Gameplay
This is a game I’ve played for years and years with my family, but we play it with scraps of paper and our own words or names. This inevitably gives rise to heated discussions over permissible words and house rules – five famous footballers is out, five famous cricketers is out, and, sadly, so too is five famous physicists.
Well, this game does away with all those arguments by providing pre-made chits of paper. However, the words on these chits are somewhat NSFW. Or as it says on the box “Not for Grandma”. Also “18+”. This is a “Cards Against Humanity” version of the game I’ve played for so long with my family. Actually, all of my family have played CAH and some of the words they come up with in this game are definitely risque.
Having said all that, if you really like the game and you want to play it with youngsters or Grandma or you’re just desperate to try the internecine conflict option, then you can always make your own words to guess.
The game is played over three rounds and the players sort themselves into teams. Teams take turns to guess a series of words from the bowl.
Round one is the easy round and players clue their paper chit by describing the word without saying either of the two banned words below it. These banned words are indicated with “X”s. One team goes first and nominates one of their members to clue words. They have forty five seconds – you’ll need a phone or a stopwatch to time – and they score one point for each word that their team guesses correctly. If they say a banned word or similarly make a foul in later rounds, then it’s minus one point. Once the forty five seconds are up, the other team has a try. There is no passing (I think this is quite harsh!) you just have to keep trying.
Once the bowl is empty and all the chits have been guessed, it’s time to reset and start the next round. Pause the timer if someone ends the round in the middle of their go. The chits are folded up again and put back in the bowl for round two.
Round two is slightly harder and players are miming the word on the chit. The added complication is that you can’t use your dominant hand for the mime or charade. Sit on it or put it behind your back! Of course, this time everyone has heard all the words once, so it should be simple, right? Well, unless you’re using a sophisticated memory palace or you’re Rain Man, then most people’s working memory tops out around seven, give or take a couple. There are likely to be at least sixteen chits in the bowl, so good luck with that. Plus, this is presenting the information in a completely different way – mime rather than speech. Again, it’s a point to your team for a correct guess and a minus point if you speak – you’re miming.
Once the bowl is empty again, it’s time to reset for the last time and go into round three. Here’s where The Big Bad Bowl really diverges from what I’m used to playing. In Big Bad Bowl, you say the word on the chit backwards just once and then zip your lips. In the home brew version that I’m used to, you get to say one word, just one, to clue the chit. This might refer back to something from a previous round. Again, it’s a point for a correct guess and a minus point if you say anything at all other than the word on the chit backwards.
Once all three rounds are completed, both teams add up their scores and the team with the most points wins.
Pros
This is a great fun party game and it will stretch to ten or more players. With eight booklets of around eighty chits each, there are around six hundred words to guess, so there’s plenty of replayability. It’s a simple game to explain, it gets everyone involved and it can be challenging in many ways. Honestly, I’ve played a version of this for decades and I’d put it second behind Blood on the Clocktower and ahead of Cards Against Humanity as far as party games are concerned.
Cons
Well, it’s a party game, so the minimum player count is 4. As well as the purple bowl and the booklets of chits, there’s a score pad, which is nice, but there’s no timer. Many games like this in my youth would have a mini hourglass of the kind used for boiling eggs. I guess everyone uses their phone. The other con is that it’s the NSFW version of the game, so if you do have young children, it’s not going to be suitable.
Conclusion
I like this game a lot and, as I said at the beginning, the supplied chits make it quick to set up and get everyone involved. I would rate this at 95%.
