About
CIA: Collect It All
$151,184
4,476
A Game Designed By The CIA!
Now Shipping Internationally!
Ever wondered what it’s like to be a CIA operative? The CIA designed a classified card game which they use to train their analysts. They recently declassified it and we’re adapting the game so you can play it too.
CIA: Collect It All is a competitive card game based on the CIA game Collection Deck. Players take on the role of agents who are collecting intelligence and tackling security threats over multiple rounds.
Drawing from a deck of over 150 cards, players start each round with a hand full of intelligence tactics and must devise strategies to successfully defuse various crises. The tactics and crises all contain aspects – Political, Military, Economic, and Weapons – and players can only tackle crises if they have tactics with matching aspects. However, rival players also have “reality check” cards that they can play to complicate their opponents’ efforts.
The Story Behind the Game
Collection Deck was designed by CIA Analyst David Clopper and it is used to teach new recruits about intelligence collection techniques. It was originally classified as Top Secret. The CIA recently declassified the game and Douglas Palmer and Mitchell Kotler secured its public release through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request via Muckrock.
When the news first broke, we were fascinated – the CIA is making board games? Now that we have the game files, we're thrilled to finally play them. We figure that there are plenty of likeminded folks out there so we're running this Kickstarter.
Work created by the federal government is automatically in the public domain. This allows us to expand on their designs while using their game as a base. You can check out the CIA version of the rules and cards. We’re creating new content to replace the censored material and we’re updating the visual design to bring you a polished version of the game.
As a bonus, we're designing an all new storytelling variant of the rules. Players will weave narratives around the crises and tactics as they race to avert disaster.
What's In The Box?
Don't Miss Out
We’re running this Kickstarter so that we can produce the game at scale. We aren’t planning to sell this in stores so this might be your only chance to buy a copy. If you want to purchase more than one copy, you’ll have an option to do so after the campaign ends.
We're shipping this game internationally to over 170 countries. Overseas shipping is expensive but we've done our best to secure reasonable rates.
About Us
This game is a collaboration between Techdirt and Diegetic Games. Techdirt has spent over 20 years reporting on a variety of topics including the CIA and its intelligence gathering, as well as the whole FOIA process — not to mention the importance of the public domain to encourage creative reuse of content. Diegetic Games makes storytelling and card games; it is Randy Lubin's design studio. We’re excited to work together and bring this game to a wider audience.
Risks and challenges
We’ve intentionally kept this Kickstarter Campaign simple to reduce production risk. It is fairly straightforward to print the box and cards and we have already identified several production options. We are confident that we can deliver the game on time and within our budget.
The game’s rules and mechanics have been thoroughly playtested by the CIA but we plan on testing it further to improve the gameplay. You can read the original rules here: https://www.muckrock.com/foi/united-states-of-america-10/materials-for-the-game-collection-deck-35175/#file-162778.
Under Section 105 of the Copyright Act, works created by employees of the federal government for the government are automatically in the public domain. The original game was created by a CIA employee for the CIA, it is clearly in the public domain and we're excited to build on it.
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Funding period
- (29 days)