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First of all, I'll just state that I'm reviewing this based on the Xbox 360 version. I preordered FGN3 based on my enjoyment of FGN1 and downloading all of the games that didn't come on the disc, and I loved them all. But for Family Game Night 3 ("FGN3" from here on), if you loved all the previous games, you'll be disappointed with all five of these. Why? The previous ones were faithful reproductions of the games they were named after, and all of them added *options* to switch up the rules/game settings in case you wanted something a little bit different. Battleship, Yahtzee, Connect 4, etc., were all extremely fun to play alone or with friends. The games included in FGN3 are all unfortunately very disappointing, and none are faithful to the games they were based off of. Allow me to explain...
Twister: 0/10 -
The very worst of the bunch. It has *nothing* to do with the actual game Twister, and they merely decided to use the brand's name to increase sales. I was of course very confused and interested for how they could creatively transfer Twister to a video game. I imagined, maybe you'd get some crazy finger-twisting moves like "left thumb X button, right pinky left trigger", and so on, until a player failed to do whatever the game requested. Could you cheat at such a game? Sure, but I really think it could be a fun idea with a few friends who are actually playing by the rules. But instead, they didn't even attempt to make the game Twister-like.
You start by choosing a song, there are two songs to choose from in each category (Pop, Disco, Funk). Then, you'll see a button sequence come up that you're supposed to repeat. "A X B", then you hit "A X B" in rhythm of the music. Then you get a four-button sequence like "B B X Y", then five, then six, then the game is over. For anyone who has played a video game before in their life, these button sequences are all very easy and you'll get a perfect score every game, making any competition completely dull and end up in a tie.
Mousetrap: 0/10 -
Whether you're playing this with a friend or a computer player, the game is ultra tedious. In the real game, 90% of the fun of this game comes purely from building and setting off the mousetrap. The real mechanics of the gameplay were never very fun to begin with, so when you just watch a virtual mousetrap being made and set off, you take away the fun part of the game and the game you are left with is merely "roll the die, hope you don't land on the mousetrap." There is no depth to it. But the real tragedy of this game that made me give it a zero out of ten? Each time you "build" part of the trap, you have to take a two minute detour from the real game and play a super lame mini game. In the mini game, you try to build a network of pipes to route a ball through. How well you do determines how many trap pieces get placed on the board. This mini game is where you'll spend about 80% of total gameplay in Mousetrap, which is why I say this game is tedious. The only positive thing I can say about this game is I like the sneaky, mouse-like music.
The Game of Life: 6/10 -
This is one of the only reasons to buy FGN3. Though boring with computer players, the game can be fun to play with a friend. Unfortunately, as with all games in FGN3, this one also does not match the real-life board game. It's a lot closer than the others, but there are quite a few features thrown in that greatly hinder the game's enjoyment. For example, there are game spaces you can land on that let you sue another player for up to $100,000. The person getting sued has to waggle the control stick back and forth for like 20 seconds to argue his case to the "judge". The faster you do it, the more your bar gets filled up which indicates how successfully you're arguing. Even if you max out the bar, you still end up paying the other player like $15,000. There are many examples of additions like this that add nothing to the game other than being annoying. Every time a player gets married, you have to take a 5 minute detour from the game to play the "Twister" mini game (yes, the one I reviewed above). Again, another "feature" that slows down the game and is ultimately just annoying to wait for. Even if the player gets zero points on this Twister mini-game, you still have to pay them a $5,000 wedding gift ($15,000 for max ponits). It's game mechanics like that which make the already-boring mini-games even more pointless, because you feel like your score on the mini-game has such an immaterial impact on the game as a whole that you'd rather just skip it. Ignoring all the annoyances that were tacked-on to the original game, it's still fun to try fighting over the best careers, salaries, and houses and seeing who can amass more money over the course of their "Life".
Clue: 6/10 -
Again, the basic idea of the original game is here (find who the murder is, which room it happened in, and with what weapon), but the core of the game is significantly altered in a negative way. The way in which you play this game as opposed to the traditional Clue game, is by landing on question mark squares across the hallways of the Clue mansion. There really is no reason to even enter any of the rooms (you can, but it's strategically a bad idea with how the game is structured). When you land on a question mark square, you'll get "rumor points". Either it will just give you 1-3 points and end your turn, or it will make you play another (boring) mini-game to win from 1 to 3 points. Each time you get to six rumor points, you can make a mock-accusation and find out if any of your guesses for person, place, and weapon were correct. When you get them all right, you can make an official accusation in the poolroom to end the game. So this game has the potential to be sorta fun with a friend, but not half as fun as the real game, and you'll feel like you're missing the point of the game by only going around seeking question mark squares to land on.
Yahtzee Hands Down: 4/10 -
Card version of Yahtzee, only much less fun. You are forced to play with four players always, meaning you'll probably be with some lame computer players, because you'll have a hard time finding four human beings in the same room at the same time who are all going to be willing to play this with you. Basically, you get five cards (instead of using dice) and just try to get whatever the middle of the gameboard says to get. So if it says, "Four of a kind" you keep choosing cards to discard and redraw them each turn until someone gets four of a kind. But there is a time limit before the objective changes. So almost every time a Yahtzee card shows up, you'll have a lot of players get to 3 or 4 of a kind until the Yahtzee card expires then asks you to get a run of 4 instead. Frustrating.
As with previous FGN games, each game has a "remix" mode. I'll briefly go over each one.
Twister: Still the same exact boring game, don't bother with either version of this one.
Mousetrap: Although still not that fun, remix version is much better than the standard mode for this game, and you'll avoid the horribly tedious minigames that plagues the other version. The gameboard and layout are completely different. It's almost a whole new game.
Life: Instead of getting money, you'll get to move forward a certain amount spaces that corresponds with how much money you *would have* gotten in the standard version. The farthest person on the game board wins, instead of the person with the most money (there is no money at all in this version). Less fun that standard mode.
Clue: You'll have the same dice to see how far to move with each turn, but you'll also get to roll another die which does some dramatic things to the game to keep it interesting. Example: Someone gets killed by the murderer (removing that character from accusations of course), or getting to lock someone in a room for a turn. This mode can be fun, I'd play it about equally as much as the standard mode.
Yahtzee: Just alters the speed and flow of the game a bit, but neither mode for this game are really that fun anyway.
Conclusion -
Family Game Night 3 is a big disappointment if you loved any of the previous Family Game Night releases. It suffers from too dramatically altering the original gameplay of each game, with no options to play a more faithful remake of the original. If you're looking for a good casual/family game, I would highly recommend the original Family Game Night if you don't already have it. Otherwise, this one might be worth it when it hits the clearance bin in a few months (for under $20).
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I have got all the Family Game Night games from XBL and have enjoyed most of them so this was a must. I had about 7 adults having a blast with Life. Clue was a little tricky at first but a lot of fun. The Remix is the best way to play. Twister was a little disappointing. It's more of a DDR type of game then Twister. Mouse Trap was a blast playing with 4. Remix was ok but original is better. Yahtzee hands Down is frustrating but a good frustrating if that makes sense. Overall at a $40 price its worth picking up if you're a fan of the series. Plus each game has a remix mode and some are really better then the original.Life 8/10
Clue 9/10
Mouse trap 7/10
Yahtzee Hands Down 7/10
Twister 3/10
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