THE JOURNAL
Illustration by Mr Adam Nickel
You think you’re fiercely competitive? You’ve clearly never played Connect 4 with me. So, as much as I love the holidays, it can all go wrong when someone pulls out a board game. The point of family classics such as Cluedo and Monopoly is spending time together; destroying opponents is not really in the spirit of things. And yet, every year, I find myself pushing aside my excruciatingly right-on Gen Z moral compass and resorting to cheating. Assuming you’re made of sterner stuff, ethically speaking, and you’d rather rely on a combination of strategy and luck, here are some tips to win some of our favourite board games.
01.
Monopoly
“Monopoly is a simple game,” world champion Mr Nicolò Falcone recently told The Guardian. “It’s not chess.” But like chess, there are strategies that can help you win. Chief among them: get rich quick.
If you have a poor start, it’s unlikely your game will drastically improve, so go in strong. Begin buying and trading immediately. Always buy train stations. Develop properties – Falcone suggests three houses on each as soon as you get a set (but stop short of hotels).
Form alliances. Jail time is best avoided at the start, when you need to accumulate cards, but can save your ass when there are more properties on the board. Hold off on G&T number three until you’ve at least bought every street in one area and can start collecting rent and bankrupting other players.
Chance and Community Chest cards can ruin everything – this is where your poker face and bare-faced lies can come in handy. Alternatively, assign yourself as banker…
Within the gaming community, Monopoly is largely considered a game for muggles (sorry, Falcone). It’s old and there are other games out there with newer mechanics, which make for more fun, thoughtful playing. Game design has evolved, as have we. I mean, has anyone ever finished a game without the need for family peace talks afterwards? Our advice: save yourself the pain and try something else.
02.
Scrabble
“It’s just a matter of learning the words,” says five-time Scrabble world champion Mr Nigel Richards. Easy, then. There’s just the small matter of committing to memory the near-200,000 words that are valid in the game. Not to mention more than 16 billion ways to choose seven tiles out of a bag of 100.
The point, however, is the more words you know the better – especially the two-letter words. And when they include high-scoring tiles (J, Q, X and Z) and you’re lucky enough to land on a double or triple word score. It is only until someone has the audacity to add an E, S or Y to a brilliant word you made and manages to land on a word-trebling tile that things can turn nasty.
(FYI: oxyphenbutazone is theoretically the highest scoring of all the words in Scrabble, potentially earning you 1,778 points. You’re welcome.)
03.
Guess Who?
Not so much an inter-generational classic, but an addictive game that’s great to pull out when you have youngsters around. And, oh how satisfying it is to hear the clickety-click of heads being flipped down as you step closer and closer to your rival’s identity.
According to award-winning “science magician” Dr Matt Pritchard, there’s a sneaky solution to cut out half your opponent’s heads with one question: “Does their name start with a letter A to G?” Follow this with questions of gender and facial hair and you’re almost there.
04.
Cluedo
First tip: do not drink. Cross-examination and focus are crucial to success. Your mind needs to be sharp, your expression poised.
Throughout the game, other players will announce that they suspect characters, weapons and locations. From this, you can conduct a process of elimination.
It’s pretty complex and you’ll need more paper than the measly little strip they offer you in the box.
05.
Catan
Catan takes endurance and strategy. It’s a marathon, not a sprint, and is what many enthusiasts consider a “real” board game.
Mr Bo Peng, 2022 US Catan champion, has three key tips to win: “One, never give up. Two, focus on what’s in your control; make the most of the cards dealt, and trade extensively with opponents. Three, have thick skin. Before my final game started, I learnt that two opponents made a gentlemen’s agreement to work together and target me because they feared my abilities. To combat this, I kept my head up, remained calm and eventually convinced them to work together against the player about to win.”
The current world record for the longest game of Catan is 61 hours. I don’t think there are enough turkey sandwiches in the world to help me attempt such a feat.
06.
Jenga
A controversial addition to this list since no board is involved. Yet it isn’t the festive season without a game of this block-stacking, block-crashing game of physical skill.
Excellent hand-eye coordination is imperative if you’re to have a chance of winning. Boxing Day shakes? Don’t bother.
Key tip: push, don’t pull. Pulling blocks from the tower is more likely to disturb the overall balance and subsequently result in your demise.
The rules state you can only use one hand at a time. If you’re playing with under-10s or over-70s, we’d recommend some leniency. Unless, of course, this results in you losing.
07.
Articulate
Articulate is a test of worldly knowledge and being generally cultured. So, do I need my mum to have a go at me, on Christmas Day, for not knowing who Ms Rosalind Franklin is? No, I do not. Add to the mix a deaf grandad, a tipsy grandma and a room of almost comatose adults and this can be challenging.
The tip to win is know your shit. And keep calm. Don’t let your team bamboozle you into a state of anxious mayhem. Get creative and take your time to think about how best to describe your category of Object, Nature, Random, Person, Action and World.
A friend recalls playing Articulate with his gran where the only description she could give was, “He’s a nasty chap”. It was Dracula.
A final note
The real reason that my family argues so much every December, when the board games are dusted off, is not because I resort to cheating – well, not just that – but because we only play them once a year. The trick is to play more often (which, by the way, has been shown to improve brain health and cognitive functioning).
In the spirit of the season, I shall leave you with a true tale of peace and joy. Hugh and Mary, both 66 and from Suffolk, play a game of Scrabble every single morning at 5.00am. They’ve never argued and claim this as the foundation of their very happy marriage.
Oh, and try new games. That way, everyone is a winner.