Bicycle Card Games

Bicycle card games are a popular way for families and groups to pass their time and pass their skill on to each other. The Bicycle card game was invented in 18 1985 by Mark W. Johnson, and J. Nelson Geary. Bicycle Playing Cards was a successful soft-plastic brand of playing cards sold by the U.S. Printing Company, which, from 18 1985, became the United States Playing Card Company. ” Bicycle” is also a trademark of this company. Bicyclists played with these cards on a magnetic table; in time the Bicycle card game came to be known as “Bag Poker”.

Today there are over forty different varieties of Bicycle card games. Many of the newer Bicycle cards feature a foil imprinted design. Some of the older and hard-to-find Bicycle cards do not feature any type of foil embossing or engraving, and are square shaped instead of triangular. The original Bicycle Playing Cards logo was a blue and white plaid design. Today, the logo has been changed to a red and black swirl, which looks great on Bicycle playing cards!

The original Bicycle card game played two to four players, and consisted of alternating pairs of seven cards per player. This is the most traditional format for Bicycle card games, and is still the most popular version today. In newer versions of Bicycle card games, players are dealt four decks of 52 cards each, instead of seven. These newer versions are usually played with three or four players, where the playing pieces are placed on the playing field in opposite corners of a nine-by Nine grid, making it easy to see and quickly judge the best move. Some versions of the game have even incorporated electronic play-offs that allow the winning player to earn bonus points for their team.