This post is from a nice suggestion from my buddy Nate-Dogg…the man holding down the fort in Sea-Town. He thought it would be a great idea and I agreed with him and promptly wrote the post…104 months after it was suggested. Maybe it was only four months. I don’t know. I usually overshoot how long time goes. Guess that’s why I tell girls I last four minutes in bed.
Anyway this post is all about board games that my generation has grown up with or continue to play to this day:
Monopoly. Not a generational board game since it was invented some time during the 1880’s or something like that, but every kid has at least played this game of entrepreneurship, top hats that pay taxes and Rich Uncle Moneybags looking sexy as a 2nd place beauty contestant. Now playing Monopoly is the same thing every single time you play, but where it really is interesting are the types of people you play the game with. Here are five very distinct players that play in every Monopoly game ever played…and they piss you off if you’re not one of them.
- The No-Trader. Might as well name this person The Black Hole: once properties land in this person’s possession they never see the light of day again. You could offer them two railroads, both utilities, $1,000, the naming rights to your first two children and 30 minutes alone with your girlfriend for Vermont Avenue…no dice. “That will give you a monopoly…I’m not doing that.” Oh yeah? Well at least I have a girlfriend! “True…but I have Vermont Avenue.” AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
- The Lucky Bastard. Alright I got this guy dead to rights. I have the whole red and yellow side including Water Works and the railroad. The only way he avoids doom is by rolling a…3. HE ROLLED A 3?!?!?!?!?!? THAT’S THE SEVENTH TIME IN A ROW HE’S AVOIDED MY DEATH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I’VE HEARD OF SELLING YOUR SOUL, BUT FOR A MONOPOLY WIN????????? I’D HAVE AT LEAST GOTTEN THE MONOPOLY WIN, THIRD BASE WITH ANNE HATHAWAY AND COORS LIGHT BEING FORCED TO STOP THEIR STUPID COLD BAR PROMOTION. I KNOW WHEN MY BEER’S COLD…I CAN FEEL IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
- Mr. Alamo. It’s never say die, fight for the every last dollar, mortgage every property seven times over and promise to do laundry for three months just so he can keep playing guy. The allure is for that ultimate comeback. The one time where this person had only $2 to their name…and came back to win. If this does happen it will be top three moments in this person’s life right between losing his virginity and successfully flipping an omelet. The only time this is worthy of use is if there are over five people playing and you’d be the first one out; who wants to sit around for two hours with your dick in your hand waiting for someone else to lose so you can play video games or something. I’m no doctor/scientist/rodeo clown, but I’m willing to bet this is how 65% of middle schoolers try alcohol…drinking to kill time by being the first person out of Monopoly. It’s just fact.
- By-The-Book-Bitch. The worst person to play with. This guy doesn’t allow anything that’s not in the explicitly-written rule sheet. “You don’t put fines in free parking…it goes in the bank!”, “You can’t trade get-out-of-jail free cards…that stays with the picker until it’s used”, “You can’t just give me the finger for your turn…you owe me $4 for Baltic rent!” This person isn’t just in Monopoly…he’s everywhere. Also known as The Fill-In this guy is always there because you needed one more person to make the game worthwhile and it just so happens to by By-The-Book-Bitch. If By-The-Book-Bitch is ever at a game you’re at make a side game of it. See who can piss him off the most without having him leave the table. Whoever forces him to leave owes the others $1. It’s like Jenga: you must have delicate balance and keep pushing your luck until someone causes it all to fall apart leaving someone crying in the fetal position.
- The Smart One. 45 minutes in this guy sells all his properties and money to the first place person for $1 real money. We all hate this guy…but secretly want to be him. He’s the only one winning in real life.
Apples to Apples. This is a game that became popular with my group of friends during high school and college. You have two sets of cards: one with nouns and the other with adjectives. Everyone gets seven nouns and your goal is to pick which noun goes best with the adjective a guesser selected. The game makers believe this is a nice, wholesome family game where you match adjectives like “healthy” with nouns like “bananas” and that’s no fun. You have to get dark with it.
The best combination I’ve come across was my 13 year old cousin played “Rosa Parks” with the adjective “mischievous”. She didn’t get it, but everyone else died laughing. The game is meant to be dark. You don’t have people like Hitler, Helen Keller and Bill Clinton without having twisted fun with it. Another perk is the ability to have inside jokes. If you mention “creamed corn” to any of my cousins from the Fraker side of the family and I guarantee a five minute laughfest where no words are said and 50% of pants are peed.
If you haven’t played this game…go get it right now.
Loaded Questions. Another fantastic dark humor game. The game is exactly what it says…there are loaded questions that are asked and everyone but the guesser has to write an answer. Questions like “What three things would you take with you to a desert island?” are asked and the guesser has to guess which person said what answer. The rules want you to tell the truth, but…where’s the fun in that?
This game is no fun to be played with younger kids, grandparents or people who don’t think outside the box. Creativity is key. The more obscure/personal/weird you get with answers the better. A good rule of thumb would be to include mothers, celebrities and sexual things. Roll them together and you got yourself a hit. Personally I like to stick to obscure celebrities and actions. My personal favorite answer I’ve given all-time was to the question “What’s your most prized possession?” My answer: “My 9th place ribbon in an Al Roker look-a-like contest.”
Life. There isn’t a bigger kick in the dick for real life than Life. This game makes everything seem so easy. You get to choose three careers straight out of college that aren’t even similar (hmmm…musician, cop or accountant?…), everyone finds their significant other at the same exact time (sometime around 25…uh-oh, I’ve got five months) and you never have to rent a place to live until you buy your first house…which you may be able to pay off in cash!
Not only is everything easy, but those life cards…they’re evil! They make you think your life is in shambles compared to these people. In one lifetime you can win a Nobel Peace Prize, cure the common cold, win $80,000 on a game show, have sets of twins (one biological, one adopted), have a mid-life crisis and get a better job/salary without the token Harley, climb Mt. Everest, hit it big in the stock market of numbers (always go 3) and steal other life accomplishments from other people all before you retire at the age of what implies to be 65, but in reality to do every life tile you’ve obtained would take you to age 753.
The game Life is such an easier life than real-life. Damn you Hasbro! AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Cranium. This is a game that is a nice all-around affair. You have to know science and English, know how to draw/sculpt, be musically capable and have a great connection with your teammates. It’s a fun game. However the best part of this game isn’t the game itself…it’s how mad people get with their teammates, but specifically the couple who blows up at each other. They’re usually losing by a wide margin and a person doesn’t know how to sculpt a harp out of clay. Then it’s name calling, hand gesturing and raised voices until someone either leaves the game or gets personal. Whenever the dust settles…the game just continues because it’s all been seen before with said couple so let’s just keep going.
Mousetrap and Operation. Both were fun kid’s games until someone loses a piece…then you’re f***ed.
Ants in the Pants. This was my favorite game as a child. It involved a 1’ pair of plastic pants that you had to spring ants into. You’d push down on the ant’s butt and it would spring in the air, hopefully into the pants. You could have up to four people playing, but because I was either a selfish brat or I was too good at the game that I’d play by myself. Every indoor recess (the spawn of Satan as a child) I’d play that game until my fingers were sore. I was a simple kid and I’m still a simple man. If I had that game now I’d play it at work and annoy every around me…Heaven.
Risk. A great game to play, but you never want to win the first time you play with friends or else you’ll never win again. People will always remember you won the first game and always hunt you down even if they go down with you. I won the first time I played with friends in middle school…to this day I’ve never won again. I’m not bitter or anything…jerks. Anyway there are two people that are in every Risk game: Too Serious Guy and F*** Serious Guy Guy. Basically Too Serious Guy is in the game 100%, has his whole strategy planned out, can see moves that other people are about to make and has a fool-proof plan for victory…until F*** Serious Guy Guy sees Too Serious Guy getting way too into it and will purposely go after Too Serious Guy until F*** Too Serious Guy is dead and has ruined Too Serious Guy’s fool-proof plan.
There is one problem for Risk…geography. I’ve learned most of my world geography from Risk. That hurts in tests and quizzes. Apparently there aren’t two states in Australia: Eastern and Western Australia. Oops.
Guess Who. A game that got more in-depth and racist as you get older. As kids it was a simple game of whether your person has a hat, earrings or gray hair and a great way to practice lying (one time I won eight straight games…lied for five), but as you get older you get questions like “Does your person look like a hooker?”, “Is your guy a registered sex offender?” and “Does your person enjoy tossing a nice salad?” It’s very politically incorrect…and very funny to play.
It also makes a great drinking game. If you lose you have to drink by how bad you lost. If you lost by five you drink for five seconds that are count down by the winner at however fast a pace they want.
Pogs. Who doesn’t remember this fantastic fad in the mid-‘90’s? I remember writing a “newspaper” article about pogs in third grade about their origins (all I said was that Kelly brought them in…I wasn’t big on actual research.) I was all about it. I even had the Pog-Maker. It was basically a cardboard sticker. You’d peel off the top of the pog, place whatever picture you were using on top, cut around the pog and voila!…crappy pog made! I would take my Sports Illustrated for Kids and tear them up making pogs, but I would always suck at cutting circles. Usually I would cut it too small, but still put the picture on the pog leaving a ring of the cardboard sticker visible and making my awesome created pog stick to anything it touched. I suck at art. I wish I still had it…I’d make Nudie Pogs!!! Hooray immaturity!!!
There you have it. Games I played as a young lad all the way to college grad and certainly through being a dad. Now if you excuse me I have to find the butterfly piece from Operation so I can f***ing play it again!
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!
