Popcorn cover
2025BGG rank #4,309

Popcorn

by Victor Saumont · IELLO

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Players2–4
Time60m
ComplexityMedium-Light
Age10+

About the game

What is Popcorn?

In Popcorn, each player manages their own movie theater and tries to show the best combination of movies in order to attract guests to their seats. The game plays out over nine rounds, and in each round you may acquire a new movie, build or upgrade your theater, and use advertising to attract new guests — then it's showtime, with you drawing guests at random from your bag to see who has shown up. Place guests in the right seats to activate special powers; match them with the right movies, and you get a movie bonus as well, thanks to their enthusiasm for your good taste. After watching films in your theater, guests might be spirited away to other theaters thanks to ads presented by those theater owners - but you'll probably do the same to them, too. The bonuses from a movie get worse the longer it runs, so be sure to bring in fresh films to keep guests on the edge of your seats. After all, happy guests can help your theater win awards in town; more importantly, they can keep the "popcorn" piling up in your coffers, and whichever theater owner fills their popcorn box the best wins.

How it plays

Mechanics

Deck, Bag, and Pool Building

On the shelf

Categories

EconomicMovies / TV / Radio theme

Questions players ask

Questions to bring to BoardGameBrain

  • How do setup and the first turn work in Popcorn?
  • When does scoring happen and what ends the game?
  • How should the table resolve an unusual timing or rules interaction?