New rules and changes for classic board games,

Gotta love Sammy over at 'Yid with Lid.' I just had to steal this one and I also am asking any of you who can, to help Sammy out. He has some of the best writing and wit out here in the old blog world. I consider him a true patriot and honest to the core. Yeah, this is a pitch to for a donation of sorts. Any of you familiar with YWL already knows what a jewel Sammy's site is. Now back to the next post...

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New Rules For Old American Games
Sammy Benoit

YidwithLid, Yesterday as I was pouring over some background on the Dodd bill when my wife came into the room and said, "Your son has a birthday party to go to this weekend, I want you to go to Wal-Mart and get a board game for him to give as a gift." Right in the middle of a pile of research material, there was no way I could take a break and leave right then. So summoning up a dose of testosterone, I stood up and said, to my wife "OK."

Within fifteen minutes I found myself in the board game aisle of Wal-Mart and I was getting very confused. They had the evergreen games that I grew up with but they were different, they have all become, well...lets just say they have changed with the times. Allow me to explain.

The first game I came across was Operation. You may remember that one, you had to use tweezers to extract plastic "internal" organs from a patient and if you hit the sides the patient buzzed and the light in his nose began to glow.

Operation has really changed to become more realistic. When I was a kid we got to choose which organ to remove. The new version included URL for a website. In each round before you extract a body part, you have to go to the website where a central moderator tells you whether you can remove that body part. Also I think there is a mistake on the box, it says in bold letters, this game is cheaper than before, but in actuality it was much more expensive. I decided Operation was not the game for me.

Right next to Operation was Lincoln Logs, but it didn't look anything like the old toy where you built log cabins out of little sticks of wood. This was very different, the New Lincoln Logs removed all of the wood, the box said something about Greenpeace and deforestation of the rain forests. The "logs" are made out of recycled paper (they look kind of flimsy) and includes a pre-printed letter, that you can address to you congressman asking them to pass Cap and Trade.

Along side the Logs was a game that looked as if it was a modernization of the game "Whac a Mole." The original game had little plastic moles, that would pop out of hole that you would smack on top of the head with a hammer to drive back into the hole. The new game is called Dangerous Americans, this version has ordinary looking Americans holding tea bags or protest signs inscribed with comments such as " Jefferson Was Right" and "I believe in the US Constitution," popping out of holes. Instead of a hammer to beat down the ordinary Americans, you get a gavel inscribed with the words, "Speaker of the House of Representatives.

To be honest this was making me a bit nuts. Granted I don't deal well with change, but this was going too far. I headed right to the one game I knew they couldn't change, Monopoly. There is nothing they could do to Monopoly with the possible exception of changing the street names. What could they do to this Classic?

OH MY! You wouldn't believe what they could do. They changed the entire thing. First of all remember that you had little metal thimbles, cars, etc.as game pieces? No longer, now they were all cars, they all looked the same (ugly if you ask me) and worse the were engraved with the words "Made by The US Govt.," and that is the least of it. Those little green houses, replaced by foreclosure notices. You can no longer put a hotel on Boardwalk, you put up a shell of a building, and the "deed" from the game says "Construction delayed, cost overruns because we are being forced to use Union construction shops."

That corner box that used to say, "Go Directly to Jail, Do Not Pass Go Do Not Collect $200," now says, "Go Directly to the Attorney General, If you are a progressive he will let you go, Otherwise you will be allowed to Lawyer-up and go to a civilian court. Collect the $200 dollars more than the regular player because the ACLU won a lawsuit." And the "Free Parking" is now a "Car Pool Meet Up"

Those chance cards? There is now one that says, "Barney Frank needs someone to blame or people will look to him, your banker has gone to Washington DC to get yelled at. Game delayed for a half hour"

The Railroads have been replaced with a Rickshaw, Electric Car, "PETA Approved" Horseback Ride, and Bicycle Company. The Utilities are now "Electric is Now 10x the Cost", and "Windmill Company"

That wasn't even the worst part, here was the straw that broke my back. One of the Community Chest cards says, " you have gotten too rich divide 75% of your money with the rest of the players." Gee whiz if you do that how do you win? If you have no chance of winning, it isn't even worth playing the game.

I had it, I left Wal-Mart and went out for a few slices of Pizza. Lets face it, what kid would play any of those games? In the era of realistic video games, kids are interested in activity that imitates real life, these have no connection to the real world, nothing like these revised game scenarios could ever happen in the US.

Thanks to Yid With Lid