"When You're Playing Monopoly, It's Life"

After an unscheduled three-month break, we were back to Monopoly this week, playing Pete's recently purchased Le Mans-themed set.

Pete has been attending the world-famous endurance racing event for donkey's years and actually acquired this slick-looking Monopoly set at the race track earlier this year.

The properties for sale around the board were key locations on and off the track, from the fun fair and media centre via the Dunlop bridge and certain turns on the track through to the finish line and podium.

House and hotels were renamed "garages" and "lounges" (even though the little plastic buildings remained the classic Monopoly design and colour), but "chance" and "community chest" remained unaltered. Although the names stayed the same, the cards were nicely reframed as racing-related occurrences to reward or penalise you.  

Everything was labelled in both French and English, which was a really cool touch, but as the warm evening wore on I have to confess that I started to get them muddled up - but that was all on dopey me.

In fact, the warmth - even though we had the rear louvre doors of the house open - meant I was quite befuddled for most of the evening!

Pete was the race car; I was the running driver; Clare was the flags; and Rachel the helmet

The game started quickly... for most of us.

Pete, due to a succession of unfortunate dice rolls ended up plodding along behind the rest of us as we scooped up property after property, and he kept missing out.

Once we completed buying up everything that was available it looked at first as though Pete was actually the most 'cash rich' out of all of us, but that got whittled down quickly by parking fines until he went bankrupt.

Rachel only had a small property portfolio, but it included the two most costly locations on the board - the podium and the finish line - and she secured her hold on them with a couple of lounges.

I thought I was doing well with the biggest collection of properties I think I've ever owned in the three years of Monopoly Club.

Through some horse trading I ended up with three complete sets, but my downfall came because I'd carelessly splashed my cash indiscriminately and had little left to pay the cost of landing on anyone else's properties.

That's why I was the next to go out.

Clare, as ever, built up a solid collection of properties while maintaining a good bank balance, but it still wasn't enough to defeat Rachel - who was on fire last night. 

With Clare out, Rachel was declared the victor... again.

However, even with back-to-back victories Rachel remains at the bottom of the league, due to an earlier propensity for finishing in third or fourth place.

Nevertheless, the gap between us all is closing up. Even Pete's previously unassailable lead at the top of the table is starting to look less daunting.

It you want to do the maths: it's five points for a win; three for second; two for third; and one for fourth. If two people tie for first then they get four points each.

This means it's still going to take several more games of Monopoly to topple our current champion, but with every game we play it's looking more and more feasible.

Next time we're looking at playing a second Le Mans themed board, but this was designed by our Monopoly expert Pete himself, years before he purchased the set we played this week. 

When it came to rating the quality of this week's set, we settled on a 7.5, putting it on a par with James Bond and Disney. The general feeling was that it was good, but nothing special.

For instance, there were no special rules and no effort to remould the houses and hotels in garages and lounges. The dual language on the cards was good, but it did mean the writing got very small in a lot of places and, also, there was no room for pictures on them.

"The Chamber of Commerce Has Been Opened"

Because this month's roleplaying game session had to be cancelled, Pete suggested we sneak in an extra meeting of Monopoly Club instead - which we did last week.

Then, for our 'regular' game of Monopoly, Pete conjured up a surprise themed set that I don't think any of us could have predicted: Harry Potter. 

Game elements even came with their own little suitcases

Based on the successful movie franchise, this set turned out to be not only very attractive but also a rather innovative hack of the original game.

In my excitement I forgot to take a picture of the board, but here's a publicity picture

The game's main financial resource was rebranded as "house points", and all the property costs were different, for example everything on the first side of the board was "10 house points", on the second side was "20 house points" and so on. Rents on single properties were equal to the purchase price, and increased if you had a full colour set, or planted a "house crest" on your properties.

There are no 'houses' and 'hotels' in this game, instead you can buy - once you own a complete colour set of properties - a "house crest".

Once you've purchased a property it is considered "explored" and the game ends the moment the final property is "explored". Then everyone, who is still in the game, adds up the value of their properties and loose house points. The person with the highest number of points is declared the winner.

Our tokens

As well as picking your transport token at the start of the game (I was Harry's broomstick, Pete was Hagrid's motorbike and sidecar, Clare was the night bus, and Rachel the Hogwarts' Express), you also got to choose your house: I was Gryffindor, Rachel was Hufflepuff, Clare was Slytherin, and Pete was Ravenclaw. 

My House card

Your house granted you certain bonuses (such as not paying rent when you landed on your own 'common room' - this edition's version of train stations), but could also make you susceptible to certain Owl Posts (this game's brilliant spin on Chance and Community Chest).

Some cards you drew that might land you in trouble could be redirected at other players if they were of certain, named houses. I remember at one point I managed to send Clare to jail because she was a Slytherin.

The Owl Post cards came with their own little owl stand

Some of the cards, though, were clearly marked as Howlers... and they were always bad news for the person whose turn it was to take the next Owl Post.

As this iteration came with its own, unique finishing conditions, we opted not to use Pete's official 'speed die' this week (something we haven't entertained since last November's Wonders of The World game).

And while Pete remained arbiter of the rules, for the first time ever he passed the mantle of 'banker' to someone else. Rachel took up the position of Prefect, which meant not only did she get a badge (see below), but she was in charge of doling out - and collecting - the house points as properties (locations in and around Hogwarts) were brought and sold.

We'd already guessed that this would play quicker than our usual games and, in fact, the session lasted around 90 minutes, which still felt like a reasonable duration.

The start of my property empire

I won't bury the lede: I won, which moves me within touching distance of Pete at the top of the league table (see below). But what surprised us was that Pete went out comparatively early in the game.

In fact, he was the only person not to make to final House Point tally. 

The general consensus was that he had been unlucky in his early trips around the board, not being able to purchase any property, while the rest of us were hoovering up whatever we could. 

Gryffindor House crests on display

This isn't a version of Monopoly to be taken cautiously. I just went on a spending spree, then as we got down to the final available properties I indulged in some horse-trading, got myself a couple of complete colour sets, slammed house crests on them, and waited for the rents to roll in.

Bizarrely, I think a lot of my own good fortune came from the fact that, compared to everyone else, I hardly ever landed on the Owl Posts, instead those turns were spent making purchases when possible.

While I ended up with the most House Points, Clare was second, and Rachel third, which means I managed to glide ahead of Clare in the club's league table and am now just two points shy of Pete.

With its emphasise on the accumulation of House Points rather than properties per se, the Harry Potter Monopoly plays quite differently to the more traditional iterations of the game.

However, once we got our heads around its particular quirks it turned out to be as challenging and exciting as any version we've played in the last two-and-half years.

When it came to grading the actual theme, there was no denying that a lot of thought and love had clearly gone into the various elements and reworking of the old school rules.

There were some gaps in the rules mechanics though (e.g. how do you count 'mortgaged properties' in the final tally?) and a lack of baggies for the House Point tokens - which we'd popped out the cardboard sheet they arrived in - shaved half a point off of perfection.

"Th-Th-Th-That's (Not) All, Folks"

It was another hot night in Monopoly town, meaning we had the kitchen louvre doors open all evening to let in the cool air (and flies!).

Compounding that, we were all exhausted for various reasons. However, the evening's Looney Tunes theme brought out the best in all of us and the evening's thrilling game went down to the wire.

The theming of this 26-year-old set (which Pete had purchased second-hand, via eBay, from the States but was still in pristine condition) was top class. 

The overarching idea, as I grasped it, was that you were film company executives "hiring" the stars (the individual properties) for a variety of animated features (the completed sets).

Houses and hotels became "TV sets" and "movie theatres", while cash money was replaced with "laughs". Every denomination of "laugh" featured a different famous Looney Tunes character.

A That's All Folks card I picked up during play

"Chance" and "community chest" became "What's Up, Doc?" and "That's All Folks!", and, again, these were all decorated with black and white sketches of famous cartoon characters.

An added treat that we all approved of was special abilities that could be gained from rolling doubles. These ranged from being gifted "laughs" from all the other players to removing competitor's properties from the board.

The pewter playing pieces, representing well-known faces, were gorgeous (and I kept thinking how cool they would be painted up like wargames' miniatures).

Rachel initially chose Daffy Duck, but then switched to Bugs Bunny before we started

Rachel was Bugs Bunny, Pete was Marvin The Martian, Clare was the Road Runner, and I picked Wile  E. Coyote to be my avatar.

After a slow start - getting used to the board and its idiosyncrasies - I suddenly realised I was actually doing rather well. Thus it was a huge surprise when I bankrupted Pete, who, in recent games, has been on a hot run of luck.

Then Rachel walked into one of my cunning traps and I bankrupted her as well.

Which left Clare and I in a head-to-head tussle (rather appropriate for Wile  E. Coyote and the Road Runner) with our mandated 11pm cut-off fast approaching.

Although I had the bigger bank balance and property portfolio at that point, Clare managed to hang on and force a draw (according to our club rules, which I wrote... so I can't complain!)

Clare and I share the trophy as Pete looks on 

Thus we both shared the Acme Looney Tunes trophy and got four points each on the league table (see below). This left the pair of us still tied in second place (although Clare has the advantage of having played one less game).

The trophy!

Even going out first in this week's game, Pete maintains a commanding lead that's going to take a number of similar results in coming months to stand a chance of any of us overtaking him.

When it came to judging the gorgeous board and its adherence to the Looney Tunes theme, the only genuine issue we had with it was the difficulty of discerning the actual names of the properties.

While the name of the particular cartoon (the set) was prominent on the board and relevant cards, the actual individual name (the cartoon character) was comparatively small. Yes, they featured coloured pictures of the characters, but not every one was immediately recognisable in the heat of the moment.

Check the picture at the top of this post and the one immediately below to get an idea of what I'm talking about.

Nevertheless, this was a minor glitch in an otherwise perfect set, so we rated it at 9.5 out of 10, on a par with the posh Indiana Jones set. And Looney Tunes didn't even come in a wooden box!

"No, Mr Bond, I Expect You To (Roll The) Die!"

With the iconic music from the movies playing out of our smart speaker, we sat down last night to play the James Bond-themed Monopoly board.

For movement counters, Pete chose the Lotus Esprit (from The Spy Who Loved Me), Clare picked Rosa Klebb's dagger shoe (from From Russia With Love), I took Oddjob's bowler (from Goldfinger), and Rachel was the 007 logo/pistol.

Instead of properties, this set allowed players to buy up the various films in the Bond franchise, marked out on the board in chronological order, starting with Dr No just past 'Go' right round to No Time To Die and M16 being the two most valuable squares.

Oddly, this meant that - while the "utilities" were two variations of Q Branch - the "stations" (from the traditional game) were just whatever film came at that point, which felt a bit strange given the wide variety of signature vehicles associated with the character of Bond over the years.

While there were no special rules for this set, some effort was made to personalise it to Bond by having the houses and hotels as "safe houses" and "headquarters", and chance and community chest cards were "allies" and "enemies".

I started off poorly, never really recovered, and was the first to go out - bankrupted by my own wife.

After that there was a bit of a lull when it looked as though several people were on the verge of being knocked out, when suddenly the game got its second wind and a spate of house building ensued, upping the threat level enormously.

That's a lot of headquarters on the board!

There was definitely something in the air last night that meant everyone was slightly befuddled and possibly not bringing their a-game to the table, with a mixture of tactical errors and minor rules mistakes (such as forgetting whose turn it was or forgetting to take property cards when you made a purchase). 

Everyone was tired - and slightly distracted - for various reasons, meaning their minds weren't always focussed 100 per cent on the game. There was even a distinct lack of Bond-related punning, which with this franchise is always an open goal no matter the situation.

Nevertheless, the final three fought on heroically, with Rachel's property portfolio and cash reserves eventually being whittled down until it was just Pete and Clare remaining in a tense head-to-head showdown.

As 11 o'clock drew closer (now our official "end time"), Clare chose - in the dying seconds of the game - to concede to Pete, taking second place rather than sharing the glory of joint first.

She explained her reasoning on her Three Beautiful Things Substack today, and while it was good sportsmanship, I breathed a slight sigh of relief as it meant points-wise Clare only drew level with me, instead of sliding ahead of me (see table below).

Of course, she still, historically, has a game in hand on the rest of us (having missed our Scooby-Doo game, subbing in Nick in her stead).

Monopoly guru Pete continues, frustratingly, to pull away at the top of the table with another win, while Rachel's third place finish this week did little to help her close the gap on Clare and I.

In judging the theme of the evening, we all agreed that while the James Bond set was well made, when you dug down there were issues - from the plastic insert in the box not being geared to double as a bank to some of the 'property' names and cards being difficult to read at a glance.

Also Rachel's chosen token (the 007 logo) was so narrow that it was surprisingly hard to spot on the board when its thin edge was pointing towards her.

"You're Going To Need A Bigger Table!"

duunnn dunnn… duuuunnnn duun… duuunnnnnnnn dun dun dun dun dun dun
dun dun dun dun dunnnnnnnnnnn dunnnn

Like the tense final act showdown between Chief Brody (Roy Scheider) and the shark (Bruce), our Jaws-themed Monopoly evening came down to a protracted test of wills between Clare and I.

We each dominated two sides of the board and while, for a long time, it had looked as though I had things in the bag, we kept landing on each other's properties and so large sums of money were just moving from one bank account to the other.

Eventually, with midnight looming, we called it a day and agreed to declare the game a tie.

On her Three Beautiful Things substack, Clare elaborated this morning:

"Tim and I have a nice little Monopoly ecosystem: he has eaten the other players and owns everything except for six well developed properties of mine. He lands on them just often enough that I can survive another turn around the board. I feel constantly off balance, though, and I'm only really coping because of some lucky rolls, a few turns in jail so I don't have to land on his properties, and some helpful chance cards. We end with a draw, because it's getting very late."

The first Monopoly Club meeting of 2025 used Pete's Jaws-themed board, where the properties were a bizarre mix of locations (I, for instance, owned "the ocean" for the entire game, which I thought was hysterical), objects, and people... including the shark-attack victims!

The chance and community chest cards were "repairs" and "rewards", with most sporting a quote from the film, although there were no illustrations as we have seen in other sets, and the houses and hotels were replaced by "boats" and "workshops" respectively.

There was minor disappointment round the table that the boats weren't actually little plastic boats, so we agreed that the "green houses" should be placed on their rooves to, at least, vaguely resemble something sea-worthy.

Our chosen playing pieces for the evening's battle

At the start of the game Rachel chose the Lilo as her figurine, Pete was The Orca (Quint's boat), Clare was the oxygen tank, and I took the oil drum.

Rachel had abandoned her usual cautious approach and came out of the gate on a spending spree... which unfortunately saw her bowing out of the game first.

Pete didn't last much longer than that and then it came down to the final hour (or so) that was the duel between Clare and I.

I had plumped for my usual tactic of trying to own - and develop - the properties either side of "Go" and that certainly worked this time, with the high value "shark" and "The Orca" (obtained by some natty horse-trading with both Pete and Clare) and the inexpensive to develop "ocean" and "Amity Island" soon under my control.

Mine, all mine! I rule the ocean and control the shark! Bwahahaha!

My property holdings for the final act

Clare had tried to persuade me to concede soon after Pete went out, but I was utterly convinced I could win this, because of my massive portfolio of property (most of which I'd inherited from Pete when I drove him to bankruptcy).

Which I did, sort of. An agreed draw between two players gains us both "four points" in our ongoing league table (see below), instead of the "five points" for a clear winner.

I'm still hanging in there at second place overall, with Clare nipping at my heels, but Pete's five-point lead is going to take, at least, a couple of sessions to wear down.

Despite some short-comings in its design (for instance, some of the property images on the board were quite indistinct) and no exciting "bonus rules", Jaws Monopoly was really enjoyable to play, so we communally agreed to rate it as an eight out of 10, which currently places it as eighth in our rankings (see below).

This was our longest game of Monopoly and so we've also agreed, for the future, to place a timer of sorts on our sessions - calling time at 11.30pm, regardless of how everyone's doing.

Next month is scheduled to be a James Bond theme, which we felt was quite topical in light of the recent announcements of Amazon taking over the Bond franchise (Pete - a massive Bond fan - was not happy about this news and didn't want to talk about it!)

Satchmo Played Monopoly: "And I Think To Myself What a Wonderful World!"

This month's theme for our regular Monopoly Club get-together was a total revelation. What I had understood to be "around the world" was, in fact, Wonders of The World (both natural and historical, with The Seven Wonders of The Ancient World being the most valuable properties).

As well as the traditional "forcing your opponents to go bankrupt" method of winning, this version introduced a new way to end the game, emphasising its theme of "seeing the wonders of the world".

Everyone was given a faux passport, containing a miniature version of the game board, upon which you marked off every "wonder" that you visited, and when a player had ticked them all off they got a £1,500 bonus and game would finish.

This change was complemented by a new rule for the airports (the railway stations on a traditional board). Landing on one allowed you a free "return flight" to any "wonder" on the board, so you could tick it off on your passport. Your counter didn't move, you simply marked off a square of your choice.

Pete shows off his passport

Passport interior: the game provided easy-erase marker pens to tick off the squares

The passports were decorated with date stamps from the early 20th Century, heightening the feel of the game as emulating the Golden Age of travel. Money in the game was pounds and you were building "guest houses" and "hotels".

Because of this passport twist in the game mechanics, for the first time in our 12 games, we opted not to use the official Monopoly speed die in case it made the game "too short". As it turned out the game ran long, and yet I still believe that the gimmicks of that special die would have made it too easy to tick off all the locations on the board.

Our musical background for the evening started as "EuroPop", but when Pete had an allergic reaction to Whigfield's Saturday Night, Rachel switched the Spotify playlist to "traditional music of the world".

We chose our movement pieces, which represented stages in the development of transport - Clare was Stephenson's Rocket (aka "Puffin' Billy"), Rachel was a three-masted schooner, Pete was the Montgolfier Brothers' hot air balloon, and I was the vintage motor car - and the game began. 

Pretty much from the off, although I was, of course, collecting properties along the way, my goal was to "visit" all the sites, claim the £1,500 bonus and (hopefully) win that way.

A promising start to my property portfolio

Although I managed to mark off all but one "wonder" on my passport by the time I went bust, I blew through my finances in the process and, not surprisingly, eventually crashed out on one of Pete's properties.

Pete had a cunning tactic of buying up all the airports. This meant that even though those squares gave us the potential to eliminate another site from our passport it would cost us £200 for the privilege. 

Because we opted not to go with the special die, that also meant we started with less money, and it felt like we spent a lot more time "cash poor" than usual.

Not long after I was out, Rachel followed, and eventually Clare, leaving Pete as master of the world!

No one else had come as close as me to marking off all the sites in their passport - for all the good that did me!

This victory means Pete's lead in the league table (see below) has become more commanding. He's now seven points ahead of me, and as a win nets you five points (second gets you three, third gets you two, and fourth gets you a single point), it is going to take several wins from any of the rest of us, as well as somehow ensuring Pete goes out first or second each time, to overtake him!

All our passports at the end of the game

Current standing in the Monopoly Club league table

Wonders of The World was a wonderful version of Monopoly (pun intended), provoking a lot of conversation and banter along the way, as we were inspired to share stories in the "I've been there" genre. Not only did the rule booklet have historical details on all the movement counters, but we belatedly realised that all the property cards had facts about their particular 'wonder' on the back.

All the squares on the board were also numbered and these tallied with numbers on the map in the middle of the board, so you could see where any particular 'wonder' was in the world (which was useful for me when I mixed up Angel Falls with Victoria Falls).

See where your property really is in the world

A beautiful iteration of Monopoly, with no printing errors that we discovered, nice chunky playing pieces (always useful when every player wears glasses), and an interesting educational element if you wanted it, it's no surprise that we all agreed that Wonders of The World was our first 'perfect', ten out of ten, Monopoly theme (see table below).