Board with Each Other Bite Size: Episode 5 - Monopoly Deal

In this edition of Board With Each Other Bitesize we appraise the re-imagining of the sleeper indie hit Monopoly into the fast paced set collection card game that is Monopoly Deal.

Is it worth your time despite it's shared moniker? Is Monopoly unfairly maligned? How many house rules can you add to this one? All these questions answered and more within the episode!

We hope you enjoy.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:15

Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of Board with Each other Bite Size, the spin-off podcast from Board With Each Other, where we look at light, quick, easy games and expansions, which don't warrant the full review treatment that we do on a monthly basis if you're joining us here for the first time. But instead we just do sort of a quick run-through of our thoughts on the game and just give it an overall score. So quick, snappy, breezy easy. I'm Al Simpson, and I'm joined as ever by my lovely wife and player 2, Hannah Kelly.

SPEAKER_00 0:45

I'm just here to collect the rent.

SPEAKER_01 0:47

Sure you are. And today we are looking at the card reimagining of the nickelback of board games Monopoly. That is Monopoly Deal. Monopoly Deal is a reimagining of Monopoly, which is basically been distilled into a set collection card game. In Monopoly Deal, you start the game with five cards each. At the start of your turn, you draw two cards and then you play three cards. The object of the game is to collect three full property sets. So obviously vary in number depending on the colour. So you can play those down properties down in front of you. There are action cards which allow you to do a variety of things within the game. So it might be collecting rent from the other player. So it'll have a you collect rent on blues, and if you have whatever number of blues you have on the card, I don't know it's how much money you collect. Or it could be things like swap one of your properties for another person's property, collect some cards, etc. etc.

SPEAKER_00 1:43

You also have money cards.

SPEAKER_01 1:44

Yep, you also have money cards. So the third action you can take is put money into your bank. So you have cards that are just money, so you pop them in your bank, or you could play any of the cards in your hand, they all have monetary values attached to them, into your bank. When you collect rent from another player, they pay you from their bank. If their bank is empty or they don't have enough, they have to pay you with properties. So the whole point is trying to get your opponent's money down enough to steal their properties via the mechanism of rent. And you continue until you have three, full sets, and that ends the game.

SPEAKER_00 2:14

Yep. It's a fairly quick game to play. I don't think it takes massively long. I mean, even some of our longest games are probably only about 10 minutes long.

SPEAKER_01 2:21

Yeah, 10 to 15 minutes usually, so it's very, very quick fire. You don't need a lot of space to play it, you can just sort of play wherever. You just need enough space to put your sets down in front of you, which you could always compress if you needed to. Yeah, it's a good one. So again, one of those airplane table kind of games that you could do if you wanted to. So I picked this up completely on a whim because I'd heard that it was an improvement on one of my most despised experiences, Monopoly. I I know it's a cool thing to hate on Monopoly, and I did play it quite a lot as a child, but I I think the first ball game we ever played together was Monopoly. It was the first board game we ever played together. Very, very early on in our relationship. We went around to somebody's house and they cracked it out. And it it reminded me of why I hate Monopoly. I don't hate Monopoly because of the rules. I hate Monopoly because it seems to bring out to the absolute worst in everybody who encounters it. And I seem to remember you were cheating, you got very argumentative. Um it's there's something about this cursed board game that just turns people evil. Um, and that's one of the reasons why I don't I don't like it. Also, I just you know it's been surpassed by so many a thing. Now you're looking at me like you're about to defend Monopoly, and I'm here for that.

SPEAKER_00 3:26

I do, I like Monopoly.

SPEAKER_01 3:29

But it turns you into a bad person.

SPEAKER_00 3:32

And maybe that's why I like it.

SPEAKER_01 3:34

Maybe.

SPEAKER_00 3:35

No, I really like Monopoly. I have a I have a very warm soft spot for it. Um, would I play it probably? Well, you know, you'll never play Monopoly with me every day. Never, never again. No, that's not gonna happen. Um, but yeah, I love it. And also, having played Monopoly an awful lot, I only found out a couple of years ago that I've been playing Monopoly wrong for my entire life.

SPEAKER_01 3:57

Everybody's been playing Monopoly wrong their entire lives. I think that's one of the problems. I think Monopoly got heavily house-ruled by our parents' generation, and that just got passed on to us, and I don't really know why. Nobody plays Monopoly by the rules.

SPEAKER_00 4:08

Yeah, if you played it by the rules, it wouldn't be such a painful game to play that goes on for like 16 hours with you know, people throwing the board in the air and yeah, free parking, not a thing. Yeah, no, I never played the free parking.

SPEAKER_01 4:20

I know, we we had the full caboodle. We used to play with free parking. We used to have this weird rule that if you land an on-go, you got 500 instead of 200. Um, there were just loads of house rules that just got passed down to me as fact, being taught as a child by my parents, and it just makes the game into this eight-hour marathon of pain.

SPEAKER_00 4:36

But this is the thing, right? Like you and I grew up in different countries, and yet our house rules are the same. I know. Aside from the free parking thing.

SPEAKER_01 4:41

Yeah, aside from the free parking thing. It's it I think it's pretty universal. I just I just blame Boomers and Gen X, really.

SPEAKER_00 4:48

But we're not reviewing Monopoly.

SPEAKER_01 4:49

No, we're not reviewing Monopoly, but we have to deal with the elephant in the room. So just for the record, I absolutely fucking hate Monopoly. And uh much more warm. But yeah, so pick this up on a whim because we're going on holiday and I was looking for nice quick games that we could play on an aeroplane table. And um I think it's fair to say I was actually quite pleasantly surprised by this when we first cracked it out.

SPEAKER_00 5:08

I mean it's not Monopoly, though, is it?

SPEAKER_01 5:09

No, it's not Monopoly. It's never going to be Monopoly. Let's just draw a line under that. It's definitely a different game with a Monopoly skin on. I think the difference is there's no board or dice, or any of the components over the property late.

SPEAKER_00 5:25

Uh there's no little dog, is there?

SPEAKER_01 5:27

No, there is no little dog no.

SPEAKER_00 5:29

Um what I will say for this is it's much more competitive than actual monopoly. There's actually strategy involved. There's a bit of strategy involved, but actually there's a little bit more competition without it being bloodthirsty, you know? Yeah, yeah. Um so you know, you're collecting a rent far more frequently. Yeah. Um, you know.

SPEAKER_01 5:46

That's a choice that you are actually taking action on, not another player just landing on your having to land on your property.

SPEAKER_00 5:52

So you get to choose when to do that and when not to do that. Um you can steal each other's properties, which is really quite fun.

SPEAKER_01 5:58

There's quite a lot of take that in this, isn't there? Yeah. And that may pop some people off. So if take that sort of aggressive take that is not your bag, I would steer clear of this.

SPEAKER_00 6:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:07

Um, but if you do like a little bit of haha, yeah, this is probably gonna suit you.

SPEAKER_00 6:11

But yeah, because it's not that huge, big, massive endurance marathon of a game, actually the winning doesn't it it doesn't hurt so much when you have those take that moments, you know. Easy come, easy go. Yeah. And you're building sets really, really quickly as well.

SPEAKER_01 6:24

I mean, you can theoretically build a set in your first turn and yeah, it can be, yeah, you can sort of just breeze through. And I think that is one of the problems with this. Um, from what I found of the actually quite a lot of games that we played of it, um, things either go your way or they don't.

SPEAKER_00 6:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:43

And once you get go if you both get going, then it's fine, but I tend to find in most games you've just got sort of immediate runaway leader that just sort of bullies the other person until into submission.

SPEAKER_00 6:53

Yeah. And three sets isn't all that much.

SPEAKER_01 6:55

No, no, it's not.

SPEAKER_00 6:57

It's actually quite easy to to to hit that number, and maybe if you spread it out a little bit more, you get more sort of game play out of it. But I don't know whether you'd really want to, really.

SPEAKER_01 7:06

No, I think I think it's perfectly fine as it is. It has its problem. I think the problems, I think that runaway leader thing is is a problem. Again, I've got no idea, we've never played this with uh anything aside from two people, um, because I'd love to see the look on my friends' faces if they came over and I whacked this out. Uh like, what are you doing what are you doing? Um so I don't actually know. I feel like it would probably play a bit better with more people. I think it'd be a little bit more fun. I think that runaway leader problem might be less of an issue because you'd have multiple people with the ability to sort of unmake the king kind of thing and bring them down a little bit. Whereas if you're playing with two, yeah, somebody just ends up sort of bullying the other into submission a little bit. Um but saying that, I was pleasantly surprised by it. I think I mean you could pick this up pretty much anywhere, and if you are travelling or you know, heading off on a trip and or just want something very, very quick and actually has a little bit of depth, then I I recommend it. I think it's alright.

SPEAKER_00 7:59

Yeah, I mean I don't know how much strategy there is really to it. It is very, very luck-based.

SPEAKER_01 8:04

I think games can get into a zone that can become quite strategic, but as whether you get to that zone before somebody runs off with it or not, I think there's a few games that we've played that were actually quite genuinely strategic because we're both, you know, back and forth in it. Um, but I think that's quite a rarity with two players, from what I've seen. I think yeah, it's a shame the game doesn't have some sort of mechanism that almost forces that even keel to start taking place, perhaps like you know, like you can't you you can't collect rent until people have got at least sort of three or four properties out, maybe, I don't know. But there's I wish there was something that sort of pushed the balance balanced it into the the point that it starts to actually become quite an interesting tactical experience. Because it can do, you just have to get there, and a lot of the time you don't.

SPEAKER_00 8:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:50

Which is a bit of a shame. And this is not going to break the bank. I mean, we paid less than ten pounds for it in Waterstones, which are famous for their smiths, in fact. Or shit. They are famous for charging absolute full RRP on everything.

SPEAKER_00 9:05

So again, it's Hasbro, isn't it? So you get it cheaper.

SPEAKER_01 9:10

Yeah, yeah. So but most places you can get this found to ten pounds, and it's just uh takes up no shelf room, etc. You know, it's quite quite a good one to have on the shelf. Um there's nothing wrong with the quality of it. The box is a bit like a duno box, you know, and if you're concerned about travelling and whatnot, it should stand up to that.

SPEAKER_00 9:24

Yeah, I mean I think if your season ball game is it's probably going to be on the light side. Um but I think again, if you're trying to introduce someone to the hobby and you want to show them there's something a little bit different other than you know traditional Monopoly, although why you would want to do that I don't quite know.

SPEAKER_01 9:38

Because you don't hate your family and friends.

SPEAKER_00 9:41

I don't hate my family and friends.

SPEAKER_01 9:43

Just when we're playing Monopoly.

SPEAKER_00 9:44

Yeah, it's cataracts. Um so yeah, if you're just trying to introduce someone to the hobby, then actually probably this might be a really good thing to pick up. Yeah. It's something that everybody knows, um, and it's quite fun and quite snappy.

SPEAKER_01 9:57

Yeah, and I imagine if you've got pre-teen or teen children with, you know, short attention spans and don't want to sit there for longer than 20 minutes, it might be quite a good one just to crack out. Yeah. I can see that that having a place there. So, what would you give it as an overall score then?

SPEAKER_00 10:12

Yeah, it's very hard not to think about, you know, actual monopoly.

SPEAKER_01 10:16

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Um I'm trying very hard not to make that colour my one! It's a one, it's a monopoly. It's not monopoly, guys. If you're like me, it's not monopoly. Um I mean I'm gonna settle on a six for this, I think, because I think it's a I think it's a solo game. I think it's yeah, five would be bang average. I think this is a six for me.

SPEAKER_00 10:37

Yeah, so I I'm gonna go probably five.

SPEAKER_01 10:40

Okay, five.

SPEAKER_00 10:40

Yeah, I think that's partly as well because actually at two play it does fall a little bit flat.

SPEAKER_01 10:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:45

Um and I think it has its time and its place, but would we reach for it? No.

SPEAKER_01 10:50

No, I mean in certain situations maybe, but not sitting across each other from a ballgame table with a huge collection behind us. Let's raise a monopoly deal! No, that's that's unlikely to happen. But I think that it it it is a decent, it's a decent game.

SPEAKER_00 11:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:06

Anything else you want to add? Any one last gasp attempt to try and win people over to you on the monopoly.

SPEAKER_00 11:11

I'm trying to remember if there's actually a go to jail card. I don't think there is, which is just no prison. You know, maybe if it had that, I would have rated it a sex.

SPEAKER_01 11:20

No prison. You need to threat a prison.

SPEAKER_00 11:22

Yeah. No community charges.

SPEAKER_01 11:26

Community chest.

SPEAKER_00 11:27

That's embarrassing. I don't know that.

SPEAKER_01 11:29

Well, yeah. It's been a while. Uh all right, okay. Well, thank you for joining us. I hope you enjoyed this quick snappy review. As I said earlier, if this is how you are joining us for the first time, we have our much deeper dive content that we release on a monthly basis into sort of larger, more detailed games. So please come and join us there. But until next time, have fun, be good to each other, play lots of board games.