Jackbox Party Pack 8 - Safe and Entertaining
There’s nothing quite like having a Jackbox session with friends. Whether you’re hosting a stream or gathering at someone’s house for a party, flicking on a Jackbox pack has always proven to be a fun way to spend some time together. Over the years, each additional pack has continued to provide something for everyone and improve upon what is already a great catalogue of titles. The latest pack, Jackbox Party Pack 8, continues building its selections with five new games to check out, so let’s dive into each one individually and see if they’re any good.
Drawful Animate
Even if you’re rubbish at drawing (points to himself), Drawful is simplistic enough that if you’re even remotely competent, you could play well, get some laughs and even win some games. Drawful Animate has taken the initial concept and simply added it to its existing framework. You still draw a picture to ridiculous prompts, but now with two frames in which it will switch between them, thus animating your image. It continues to be fun and feel different at the same time, this one is a winner.
The Wheel of Enormous Proportions
Sadly, this game is the weakest of the pack. It has elements of Trivia, where if you correctly guess the answer, you’re rewarded with extra wedges that can be placed on a wheel. Said wheel is spun at the end of the round and points/rewards are given if it lands on yours. The reason this doesn’t work is simply that you have multiple elements trying to work with one another and neither really being fleshed out enough to warrant more playthroughs. Sadly, this one doesn’t exactly get our thumbs up, if you’re looking for a better and more fun trivia game, we highly recommend checking out Murder Trivia Party 2 on the Party Pack 6 collection. It’s more fun and less RNG.
Job Job
No, get your minds out of the gutter. The idea behind Job Job is very simple, once you get a bunch of like-minded individuals with warped minds, becomes the best game of Party Pack 8! The scenario is you’re applying for a job, you initially get asked some questions and you answer however you want. The following questions will require you to use the words from all other answers to formulate new responses, your response is pitted against another player and everyone votes on which is the best (but let’s be honest, it’s whichever one makes you laugh the most). There are some Quiplash vibes going on for this one but the simple act of choosing existing words just makes this one pop on the laugh and enjoyment factor. This title will get many replays with a group of friends.
Poll Mine
Split into two teams, you answer survey questions and try and guess the results of all the answers. The team who does this better wins and the other team remains trapped in the mine forever … or at least until the next game. Not through any fault of the game, but it’s one you need to be paying more attention to because the questions aren’t always along the lines of ‘what is the most popular or least popular answer?’. Sometimes it’ll through in some curveballs and if you’re not listening to the question (much to the dismay of anyone on my team) you’ll choose the wrong one and doom your team to failure. Poll Mine is quite enjoyable and gets your brain ticking, one for groups of people who generally know each other fairly well and easily a game that you’ll want to come back to again.
Weapons Drawn
Easily the most confusing and hard to learn game of the pack. Weapons Drawn is a social deception game, you’re all dirty filthy murderers and the general idea is to get the attention away from you and direct it to one of the other players, so you don’t get caught. Every time you murder someone you leave a calling card, which is essentially a letter from your name, hidden in an image of your own creation. There are a few things going on here and since it’s more complicated, it tends to be a game that gets better the more you play it (with the same people of course). Fewer laughs to be had in this one, other than having the knowledge of duping your friends successfully that is. But fun nonetheless.
After the 8th pack, one might be wondering if these games are losing steam or continuing to improve whilst offering new and fun experiences. Having played countless hours of these with friends, I couldn’t be happier to report that the latter seems to be the case. Wheel of Enormous Proportions was the first game we tried, and there were some red flags of a cacophony of ideas that just didn’t mesh well, but the rest of these titles were bangers that I’ll gladly revisit, including a few all-time favourites (spoiler: it’s Job Job). If you’re looking for your first pack, I would still recommend party pack 6, but this one comes a close second! Check it out.
