Games Britannia Part 2

In this episode Wholly talks about the 'Golden Age of Modern Board Games'. Like in his ancient board game episode, he starts off with a 18th- 19th century board game called 'Mansion of Bliss' it was a simple game of chance (much like snakes and ladders) where the aim of the game was to * surprisingly* get to the mansion of bliss. It is a circular board shape and the mansion was situated in the center, with 50 squares, each one of the squares had an individual poem on them about a certain point in a persons life, each poem can hinder you, help you or could just be a nice poem to read out aloud. This game was played a lot in schools because it was a 'fun' way of showing the children how to live a good life, and that with hard work, you will eventually reach your goal.

'Popular games were morality based' Bruce Whitehall used the example game 'Rags to Riches' as a board game for Americans to try to achieve the *American dream*. Because Morality games were so popluar with both children and adults, it became one of the biggest industries during and after the world war.

Following the great success of Rags to riches, *Chequed Game of Life* was the modified version of teh British idea of a moral journey to american themes of opportunity and individualism, with the added twist that that player can choose where they want to go and how to achieve them (e.g they the could either take the chance of obtaining a lot of money, or settle down with a family)
The Britain's also used board games to promote their ideas and to create a political discussion within the families. Just like chequed game of life, 'Plank-a-Squith' held a massive political message, which was based on Emilie Pankhurst, and her campaign to get a woman into the parliament ( I thought that this game was a brilliant idea) Another popular political game made in britain was called Brerefox and Brere rabbit.

Monopoly:
The popular game was originated from the american board game called 'The Landlords Game' made by Elizebeth Philip. In her eyes the game was meant to educate the families about property values and be money cautious, but it had the very opposite effect, players  played the game to bankrupt and smash the opponents down so that the winner owns majority of the properties and the riches. Monopoly is such a world renoued success and game that an annual competition is held every year in the Mayfair hotel, the final winner gets to go to Las Vegas to play in the final.
Why Monopoly is was a great success:
-The game creates communications between players e.g negotiation
- It is one of the few board games i have played in my life that has interesting games bits
- There are about 20 squares on the board, it came into light that more people remembered the position and name of the places on the board then the map. Monopoly was played around WW2. so the army devised a board game just like Monopoly, but instead of London places, they used other army camps and refugee places.

As time went on T.V game shows started to take over the board game industry, until Trivial Pursuit was introduced. Dubbed a the board game version of T.V game shows, but this game wasn't enough for board games to survive. In mid 80's electronics began to wipe out the board games.
Wholly then ask's the audience 'In games Britannia dead?' because most of the well known games were american based, until he introduced 'War of Terror' made by Terrorbull games.Each player has an empire, much like the board game "Risk" the aim of the game is to liberate the world. When Wholly introduces game to us I instantly gained an interest in it, because it was a game about the modern political setting of our time. When watching him play this it seemed enjoyable as you can communicate, either by helping them or using them  for your own sadistic gain (and because you get a balaclava)

Watching games britania 2 was not as interesting as watching the first purely because of my gaming preferences, however I know now that games as great as monopoly are the result of many evolution from previous much simpler board games. Also i gained an understanding of  how powerful board games were to the political understandings of their time. What intrigued me most about this episode was finding out the "war of terror" board game. It reminded me very much of settlers catan ( which over the christmas holiday i have yet to win) But i will definitively consider buying War Of Terror (if it is still legal)