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Board games are all fun and literally games, until s**t gets a little too real. In my household there were a lot of kids, so in turn, there were a lot of board games. But with all these games came a lot of aggravation in the house. Someone would get called a cheater, playing boards were flipped and feelings would get hurt. But we would always find our way back to the following boards trying to see who was down to play. Here are 10 games that everyone played as a child that caused at least one argument, two cheating claims, and a pause to figure out who was f’ing up the rules.
Corbis/Steve Miller/The Star-Ledger
Monopoly
Not only was Monopoly possibly the longest game ever, it was one of the few games that could send you to jail and leave you in poverty. Doesn’t sound like fun, but every few months someone would cave in and play this game with me as a kid. Land on someone’s hotel on Park Place and your good friends and family members will treat you like the IRS. Pick up a community chest that won’t let you collect $200 after you pass “GO” and you basically want to flip over the whole damn board. Childhood memories!
Corbis/MATT RAINEY / THE STAR-LEDGER
Scrabble
Everyone thinks they have a way with words when they play Scrabble, until they play with that one family member who tries to question their spelling skills at every turn. Put up a word too short and folks clown you (“That’s it!?”). Put up a word worth crazy points that uses up most of your tiles, and folks are scrambling to find the family dictionary (“That is NOT a word!”). And don’t get me started on the people who cheat and flip over their tiles to pretend they got a coveted blank!
Hasbro
Perfection
Talk about a game that will have your nerves all jacked up and have you feeling like a toddler, the person who fits the shapes in the tray before the time is up and in the fastest time wins.
Electronic DreamPhone
We’ve all literally been looking for love since we were kids. With DreamPhone, you were basically taking a survey to find out who has a crush on you, and if you got someone you weren’t feeling, all hell would break loose. With a lack of black characters on the game (Wayne, John, James, Jamal and Mark were it), you were getting your swirl on at a super young age (just kidding!).
Corbis
Jenga
If you’ve ever wanted to see how badly your friends want you to fail, play Jenga with them. Anytime you get your hand near the wooden blocks to pull, they will jump at you and say “BE CAREFUL NOW!” It takes some smooth moves to do well in Jenga, so heavy-handed folks should expect to be the one laughed at when the tower comes crashing down…
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Speed (The Card Game)
This isn’t necessarily a board game, but I had to include it because of the intensity of it all. The fight to put down your last card in a pack can cause bruised knuckles and hurt feelings.
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Taboo
The trick to excelling in Taboo is to play with people who don’t take forever to answer clues, and someone who doesn’t give terrible clues (and you sure don’t want to play with the person who says the clues). If you do find yourself with these people, somebody is getting yelled at.
Mattel
Uno
Who hasn’t felt like a gangster when they’ve got their hands on a Wild Card? Uno is one of my favorites, but the struggle of having a certain color left in your hand and then having someone flip it up on you when you’re ready to shout UNO! is quite aggravating.
Corbis
Sorry!
How annoying is it to wait to draw a card just so you can start playing? And it gets worse when you pull cards that cause you to have to move backwards. And if someone lands on your pawn, you then have to return to the start space. This is all fun and games in the beginning, but if you’re stuck at start too damn long, you will start feeling “sorry” for real.
