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Graphics & Sound:
I have been playing the You Don’t Know Jack series since the first one came out many years ago and I loved the irreverent, twisted trivia games. They were the best games in the mid to late 90’s, but by 2000, they stopped coming out and I really missed them. Luckily someone decided to revive the idea and expand on the twisted series with the Jackbox Party Pack games.
You can’t have a Jack game without Cookie Masterson. Since there is no trivia in this pack, you might be afraid there’s no Cookie, but have no fear! Cookie is the host for Fibbage 3. You’ll have other hosts for other games, but none of them are as entertaining as Cookie! The music is different for every game. I think the Monster Seeking Monster has the funniest music, but it is my least favorite game.
Graphics aren’t really the first thing that you look at when you’re playing a game like this, but once you do stop and look, you’ll notice that are little bonus things thrown in there. There are cute little pop-ups that will entertain you while you’re waiting on other players to fill in their answers. There is one game, Civic Doodle, which will put your drawing skills to the test. I like that they give you a few different colors to work with. Basically, the entire game is beautiful in its own way. |
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Gameplay:
If you have played the Jackbox Party Pack series, you’ll know that each game has a different set of games. Jackbox Party Pack 4 has Fibbage 3, Survive the Internet, Monster Seeking Monster, Bracketeering, and .
When you choose Fibbage 3, you’ll actually get two games to choose from. There’s Fibbage 3 and Fibbage: Enough About You. In Fibbage 3, you’ll get a statement with a blank in it. You will need to fill in the blank with a statement that sounds so believable that the other players will believe your lie and choose it. Then you’ll see if you can find the truth. You’ll get points for everyone who believes your lie and you’ll get points if you can find the truth. Fibbage 3 is my favorite game of them all and I was glad to see it back in this edition. In Fibbage: Enough About You, you’ll learn a lot more about your friends than you might have wanted to know. You’ll answer questions about yourself, and then you give fake answers to the other player’s questions. After that, you guess which ones are correct.
Survive the Internet will fill in another player to get you to 4. You can join the game or the audience from a computer. This is a very strange game. It is hosted by Todd and personally, I find Todd pretty dull. Anyway, you’ll fill in statements and then those will go to another player, who adds something different, and then you vote. I recommend the most people you can find to make it the most fun. With only three people, it’s much easier to narrow down who put what, so it’s not quite as funny.
Monster Seeking Monster, hosted by Felicia, is another game where I highly recommend including as many people as you can find. You will pick an avatar and will randomly be assigned a monster power, like serial killer, leprechaun, werewolf, and many more. These monster powers will really affect the outcome, so use them wisely. You’ll get time to use to flirt with any or all of the other players. After that, you pick who you want to date. You can pick someone that you didn’t even chat with, if you want. The robot will be added on the second round and he adds some complication because if the robot comes in last at the end, everyone loses. It can be quite interesting to see the results.
In Bracketeering, you answer questions and your answers are pitted against someone else’s and everyone votes on whose is the best. If there is a tie, you will get to tap as fast as you can on which one you want to make it win. Those selections move up the bracket to the next level. You’ll also be able to make predictions about which ones you think will win. The next step will be a blind round, where the category will change at the end. Then there is a triple blind round where the category changes every round, so you better hope your answers still work!
Civic Doodle will put your artistic skills to the test. The Art Council wants new murals. Two players will add to the drawing that is already there and then the rest of the players get to vote on which one they like best. While they are drawing, the other players can send emoticons on how they think it is going. After the first two are voted on, the next set of players will add to the drawing as well. After everyone has drawn, then everyone will add a title and you all vote on the best title (you cannot vote for yourself). You’ll then go on to the next place to beautify. There are three places total. |
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Difficulty:
The only real difficulty in Jackbox Party Park 4 is beating your opponents. I guess they could have easier questions on Fibbage, but the rest of them are purely difficult based on who you are playing with. We did find that the more players you have, the more fun it is on pretty much every game. Fibbage is fun as a trivia-ish game with only a couple of people, but you get a lot more amusing answers and good lies with more people. Civic Doodle can be fun with just three people, but you’ll get more complex and humorous murals with more players.
Since this game is played over phones, if you have a webcam, you can have people join you from pretty much anywhere. They simply need to be able to see your TV for the questions and such. The audience participation can definitely change things as well. They don’t even have to be able to see your TV. They’ll see questions on their screen and can just choose options when things pop up. This means that you can send room codes to anyone to join you, which can definitely change up a game! |
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Game Mechanics:
Jackbox Party Pack 4 can be played with 2 - 99 players. I know you’re sitting there saying, but I don’t have 99 controllers! When you launch a game, it will give you a website and a room code. Only so many people can join the main game, which varies per game, but the rest can join the audience as I mentioned earlier. You can play from pretty much any device that has a web browser. It says phones or tablets, but I have joined from my desktop and laptop as well. I have also tested an iPad successfully.
If you want to cancel out of a game in the middle, hit the (Options) on your controller. Otherwise you only need your controller to select the game and to exit at the end. The Audience has different options in each game, but they’re easy to figure out what to do. I have run into one issue. We got Fibbage stuck twice at the end of Round One and had to shut the system down to bring the game back up both times. That was on the first couple of days I had it though. I haven’t run into that issue since, so maybe it was patched.
If you’re looking for something to entertain your friends at a party, I highly recommend you check out the new Jackbox Party Pack 4 and the previous games as well. They are highly humorous and shouldn’t lead to any fighting among friends. With the family-friendly setting, you can make sure the game is appropriate for most age groups. I can’t promise your friends are appropriate though, so be careful who plays with you when!
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-Cyn, GameVortex Communications AKA Sara Earl |
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