Jackbox Party Pack 11 preview - "More wild and wacky games!"
- Lots of new Jackbox games!
- Play games with the microphone on your phone
- Team up with friends
If you are unfamiliar with the party game Jackbox, they have a variety of different packs that basically provide a bunch of party games for you and your friends to play, all together, using your mobile phones. You will need a screen to display the games, but your phone acts as the controller, allowing you to participate. You can also allow people to join via streaming services like Twitch, but I always find it more fun to play in the same room. Jackbox is a staple in our household for gatherings and holidays, so I was excited to hear of their newest pack, Jackbox Party Pack 11. It's full of five new, all original games!
Hear SayHear Say was hands-down my favourite new game in the Jackbox Party Pack 11. This game uses your phone's microphone to actually play! Everyone gets their own little creature and creates a battle cry before starting off in a bunch of noise-gathering mini-games. Unlike other games in the pack, where your answers are secret, this game shows them off, which makes sense as you are all likely in the same room. Your creator ends up moving and dancing to your noises, which is extremely entertaining. You'll be given prompts on your phone, the same as some of the others playing with you, and you need to make a noise fitting that prompt. It might be making the noise a wrong answer makes, or it might be sexy speaking your fast food order. These are then played, and players vote on the best.
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In between rounds of sounds, there are mini-games that have you controlling characters on your mobile by making noise - a snake eats a bunch of dots depending on your pitch and a little toy jumps over hurdles depending on how loud you can be, a dot goes above and below a line, getting you points, depending on your volume... It's a neat break from the noise, answers! When the round is over, all of the winnings sounds are put together with randomly selected video clips, creating a really funny scene. Though some of the sound bites are a bit long for the prompt, it is so that they fit these clips.
Every single Jackbox Party Pack has a trivia game, though normally they are against other players. This time, they have combined the concepts of trivia with Dungeons and Dragons, and the whole thing is co-op. You and your friends will be working together to answer trivia questions as each correct answer harms monsters, but if you get it wrong, you get attacked. In the group I played with, we even split our answers when we weren't sure, so at least some of us could hit the monster.
There are coins that can be earned, a shop to purchase potions or extra damage, and even bosses to take on! The trivia game in a Jackbox Party Pack is never my favourite, but you cannot fault the theming on this one!
SuspectivesSuspectives was not one of my favourites from the Jackbox Party Pack 11, but that could be because I was playing with strangers. This game has you all being given a questionnaire about yourselves; ticking off your fears from a list, tapping yes or no if your tummy hurts right now, etc. A bunch of really random questions. At the end, one of you is given a prompt saying you are the criminal, and the rest are the good people. Then, you get to see a story about what the crime is.
During the game itself, you are given all of the answers from the bad person, though one of the answers is actually a lie, and then you need to interview people through voting on them, to see if they committed the crime. There are also bits where you can vote to see if an answer is a real one or a fake one, to continue to make the detective work more challenging. I just felt that you need the right people to play this with; one of our players was actually not the bad guy, but wouldn't answer any of the interview questions at all, making them seem sus. The artwork and attention to detail are fantastic, though.
Doominate is another really strong contentder, and I do expect to see it in more packs going forward. This game is split into several rounds, with the first round really showing you how to play. You are given a prompt along with another person in the room, and need to "ruin it." This can be something like "Eating Pizza", and you could add "but it's rotten", which will go head-to-head with the other person's response, and everyone else votes on a winner. The next phase of the round has you inputting two things you like so that others can ruin them, and the final round has you taking some of the top-voted ruined items and fixing them. So "Eating Pizza, but it's written, but you're actually a zombie" would fix it. It's really funny to see what people come up with in this game, and I do love the devil who's flying with their bum-wings. It's wacky and a lot of fun.
Cookie HausCookie Haus is a very interesting entry to the Jackbox Party Pack 11, and I do feel it's one that will be fantastic for children. You're basically designing cookies that fit a prompt (what the customer is ordering), but the cookie shapes are sort of random. You do get three cookie shapes to pick from, along with a lot of different sprinkles and icing!
After the first round, the customer actually takes a bunch of the top-rated cookies and wants them changed to be a little more of something else, so you will be taking the cookies decorated by others and changing them a bit. It's quite creative and fun, with some fantastic characters and animations!
