I have a bit of an admission on a subject that may lose me some readers: I enjoy Cards Against Humanity. I get that it’s the thing among the more hardcore gamers to hate on the game. And I can see where that comes from, but for me, there is something about getting together with friends and seeing how filthy they can be. I usually enjoy it more after a few beers, but it hearkens back to my improv days, playing the R-rated performances, trying to outdo each other with depravity. It’s also one of the games that we can generally get anyone in our various social circles to play.
That said, I have grown bored with it. Even with the create your own cards, it’s gotten very…samey to me. The same cards always used for the same topics. The same garbage cards that sit in your hand for turn after turn. Constantly having to explain what “Ennui” is whenever the card is drawn. It’s gotten old. I wanted the same kind of experience, but allow for more variety.
I found that experience with Bring Your Own Book.
Bring Your Own Book, by Do Better Games and published by Gamewright, takes the familiar party game model of having a player read a topic/phrase off of a card and having the other players come up with a response that the first player might choose as the best/funniest. The big change here is that you get those responses out of books. You remember books, right? Those are those poor neglected paper filled things that you used to keep on the shelves you now keep your DVDs and board games on? Yes, THOSE things.
These are the things.
When you are given a topic, you search through a book that was gathered for the session for a word, sentence, or passage that you feel would work best. If you are the first to do so, you say “Got it!” and flip over the sand timer. The rest of the players then have 60 seconds to find their own answer. Once the time is up, each player reads their answer and the first player picks the winner. Play then continues to the next picker.
Making the books the center of attention of the game is a fantastic idea. It keeps the game fresh and you can tailor the game to your specific game group or theme it for a game night. Halloween themed game night? Get yo’self some Stephen King, Lovecraft, and Twilight books. (Hey, they’re scary to me!) Bachelorette party? Bodice rippers might go well with a blush wine and the blushing bride. There’s a number of variants that can also be used to change things up. Once you run out of books in your own collection, you can ask your fellow game players to bring some or raid the local library.
This reminds me a lot of the improv game “The Play’s the Thing”, where plays are given random scripts and, with the help of an actor not on script, they attempt to build a scene using the dialogue from their scripts. BYOB has that same feeling of flipping through pages looking for that perfect bit of words that will fit perfectly, or the most random sentence you can find to get the biggest laughs. There were as many of those laughs in our playthrough as with any of the other party games we’ve played.
The game is $14.99 MSRP, a great price for a game that you can very easily get a lot of mileage out off. Depending on the books you choose, the game can be family friendly or a dirty as CAH. So bring it to your next family get together, surely they won’t call you a nerd for playing a game about books. Right? Right?
– Patrick
Nobody Wants the Thimble 