COLLEGE PARK, MD, July 2 -- Aquarius, the new card game from Looney Laboratories, inc., will be the hottest thing going at the 24th Origins International Game Expo & Fair in Columbus this weekend.
Last year at Origins, Looney Labs, a virtually unknown new game company, created a surprise hit with their first card game, Fluxx, which is now in its second edition under license to Iron Crown Enterprises.
Looney Labs hopes to do even better with Aquarius. They're planning a groovy, hippie-hangout styled booth for the official launch at Origins, complete with a comfy couch, cool coffee table, lava lamps and tie-dye tapestries. The spokesmodel sisters, Gina Mai and Lori Ann Denn (pictured on the outside back cover of the convention program book), along with designer Andrew Looney and the Team Aquarius entourage, will be on hand to demonstrate the game.
Aquarius is a fun, simple card game for one to five players of all ages, featuring three types of cards: Elements, Goals, and Actions. Element cards are played kind of like dominos, with each player trying to win by connecting seven panels of one particular element. Goal cards determine which element each player is going after, and Action cards allow players to shake up the action in five different ways. The game is fast, fun, colorful and easy to learn.
"Aquarius is the grooviest thing since go-go boots," Lori Ann Denn giggled at the May 28th product debut party. "I'm very excited to be involved in the launch of what's going to be the biggest hit of the year."
"Aquarius is the kind of game that you want to play again as soon as the first game is over," designer Andrew Looney said. Looney's previous works include Fluxx and the video game Icebreaker, both noted for their surprisingly strong appeal to women, a traditionally difficult market for games. "Aquarius has terrific game play, and striking, unique art. The reactions we're getting to it are overwhelmingly positive."
With colorful, sixties-inspired artwork, Aquarius will push a nostalgia button with a broad cross-section of the buying public as well as today's teenagers who have embraced many of the icons of the sixties. Aquarius is a fun, simple card game that the whole family will enjoy.
Aquarius is all-inclusive and ready-to-play with a suggested retail price of $9.95. Game stores around the country are beginning to carry the game, and it will continue to be available online through the Looney Labs Gift Shop at www.wunderland.com.
An unconventional corporation, Looney Laboratories, inc. operates as a new product design studio. They create cool new stuff by taking product ideas off the drawing board, manufacturing small runs and selling and promoting them through their eclectic online community in cyberspace (www.wunderland.com). When a Looney Labs product becomes successful enough that their small staff can no longer handle the sales and marketing workload, it licenses the rights to a larger company so that they can concentrate their efforts on creating new products. Founded in 1996, Looney Labs is headquartered in College Park, MD.
