Oh My Pigeons! review — Gather, steal, and sabotage your way to having the largest flock

Oh My Pigeons! is a simple, yet delightful party game, which takes less than a minute to set up and just as little time to learn. Your goal is simple, collect the most pigeons on your bench and rule the roost! To do so you must be ruthless with other players, flicking your die at them to knock pigeons off their bench, stealing pigeons from them, and utilizing special cards to prevent them from playing their cards. 

Oh My Pigeons! Might just be the easiest game to set up I have ever played. Before play each player grabs a bench and three pigeons to place on their bench. All remaining pigeons are placed in the middle of the table and serve as the flock. Then, someone shuffles the card deck and places 3 cards in front of each player, while the rest of the deck is set next to the flock. That’s it, the game begins with the person who most recently saw a pigeon taking the first turn and continues clockwise until someone fills up all the spaces on their bench with pigeons. When playing two players, then 10 pigeons must be acquired, while three to five player games require only 9 pigeons to be acquired.

On each turn a player must use one of their cards and do what it says, and then place that card in a discard pile near the deck. Cards may allow you to add to your flock, steal from another player’s flock, trade benches with a player, roll a die, stop a player from using one of their cards, force players to return pigeons to the flock, and more. There is a good variety of cards to pull, and it helps that the cards all feature fun artwork, which often made me laugh as I came across new cards for the first time. 

Most cards are self-explanatory, but there is a card called “Oh My Pigeons!” which then has the player roll a die. The die contains the number 3, 5, 4, 2, and poo – yes, poo. If you roll a 5 or a 3, you simply add that many pigeons to your bench. If you roll the 4 or 2 then you take that many pigeons from either one player or split the amount between multiple players. If you land on one of the two poo sides then you must place the die near your bench and flick it at another player’s bench and any pigeons it knocks off the bench are then added back into the flock. 

Gameplay is fast and fun, with players constantly shifting between adding to their flock and sabotaging other player’s flocks. Games last anywhere from 5 minutes to 15 minutes, though a few games may end almost immediately if the right combo of cards are pulled. This makes Oh My Pigeons! Perfect for a night in with friends or family, or a palate cleanser between more intense gaming experiences.

Each time I’ve sat down to play I’ve ended up playing four or five games in a session, which is a testament to how much fun it is even throughout multiple rounds. There are enough cards that each round feels unique, and the cards do a great job of keeping players on their toes about who may win. No matter how close a player is to completing their bench, all it takes is one card to send them back to nearly square one. Overall, Oh My Pigeons! is a near perfect example of a game tailor-made for quick play sessions and is sure to be a hit at your next gathering.

My only complaint harkens back to my earlier statement that some games can end almost immediately if the right cards are pulled. It is a bit disappointing when you’ve just begun and essentially two cards in a player has already rolled a die for 5 pigeons and used a card for the remaining 1 or 2, thereby winning. Thankfully, this occurs rarely enough that you can laugh it off and move on to the next round to continue with the fun.

See below for our list of partners and affiliates: