Just in Case

My group of gaming friends is always looking for new party games to try. A large number of us get together once a month, and though we sometimes break into smaller groups, we're usually playing Codenames, Telestrations, Decrypto, and the like. We've recently found a game that caught on with us instantly, kicking all those older options to the curb (at least for now).

It's called Just One. (And I'm not sure why it's called that.) It's in the clue-giving genre, but it's a fully cooperative game. 13 cards are dealt into a pile at the center of the table. When it's your turn as a guesser, you draw the top card of that pile, show it to everyone else, and pick at random which of the five words printed on it you're going to guess. Everyone else has a wipeoff board where they write a one word clue for you. Most of the usual "clue game" restrictions apply -- no rhymes, no versions of the same word (in English or a foreign language), no abbreviations. You can write a proper name, but again -- just one word. (Oh, hey! "Just one." I figured it out!)

Before the words are revealed, the guesser closes their eyes. Everyone else checks what they've written, and if any players have written the same word, all instances of that word are erased/hidden. The guesser only gets to see the unique answers written by the group. They then try to guess. If they get it right, they score a point for the card. If they pass, they give up the card and its point. If they guess wrong, they miss that point and another -- the top card of the stack of 13 is also discarded. The group tries to get as close to 13 as they can. (This is an endeavor along the lines of "The Mind" that we hope someday to succeed in.)

Two things really make this game shine. First, it's hard to imagine anything easier to explain, and that's great for a big group game. In less than 30 seconds, you're playing, and no one is really confused about what's happening. Second, it scales brilliantly to the number of players involved. The fewer players you have, the easier it is to give a unique clue, but the less the guesser has to work with anyway. The more players, the more you step on each other, and run yourself in logical circles deciding whether you should write down the "obvious answer" in case no one else does.

A big strike against the game: proofreading. There are a fair number of typos on the cards. They range from leaving the "R" out of "Churchill" to a quixotic "Numan" -- we aren't sure if it was meant to be "Human" or "Newman" or actually the guy who sang that 80s song "Cars." It's also a bit bizarre that they provided components for 7 players. It's an odd number (more than literally so), and there's really no reasonable limit to how many people could play this; components for 10 would have been great and wouldn't have raised the price point to a scary amount.

Just One has become an instant hit in our group. It's impressively simple while being a lot of fun. I give it a A-. I think it'll show up during our larger game nights for a long time to come.