TOKYO GAME SHOW

Designer: Jordan Draper | Publisher: Jordan Draper Games

Once you wear the pin of the Tokyo Game Show Host, your life is changed. You’re no longer a mild mannered games enthusiast – instead, you’re the heart and soul of a game all about silly and amusing tasks that your friends are going to try and complete for points. And what do points mean?... Sadly there aren’t any prizes in the box, but there is the pride of having been the best at describing a visiting dead person, finding all the best tokens quickest, or catching tumbling dice.

This is the definition of a box full of party games – it’s a whisker shy of expecting you to hand out favour bags with a slice of cake in it and a party horn at the end. The games inside all use a series of minor props that are in strokes interesting and absurd. There’s the coloured wrist bands, a number of coloured cards, a handful of dice, and even some glow in the dark tokens. The host picks the games beforehand, or more likely, on the fly in a fit of Richard O’Brien’s Crystal Maze style mania, and challenges the group to word games, dexterity games, and the occasional treasure hunt.

Really there’s few games that ask everyone to leave the room as the host sets up it up, or turns the lights off so that the glow in the dark tokens can be handed out – and any game that does these things tends to break down that ‘gamey’ barrier into simple and undiluted fun.

There are 63 games included in the box, so silliness can be injected into an evening over and over again with minimal repeats. If you’re willing to give up any pretence at a cerebral challenge beyond thinking of something funnier to say than “aliens with floppy femurs” this is a perfect way to slip light and surprising fun into an evening.