Card Game - "Word Chain"

For an early game-design class, I was tasked with creating a unique card game. One of my all-time favorite board games is Scrabble, and Dominoes is another favorite, so I decided to merge the two. The game can have 1-4 players. There are 85 total cards, representing the most commonly-used letters in the English alphabet plus a "wild card" that can be played as any of the other 15. Each player has a hand of 5 cards and can spell one (valid) word using their cards per turn--or pass, or sacrifice a turn to exchange the cards in their hand for new ones out of the pile (like Scrabble). The game runs on until all the cards are exhausted, and all players either run out of cards or cannot use their remainder. Players earn points based on the number of cards used per word--the more you use, the more points you land. The first player spells a word that is 2-5 letters in length. The next player either spells a word beginning with the last letter of the first word (to begin the right chain), or a word ending with the first letter of the first word (for the left chain). This starts a chain with two ends to play off. Players can only play off of the last word that's played on each chain, following the pattern from the beginning. The left chain works off of the first letter (which must end each word), and the right chain works off of the last letter (which must begin each word). This keeps the ends from reconnecting or crossing paths. If the last letter of the right chain is a vowel (which it often is), it can either begin or be the second letter of the next word. If the first letter of the left chain is a consonant, it can either be the end or second-to-last letter of the next word. Also, the same word can only be used twice, and cards left in-hand at the end of the game count as points against the player holding them. Each of these cards was meticulously digitally painted in Photoshop at a small scale. The overlaid letters were made in Illustrator. I have individually scaled up each card for a better look. I created them before learning about Photoshop's push-button painterly filters, so it took forever. The paintings were made either atop of an existing photo, or used as reference alongside the painting. Some of the photos are mine, most of them are not. Again, this game was formed for educational purposes and is not sold commercially. Thank you, owners of these photos, and also Google, for making them available.