The cards cost £5 for a single deck. They are like normal playing cards, except all of the artwork is Waterloo focussed.
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(Below) The front of the pack uses the same image that graces the 4 of Spades card, described as Scotland Forever! - Scots Greys (Butler).
(Below) The rear of the box has the artwork from the King of Diamonds, described as Wellington (after Lawrence).
(Below) The rear of each card shows Wellington riding the line, described as 'Wellington at Waterloo (Hillingford).
(Below) For a French sample, I have chosen the 'Grenadier of the Imperial Guard (E. Detaille)'.
(Below) And finally, the reliable 'Blucher (Dawe)'.
The cards have a very nice quality to them and are nice and robust to handle. I recently picked up a packet of normal playing cards because I want to try out a few game mechanics that used such cards - so to see these military based cards made for a 'must buy'.
The only thing that has disappointed me has been the Joker cards. One is a true joker card, with a brilliant satirical picture of Wellington, but the other is just an informational card with website information etc - a wasted opportunity to get two really good joker cards into this deck.
Whether you want them to game with or just simply to own, I think at their price, they are a nice thing to have. They are the 'official cards' of www.waterloo200.org, an umbrella organisation established to oversee the celebration of the 200th anniversary.
I'm not sure that these are particularly new, but gamers may want to get hold of a set before they go out of print. I might try and get these cards into an anniversary Waterloo campaign game this June, perhaps to manage reinforcements or some such.
EDIT - link to a source that sells these and a shed load of other types of card - http://www.birdplayingcards.com/collection.php
