Monopoly Secret Vault Is Our New Game-Night Obsession
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Although it’s a family-adored classic, traditional Monopoly can be fairly boring. Especially when you arrive in the long haul of the game when everyone is buying up houses and hotels (why does this always feel like it goes on forever?). Eventually, someone mentions that they’re tired, annoyed, or no longer wants to play anymore, and so the game ends (at least, this is how it goes in my house). But it doesn’t have to end this way! For those who want a little more excitement from their game nights (or are looking for a good family-centric gift), Hasbro released a new version of Monopoly late last year — one that turns players into codebreakers.
Monopoly Secret Vault Board Game
amazon.com
$20.99
amazon.comThere are a lot of similarities to traditional Monopoly: the colors and properties, Chance cards, jail, and the general objective to have the most money of all players in the end. But this version has quite a few differences, which makes the game a little spicier: In Monopoly Secret Vault, there are no Community Chest cards, no houses, and no railroads. But, there are special spaces on the board and on the dice that give you a free guess to crack open Mr. Monopoly’s vault. The goal: to open the secret vault as many times as you can.
The winner isn't determined by how many times the vault is opened (it’s still about who has the most money, ultimately), but inside are prizes, like cash, hotels, and keys, that can help you achieve the game’s objective. There are four locked properties on the board, and the only way to open them is to win keys from the vault. Once you get one, you can use it to own any of the locked properties that still remain in the game, for free!
Hotels can also only be accumulated for free by opening the vault, and the ability to bypass houses straight to hotels speeds the game up a bit. The ultimate objective is to sell all the properties, so once all deeds are bought, the game ends, with the person holding the most money declared the winner. This is slightly different — and less dissension-stirring, might I add — from traditional Monopoly, where you want to bankrupt all other players (and inadvertently crush their souls).
Having played this game multiple times over the course of the last few months, I can say that the guessing component of this game makes the competition even more fun. Plus, it seems to move faster than traditional Monopoly, which has allowed me to get through a game in 2 hours or less every time I’ve played it.
For weeknights when you want to break out some family board games or those days when it’s too cold to even consider leaving the house, you’ll definitely want to have this version of Monopoly on hand. And best of all, it's on sale!
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