JoeSchmidt.com: Gadget of the Week: Apples to Apples

Posted on December 07, 2005 at 12:44 AM

Does the prospect of spending another boring holiday with your relatives make you feel less than cheery? Are you looking to make the time spent with Uncle Earl or Crazy Aunt Betty a bit more interesting (well, besides hiding their dentures)? Or maybe you're tired of fighting over who gets to be the banker in Monopoly? If so, might I suggest you give Apples to Apples a try.

Last Saturday night, this blog was up until the wee hours of the night playing this game with a group of friends. No one had played the game before, but since it's such a simple game to learn, we were playing within 10 minutes of opening the box. This game is so addictively entertaining, even the scroogiest, anti-board game person you know will want to play.

Each Apples to Apples game comes with 749 red apple cards and 249 green apple cards giving you and endless amount of word variations. Game play is simple. To start the game, one judge is chosen from the players. The judge deals 7 red apple cards to each player (including them self). The judge then picks a green apple card from the top of the pile and places it on the table. Players (excluding the judge) then choose which red apple card in their hand is best described by the word on the green apple card and places that card face down on the table. The judge then gathers the red apple cards and chooses which one they believe is best described by the green apple card. The player whose red apple card was selected then receives the green apple card. The next round begins with a new judge who deals enough red apples cards to bring each player's hand back up to seven cards. Play continues until one player earns enough green apple cards to win the game.

To give you a better feel for the game I provided the picture below which shows how a typical round might play out.