Trombone Champ is an absurd rhythm game from Holy Wow Studios, exploring the secret connections between the trombone, baboons, hot dogs, and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. It was nominated for a wide range of awards, including a BAFTA, to Game of the Year nominations from publications as diverse as The New Yorker and Destructoid.

Trombone Champ: The Card Game is an absurd tabletop game from Jason Anarchy Games, pitting players against each other in a game that embodies the high art of the tromboner. Jason Anarchy Games is best known for the Drinking Quest series that combines tabletop RPG, card game, and drinking game into one adventure that may force you to chug your drink, the Cassandra Comics game Self Careless, and the Shen Comix game Your Friend is Sad.

It was our pleasure to interview Jason Anarchy himself.

Thank you for making the world’s first 100% accurate tabletop game about trombones. For readers who don’t know about Trombone Champ, what is this game?

Trombone Champ, the original video game, went viral a while ago with clips of its wide-eyed and whimsical trombone playing. I think the wholesomeness of the whole thing really surprised people.

But once I played the game, not only did it deliver on the whimsy but there is an incredible layer of non-sequitur humour to the game that I really appreciated. It was already a great game and it didn’t need to have hot dogs and baboons be a part of the lore, but it did it and it was all just so unapolgetically strange.

But apparently it was also very accurate. While working on the game, I consulted with Trombone scientist Cornelius Bonseworth and he said that hot dogs and baboons were in fact, a big part of trombone playing.

What can players expect from the game? How does it play?

Players take turns laying out Note Cards on Song Cards and collaboratively making these really long trombone slides. Players make the trombones together, but the point scoring system can be pretty cutthroat. At the end of the day, it’s every tromboner for themself!

You can give out hot dog tokens to distract players from playing notes (they have to eat the delicious hot dog first).

But if Hot Dogs become a problem, players can summon a baboon meeple who will eat all the hot dogs. It’s pretty advanced stuff!

First to win 20 Toot Tokens wins the game!

This has one of my favorite mechanics I’ve seen in awhile: the size of the table affects the length a song can be played. Please, tell our readers more about that mechanic!

Thank you, when I figured out the trombone extension mechanic, that was the moment when I knew this game was pitchable to the original developers.

Players just keep playing cards and potentially making these very long trombone slides, the only limitation is the size of your table. Your physical table area organically affects the note limits for the songs. So playing on different tables will give you a different experience.

Don’t want any limits? Find a huge table!

How many baboons sneaked into the game?

If you back the Kickstarter in the first 3 days you get a free Rainbow Baboon Bum pin! 🙂

The cards that finish the trombone slide in the game (The Finito Cards) have a picture of a baboon and a red bum. It ends the slide, but it’s also the end of the baboon. When I asked the artist to make the pin, he gave the baboon a rainbow bum. When I asked why, he kind of shrugged and said it was accurate. I haven’t personally verified this yet, but apparently there are actual baboons with rainbow bums out there.

From there, the game has a Baboon Meeple which is very straight-faced and he just means business. This baboon has one purpose and one purpose only–eating hot dogs!

There are also some baboons on cards, including a baboon that is uppercutting a bunch of hot dogs!

Where can everyone find Trombone Champ: The Card Game?

By the time this interview goes up, the Kickstarter should be live.

Thank you so much for your time!

Trombone Champ: The Card Game will be available on Kickstarter until next month. If you back in the first three days, you will receive a Rainbow Baboon Bum pin for free.

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Featured Image: Jason Anarchy Games

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