Game Review - Punderdome

When I pull a game out when we have friends over there are two things I’m looking for, something that everyone can understand quickly and something that creates a fun and party like atmosphere.  Punderdome does both right from the start.

The main idea of the game is to create “puns” or a “play on wor ds” based on the two randomly selected words provided on the set of 200 playing cards.  These words will be something like “colors” and “minor injuries”.  Now each player has 90 seconds to create their pun.  I will admit that although this game is easy to understand and fun to play it is actually really difficult to come up with clever puns right off the bat.  After warming up for a good 10 minutes it became much easier to think of clever things to write down.  It was like an unused part of my brain was coming out of hibernation.

Another plus about this game is the packaging.  The size is just right, small enough to carry in one hand, but perfectly packed with everything needed.  The set includes a nice cardboard box with the 200 playing cars, 2 note pads, mystery prize paper, instructions and mystery prize envelopes.  

The mystery prizes are a fun part of the game but I see them as optional.  The host of the game creates a set of mystery prizes and puts them in the envelopes.  The winner of the game selects an envelope and hopes to win a nice prize instead of something like a stale piece of bread.  I could actually see the prize envelope being worked in a pot luck sort of fashion at a small get together.

I’ve had two chances to play this game, once during my work lunch and once at home with my family.  At work the simplicity really shined.  We had 30 minutes (+/- a few) to play a game with people that have never even seen it before.  Right away we were delivering terrible puns to each other and having a great time.  The last time we had that much fun was when our boss bought everyone a free lunch.

The second time playing was with my wife and kids where I think I discovered the lowest age limit for this game.  Based on my singular data point I’d say 10 year olds could play this if you don’t mind really bad puns.  My advice for those with kids would be to form teams and add an extra 30 seconds to each round.

Overall, I really enjoy this game.  It’s quick to get into, packs up nicely, travels well and results in loads of fun which is the most important thing.  

I received this book from Blogging for Books for this review.