Amongst the board gaming elite, there are few words that draw more ire and disgust than “Monopoly.”  The first real board game most of us learn as a kid, it’s simple dice rolling, property-buying, four hour sessions of free market economy really seem to rub some people the wrong way.  In fact, this quintessential American classic scores no higher than a 4.5 average on BoardGameGeek.  Yeesh.

It would seems serious gamers have a real hate on for Rich Uncle Pennybags and his thimble full of fun.  Despite all of this, I’m here to sell you on a little card game called Monopoly Deal.

Part of Hasbro’s line-up of card games that reimplement popular board game ideas into a shufflable deck (it’s joined by games like Scrabble Slam and Sorry! Revenge), Monopoly Deal takes the basics of Monopoly – property collecting, rent paying, and random elements of chance – and condenses them into a 15 minute card game.

The object of the game is to collect three full sets of properties, thereby creating your “monopoly” and winning the game.  The sets of properties here are in keeping with the classic Monopoly board.  So while you may need three cards to complete the orange set of properties (New York Ave, Tennessee Ave, and St. James Place) you’ll only need two to complete the dark blue locations (Park Place and Boardwalk).

To find these properties, players will draw cards at the beginning of each turn.  Mixed in with the properties are money cards, which you’ll use to pay rent, and action cards, which let you do things like charge rent, penalize other players, or steal their properties.

There’s an element of “what do I hide, what do I show?” that helps keep things lively, as a money or property card is only in play if you take it out of your hand and place it in front of you on the table, and you can never have more than seven cards in your hand at once.  This leads to some nice decision making elements – do you keep hiding Park Place in your hand so that the player to your left with Boardwalk won’t have a chance to steal it?  Or do you play it so that you can keep that great action card you picked up and charge double the rent on a future turn?

Monopoly Deal is just like Monopoly, but with all of the boring bits taken out.

Like most Hasbro card games of this nature, you should have no problems picking this up for under five dollars – and that’s good, because Monopoly Deal is about five dollars worth of fun.  That’s not to say it’s not good – it’s just that it’s really a bite-sized offering that’s better as filler material than it is the main event.

If you’re getting the group together for a night of board games and are looking for a nice 15 minute time killer while you’re waiting for everyone to arrive, or maybe a light gaming snack in between rounds of something heavier, Monopoly Deal fits the bill perfectly.  The game favors luck far more than skill, but since it doesn’t last much longer than the average cup of coffee, it doesn’t really matter.  Getting to nail your friends with a whopping rent charge or a cruel action card is always good for a laugh around the table – just don’t expect this one to become the focus of your game nights.