Thirty-two scientists from physics, biology, chemistry, math, and natural sciences are included from throughout time. The game not only highlights historical contributions by ancient Greek mathematician Hypatia and industrial-age astronomer Mary Somerville but also features scientists currently working in their respective fields, such as planetary scientist Claudia Alexander and neuroscientist May-Britt Moser.
Each card’s scientist is rated based on innovation, impact, obscurity, and badassery. To play the game, each player makes a random pile of their Female Scientist cards. The player to the dealer’s left chooses a characteristic from their top card (eg, Impact 8) and each player reads scores for the same characteristic. The player with the top-ranked scientist takes the cards from that round and adds them to the bottom of their pile, until one player has collected all the cards.
Playing Top Female Scientist is a great way to appreciate preceding Scientistas and the contributions each has made to the world. It’s also a fun way to bone up on some pretty spectacular scientific findings, or instigate debates on the rankings! If you have never played a game like this before, you can find a video of the creators playing it here, and best of all, the game can be downloaded for free here!