word board games

1. Posted: Jul 10 2008

   We fell in love with this game. I chose it because of its similarity to Taboo, but now, instead of being hung up on not using the words on the Taboo list, you have to be mindful of the amount of words you use to describe the words on your list. The name of the game is 25 Words or Less, in which you have to describe the five words on your card in 25 words or less. But, there is a twist. There is a bidding process in which two people look at the card and bid against each other to see who can describe the five words using less words. For example: The list contains the words: Lion, Tree, House, Balance Beam, & Courage. Two opposing clue givers will look at the list and proceed to bid. Person A bids 25, Person B bids 24, Person A bids 23, and so on until one of the two says I can't go any lower, the card is yours. Then the one minute timer starts and now however many words were bid is how many words the clue giver can use to get his/her team to guess all five words on the list. We had a clue giver bid 12 words and she was able to get us to guess all 5 words on the list in only 10 words. Surprisingly, not many of us in the party went over the words, if anything we had more words to spare most of the time. This game is great and with only three times played we had over an hour and a half of fun.

2. Posted: Jan 12 2008

   This is a great game for older kids and adults. It makes you think! It is similar to TABOO in that you have to guve clues to make your team guess the words, but it has a twist, you have to bid on how few words it will take you to give clues to get your team to guess all five words on the card! We had a lot of fun playing this over the holidays! Definitely a new games night favorite!

3. Posted: Dec 6 2007

   If you like Catchphrase, Password, and games like it, you'll love this game. It's great for large groups (I've played with 12-15 people) and the added element of having to keep words to "25 or less" really makes it fun, in my opinion. It's because of this that I think it's a great educational game. Players learn to be exact and brief in their communication rather than rattling on forever. To do well, you need to have a good grasp of the language. And if you make a mistake, even a small one, that can throw off the game, since you don't have a lot of "supply" to work with. This is a really fun game. Worth the $20 price many times over.

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1. Posted: Aug 18 2008

   A group of us get together about once a month for game night, with word and thought games being the most popular. We've been playing BuzzWords for a couple of months (GREAT GAME!). I bought Last Word because it seemed to be a fun alternative. We played a rousing game of BuzzWords then switched to Last Word. I thought we were all going to fall asleep. It might be better if played in teams, but even then, it took forever for 8 of us to move even 2 or 3 squares. The concept sounded good -- but the execution was pretty bad.

2. Posted: Jul 14 2008

   My wife and I purchased this board game primarily just out of curiosity. We wanted something for small parties and get-togethers. We like Cranium and Balderdash, but sometimes these games can take forever. Well, Last Word goes by quickly. So, if you're trying it out and you hate it, then just be patient. It will be over before you know it! If you're trying it out and you love it, then you can play it again and again in a relatively short period of time. The game itself is a bit like Scattergories. Each player gets a category card such as "Items in a purse", a letter card is drawn, then you play your category card and starting throwing out names of items that are found in a purse that start with that letter. Mostly it's fun, but sometimes ideas run out and the game slows down almost to a halt. If there were a wider variety of category cards, then this would not be the case. Also, the last word must be spoken before the buzzer, which is set to go off at random times every time. It's a fun game which could have used a little improvement, but overall, I recommend it.

3. Posted: Jul 10 2008

   I've played dozens of party games, and usually the louder we can get then the better the game, but this game was just sheer madness. When reading the rules it seems rather simplistic and fun, but in actual application it was horrible. With a group of up to eight players everyone gets a "subject card". The subject can be boys names, actors, things found in a dentist office, etc. Each player keeps his subject to himself. Then a "letter card" is turned face up. At that point the first person to 1.) put down his subject card 2.) read the subject aloud & 3.) say a word that begins with the letter shown and is applicable to his subject (e.g. the letter is "O", "boys name: Otis!"), then his subject is the subject for the entire group. Immediately after shouting out your subject and word that begins with the visible letter, you have to hit the random timer and the race is on for everyone to say the last word. I'll tell you how the game really went: "The letter is 'B'". "Blalalalalalalalah!!!!!!!" "No," "What?" "I was first!" "Who said you can hit the timer?" "You're cheating!" "My subject is too long, I couldn't say it faster than you!" "I didn't hear anything but yelling." "Just because you were loudest doesn't mean you were first." "OK, this game is terrible, lets pack it up." With eight people yelling at once and all eight people believing that they were first, we got nowhere. We actually had to modify the game just so it was playable. We just selected subject cards and then flipped over a letter card and went from there.

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