It's Party Time - a game of dexterity and daring

Party Time, a game by Chrissy Atherholt, is one of my favorite types of games - a social game where the players bring the funny.  Some games, such as Cards Against Humanity, have all the humor pre-written on the cards and your mission is simply to combine them.  Once you've seen them all, the game is less fun - that's why CAH has more than half a dozen expansions.  You could go bankrupt collecting them all. Party Time, like Say Anything or Truth Be Told, has players provide the content every time - so the game is as funny as you are, and the possibilities are nearly infinite.

The rules and components are simple.  The game is a large box with sixteen compartments and sixteen dry-erase discs, with a few dry-erase markers provided.  Simply write down funny activities, ridiculous rules and such on the discs, place the discs face down in the box (one to a compartment), and you're ready to play.




If in high school or college you ever tried games like beer pong, quarters, or flipcup you know the basic premise of the dexterity aspect of the game.  Bounce the provided table tennis ball into one of the sixteen compartments to get a challenge. (The box has some suggested ideas you can take inspiration from - Draw a moustache on the player to your right, speak a fake language until your next turn, take a shot of BBQ sauce, etc etc).  It's OK to look into the box to see which compartments still have discs in them, so you know what to shoot for.  The object is to have the most discs at the end of the game - but really, the object is to have fun and be silly with friends.  As with any good party game, whoever had the most fun is the real winner, right?

The game is intended as a drinking game, but states up front that drinking is not necessary (but recommended.)  Because I sometimes play games with non-drinkers, I tried it both ways and liked it equally well.  But I am a silly and pretty uninhibited person by nature.  Your mileage may vary.

My players enjoyed the game and were pleased to play again, and though the version I played is a prototype, I thought it was well constructed.  The finished version will no doubt be even nicer.

I like the combination of dexterity and silliness that the game provides... and I love that it's possible to hit one of the discs YOU wrote and have to do the terrible thing you thought up.

Skill levels will vary widely.  In my games, I made a house rule that you could get one re-try if you missed the box altogether.

Party Time is a frolicsome social game that greatly improves on brainless challenges like "Quarters." Highly recommended if you've got the right group for it.  The game is heading to Kickstarter in the fall of 2015 - for updates, follow me on Twitter.

Comments