd love to see re-releases of the D&D 3E books and Chez Geek/Goth. Loved those to pieces.

 

[Argyle King]

Congratulations, Munchkin! A terrible, unfair game that still somehow finds its way to my kitchen table every now and then it's just so much random, dumb fun. Here's to the next 25 years!

Adventure Time Munchkin with the Dungeons expansion is still my fav. Shame that they don't print that one anymore.

Unfortunately, I think that one (and the Marvel one) were done via partnership with USAopoly, so I'm not sure it will be reprinted. All of the other sets that I have have SJ Games item number on them.

 

[Argyle King]

We mix sets.

We did the Good, the Bad, and the Munchkin plus Star Munchkin for Firefly, Conan and Cthulhu for Sword&Sorcery,

I do that sometimes. Sometimes it was to get a particular theme, but sometimes it was to help balance some things out.

I liked the Munchkin Fu theme, but the monsters were kinda week in that set. In contrast, the Cthulu set could be a bit tough. Together, it was a nice variety that hit a good middle ground. Thematically, I don't know what you'd call that. Samurais and Shoggoths? Ninjas & Night Gaunts? I'm not sure, but it was fun.

 

[schneeland]

Even twenty years after I first played, I'm still a fan of Munchkin, and Kovalic's art is pretty much ingrained in my mental Munchkin image. I doubt I will buy the new box, though, because unfortunately, with three players (it's one of the games I play with my parents), the original game simply has too many cards and too many add-on rules. It would be neat if they did kind of a "best of" and compressed it (roughly) to the size of the other themed boxes.
That being said, Legends, Pirates/Booty and Space work well enough. It's a shame that Western/The Good, the Bad, and the Munchkin apparently only saw a limited print run in Germany (it's one of the few sets I never owned).

 

[eyeheartawk]

My biggest problem with Munchkin is the problem that near the end everyone just gangs up on the guy closest to winning. Munchkin Quest fixes this problem by stipulating that to attack anybody you have to be in the same room as that person. Makes for a much less aggravating experience.

 

[SkidAce]

My biggest problem with Munchkin is the problem that near the end everyone just gangs up on the guy closest to winning. Munchkin Quest fixes this problem by stipulating that to attack anybody you have to be in the same room as that person. Makes for a much less aggravating experience.

Thats actually the part we like "Get them guys".

It is called Munchkin.

 

[Gradine]

Our favorite was always to mix Munchkin Bites with Munchkin Cthulhu. Swarming cultists was like the new version of running the Elvish Mafia from the original game

 

[Voadam]

Its been more than a decade I think since I played but I liked Apocalypse for adding in big global rule shifts.

When I would play with my son and my brother and my nieces we would sometimes each take a deck of our own for drawing from so each person had their own theme going with occasional crazy crossover story potential when people teamed up against a monster or threw a wandering monster against someone.

I had maybe a dozen or so sets? Basic, Cthulhu, Space, Pathfinder, Apocalypse, Supers, Conan, Pirates, Fu, Darkness, with a bunch of expansions on those as well. I stored about half at a friend's house for when the DM did not show up for game night or we felt we had not enough people that week for the tabletop game. Then after one of the couples in the group divorced and one spouse moved out of state and took his munchkin cards my half dozen stored sets were also not seen again.

 

[aco175]

I went to their site and through 5 pages of things for sale and did not see this. It's fine, I only wanted to see how much it is selling for. I could just look harder on Google or something, but the link could just bring me there.