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Comment by geekamongus | Hacker News Reader

Played this game a couple of weeks ago with my family (my wife, an 11 year-old, and a 14 year-old.)

We quickly remembered why we hadn't played it in a year: you must be greedy to win, hopes & dreams get dashed, and someone always ends up angry and/or in tears.

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If a simple board game played with family leaves someone angry or in tears then that's a problem. Games like monopoly are actually great opportunities for children to learn self control and perspective.

Agreed my little brother and I played a game of monopoly that payed almost a whole summer when we were kids. Any time somebody ran out of money, we begged for "alms for the poor" and the other guy would give money to keep the game going. I suppose increased capacity for generosity is a good side of capitalism. Think about it now - many of the richest Americans have decided to give all their money away. I can guarantee that bill gates will do a better job with it than the government would.

I recall similar dynamic rules being added by me and my friends. Sometimes there would be a Robin Hood raid on the banks. Sometimes the bank would run out of money. Sometimes the Jail would be over full. Sometimes when others were not looking hotels would vanish mysteriously or via "gas explosion". Or we would pass around cash between ourselves to give the losing players more of a chance. It made it more fun.

Monopoly is especially bad for this. It's the game you introduce people to if you want to put them off board games. So many people have stories about games of monopoly disintegrating into arguments.

Why? Probably due to the extremely zero-sum randomly-driven parts of it, combined with the last-man-standing nature. People who have to drop out early end up disaffected. Someone who gets an early advantage will usually stay ahead, which isn't fun either.

There are games with more backstabbing in e.g. Diplomacy, but they're rightly seen as not for everyone. Whereas Monopoly has this odd status as "default board game" while not being very fun.

Yes it can be a frustrating game if you lose, but it can also be very fun if you win. If you're unfortunate and end up losing early, you can still hang out and watch, or go do something else. The point is that we have to learn to tolerate and adapt to that failure. Our first instinct may be to get angry and complain but that's not constructive or helpful.

> last-man-standing nature

see every game, ever...

So how do you feel about the Game of Life? Did it give you PTSD?

Most card games are "play to completion", and so are quite a lot of games with "victory points" e.g. Carcasonne.

Deliberately misrepresenting what other people say is annoying.

I guess scrabble is a bad idea because it causes fights when someone doesn't understand the concept of proper nouns? Oh my gosh, conflict, let's just throw the game away to spare everyone's feelings.

If you get angry rather than use it as a chance to learn, sure. I'd avoid playing scrabble with that adult, among other games if this spread there too. Children get stopped for the day due to the outburst, but generally get more chances since they are learning.

https://xkcd.com/492/

Are you sure the 'we' and 'someone' shouldn't be read as 'I' and you just aren't so good at playing monopoly? :) (just kidding; almost weekend)

Though to be on topic again, are there many board games where the goal isn't to beat the other player by whatever means the rules of the board game allow? From tic-tac-toe to monopoly to card games, there will always be a loser, and if he or she can't handle that, they will cry/tirade.

Yes, there are! Hanabi, Pandemic, Sentinels of the Multiverse are three of the biggest games of the last decade. All are cooperative. You all win or lose together.

bit late, with reading replies, sorry.

hmm i never heard of these games, i'll be checking those, thanks

Rage quitting / table flipping was always a late game strategy when I was growing up. Especially playing Risk.

I suspect you inadvertently described all of life, not just Monopoly.

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