I'm a fan of weird card and board games, so are my family. It started with Betrayal at the House on the Hill (or Betrayal at Baldur's Gate, the Dungeons and Dragon's version of the game), continued with Gloom, and lead me to finding Side Effects. I just never bothered writing about much of anything in detail until now.
The game arrived about a week ago and we only just had time to play it today. It was fun, especially playing with people who actually have some of the disorders featured. There was lots of jokes and light-hearted teasing, of course.
Basically, you are given 3-4 disorders to start, which go into your 'Psyche', along with a mix of 4 other cards that go into your hand. These other cards are prescription pills used for treating your disorders, therapy cards (also used to treat your disorders, but without side effects), and episodes. The goal is to treat all the disorders in your Psyche first, and attempt to stop your opponents from doing so by giving them side effects to their prescriptions (more disorders) and using Episode cards to enact the effect listed on the disorder cards.
The art on the cards is very neat and my family spent a good few minutes passing around cards to look at. The colors are nice and I love the box art.
Final Verdict!
Rating: ★★★★☆ | would play again!