The game is for 2-6 players, plays in 20 minutes, and as might be expected from the title has you trying to collect things of value without knowing what the final value might be. Here's a detailed summary of the gameplay:
The deck includes tulips of four colors, with values 2-4. Lay out four festival cards based on the player count, with these cards showing the number of points scored for giving away tulips, keeping tulips, and having a majority of certain colors at the end of the game. Draw two cards of different colors, and place them under the festival cards in first and second place based on their value. Deal two cards to each player; keep one card face up in front of you and add the other face down to the "secret festival" pile.
On a turn, draw a card from the deck and KEEP/GIVE/ADD it, then draw a second card and take one of the actions you didn't just take. The actions:
—KEEP: Place the card face up in front of you, scoring points for it if that color is currently ranked third or fourth in the festival.
—GIVE: Give the card to another player, who places it face up in front of themselves; you score "giving" points based on the current ranking of that color in the festival, plus points equal to the value of that tulip.
—ADD: Place the card face down in the secret festival or add it face up to the festival, altering the ranking of colors if needed so that the color with the highest sum is first, etc.
When the deck runs out, shuffle the cards in the secret festival, then draw five at random and add them face up to the festival, adjusting the ranking as needed. (If fewer than five cards are in the secret festival, add all of these cards to the festival.)
For the three highest ranked colors in the festival, whoever has the most and secondmost cards in these colors scores points as listed on the festival cards; in games with five and six players, the player with the thirdmost cards of a color also scores points. In case of a tie for card count, the tied player with the higher value of a color wins that tie. Whoever has the most points wins.
The description below is light on gameplay details, but the introductory material might tell you all that you need to know about the game:
Don't worry, this is simply an occupational hazard. In fact, it is fairly common among Deep Space Miners (5th class), and some say that it is almost unavoidable. And, well, it is. Especially since the crystals that you seek happen to be inside giant space beasts. To mine them, you need to, well, be eaten.
But, no reason to panic. We are here to help you deal with the physical and mental challenges of being eaten. This handy simulation/survival guide is standard issue for all recruits and will eventually lead to a productive, if not potentially brief, career in space mining.
Should you achieve your objective and mine enough crystals to meet your quota, it is then cost-effective for the company to activate your jet pack and extricate you from the proverbial belly of the beast. While the beast's immune response was not enough to prevent its demise, its contribution to human progress and corporate profitability are most definitely appreciated.
In the eventuality that the bacteria present in the beast overwhelm you and you are digested, do not worry. Your non-organic parts will ultimately provide much utility to future space miners. In fact, you may encounter some such pieces of equipment in your expedition, remains of attempts by evidently less-than-qualified recruits.
Finally, it could transpire that you do not collect the necessary crystals by the time you reach the end of the beast's digestive tract. In this case — the so-called "ending #2" — you will then exit the beast from the other end than the one you entered: alive, yet forever changed. In this case, and after a thorough decontamination and quarantine period, we will have to evaluate your performance versus that of the beast's efforts to consume you.
In So, You've Been Eaten., the Miner and the Beast face off against one another. The Miner earns points by collecting crystals, and the Beast earns points by developing immune responses and by its bacteria attacking the Miner.
The Miner wins instantly by collecting all eight different crystals, and the Beast wins instantly by digesting the Miner after the attack of four bacteria of the same type. Of course, there's always the possibility that the Miner will simply pass through the Beast's system, in which case the player with the most points wins!
So, You've Been Eaten. can be played as:
—A game for 2 players, with a Miner player against a Beast player.
—A game for 1 player, with the Miner player against a sleeping Beast.
—A game for 1 player, with the Beast player against a robot Miner.
—A game for 0 players, with a sleeping Beast against a robot Miner.