Video Game Review: Trivial Pursuit

On Friday, I went to my local Blockbuster to rent Trivial Pursuit (available on Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii and PS3) and I was disappointed to learn that they had not ordered any copies and didn’t plan to.  I really wanted the game since the actual board game is a staple in my family and figured the electronic version would a nice change from the norm.  My three children love the Mario Party games so I knew the format would be ideal for them to play among themselves as well.  So, I got back into my van, drove to Wal-Mart and picked up a copy.  Since it was a Friday evening and my birthday was the next day, we decided to just settle in while dinner was cooking and try out this game.

image: EA.com

There are many good things about this game.  The first is that it takes the familiar gameplay and speeds it up.  There is a time limit for answering questions so it takes away the complaint that playing Trivial Pursuit takes too long.  It’s also really easy to play – you roll the dice, you figure out which space you want to land on and you answer the question.  Done!  You can also save a game and pick up where you left off without worrying about whose turn it was next and whether someone had added pies to their playing piece during your break.   Another perk is that, along the bottom of the screen, players’ statistics are displayed.  It might say something like “John has gotten 100% of the History questions correct” or “Jane has answered only 25% of her questions correctly.”

There are a few strange things that we have noticed about the game.   There are spelling errors all over the place.  We were able to ignore them for the most part until we got to a couple questions that actually didn’t make any sense due to poor sentence structure.  I’m not sure if an English-speaking person was commissioned to help design the game but, if they were, they should probably be fired.  I should mention, however, that I did play the Wii version (although these screenshots are for the Xbox) in case that makes a difference.

image: EA.com

Another problem is that, for the geography questions, players are often asked to identify a specific city in the world.  When the screen zeros in on that particular geographic region, there are several dots representing various cities.  They do not, however, have labels.  Therefore, the player must not only know the exact city but they need to be able to differentiate it from others in that area.  I can understand the value of making people learn city locations without the benefit of labels but this level of difficulty is out of place in game that otherwise presents players with multiple choice questions.  It’s very odd to me to go back and forth.

Overall, this is a decent game to have and it does have educational as well as entertainment value.  I would recommend it, especially for parties or if you like to play as a family.

Here’s a quick look at the game from a trailer: