Sabacc is, perhaps, the most famous card game in the galaxy far far away. It’s the premise of the frayed relationship between Han Solo and Lando Calrissian, the reason why the legendary Millennium Falcon changed hands, and how many people engaged in high-stakes action.
Despite the very, very long scenes at Canto Bight’s massive casino in the sequel trilogy, none of the games were looked at or given meaning, leaving Sabacc as what we know as the quintessentially Star Wars game, bar trusting Watto’s chance cubes.
Of course, in Episode V, Han merely says that Lando lost the ship “fair and square,” but in the second draft of the screenplay, he mentions the “Sabacca game.” Later, the novel Lando Calrissian and the Mindharp of Sharu says that Sabacc was the game, and it was integrated into the Crisis on Cloud City expansion to Star Wars: The Roleplaying Game. It’s an iconic part of the setting now.
Now, while almost all other remnants of Star Wars gambling were evoked once Disney began its rule, it’s possible to partake in this distinct form of Star Wars gaming in this galaxy, but is it worth the time?
Purging the Star Wars gambling lines
Under LucasFilm, the Star Wars brand became colossal by exploring just about every form of product imaginable. There were, of course, hundreds of action figures for every main character and extra in the movies, a whole heap of Star Wars versions of existing products, like chess, and even incredibly popular slots in Las Vegas. Once Disney took over, though, the slot licenses were evoked, and the same happened to the popular online Marvel slots.
Even though Disney was happy to pump Star Wars games like the EA Battlefront games with loot boxes – a form of gambling by any stretch of the imagination – older fans couldn’t enjoy the Star Wars slots anymore. Of course, there are still a whole host of sci-fi slots to try. In the slots real money activation, Pulsar and Nova 7s stand out as the more Star Wars-like creations, even if it’s just for the clone stormtrooper Nova and the Tango Company clone Pulsar.
Sabacc as a Star Wars fan’s go-to social betting game
This purge under new rulers leaves only gambling games that aren’t strictly gambling games as available merchandise to modern Star Wars fans. This is why the $1 billion park Galaxy’s Edge sells a set box for the card game Sabacc. You don’t strictly have to wager your prized Corellian light freighter, but if you and some friends do learn the rules, it could be fun to have poker-like rounds of betting. There’s also the Han Solo Card Game, which is essentially the same.
The game itself takes place over three rounds, starting with two cards. In each round, you get to draw, discard, fold, stand, or swap a hand card with one in the discard pile. At the end of this cards phase, the dice are rolled to see if there’s a double, which sees all hands fold and redrawn. At the end of the third round, it’s the player with the card total closest to zero based on subtracting red-numbered cards from green.
It’s very simple, and perhaps made more simple than the in-universe game to be accessible, but it doesn’t come with betting rules. A good way to go about this would be to have a betting round before each dice roll, with the winner getting the pot at the end. This way, a double on the dice could completely throw off a big bet and turn the tide entirely.
The game that can be found online as “Disney Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge Certified SABACC Playing Card and Dice Games” can be very fun to play for the unpredictability brought in by the dice. Make it a betting game like in the lore, or even trying the Corellian Spike rules, could make it even more enjoyable for certain audiences.