When comparing Snake Oil vs Exploding Kittens, the Slant community recommends Snake Oil for most people. In the question“What are the best party card games?” Snake Oil is ranked 5th while Exploding Kittens is ranked 7th. The most important reason people chose Snake Oil is:
Whether they're selling Story Pajamas to the Teacher, a Pocket Toilet to a Couch Potato, or the ever-handy Baby Shield to some Aliens, it is the sales pitches of the players that elevate Snake Oil above similar games like Cards Against Humanity or Apples to Apples. Being able to sell their products gives players ownership of what cards they play and it rewards those who commit to trying to actually match the product to the customer.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Creating convincing pitches for ridiculous products rewards creative thinking and often leads to surreal, yet hilarious, situations
Whether they're selling Story Pajamas to the Teacher, a Pocket Toilet to a Couch Potato, or the ever-handy Baby Shield to some Aliens, it is the sales pitches of the players that elevate Snake Oil above similar games like Cards Against Humanity or Apples to Apples. Being able to sell their products gives players ownership of what cards they play and it rewards those who commit to trying to actually match the product to the customer.
Pro Tons of replayability
With 56 possible customer roles and 336 product cards, there's already a large amount of variety built into the game, but the 30 second pitches allow everyone's creativity to keep each game fresh and new.
Pro Fun at parties
The game is very fast paced and chaotic, making it more fun for parties. The illustrations are very humorous and original, likely to be the source of much laughter.
Pro Simple rules
There are very few rules to the game, which makes it both easy to pick up and for new people to join.
Pro Completing a full game doesn't take much time
Due to the way the game is designed, a full round will require that you use (at most) the entire deck, which is not substantially large. This means you won't end up with situations like other games, where a round will end up taking over an hour to play. This makes it a good warm-up game.
Cons
Con Players need to commit to the concept of making short sales pitches for the game to really shine
If players aren't willing to really try and sell their products the game can quickly grow stale as people simply play cards and hope to get picked. Now use that silver tongue to get out there and sell some Snake Oil!
Con Limited replayability without buying expansions
Much of the fun in Exploding Kittens comes from the illustrations on the cards. If you play it regularly then this aspect might become dull due to frequent exposure. There are expansions, such as an NSFW (Not Safe For Work, aimed at an adult audience), that you can get to mix things up a bit.