For this critical play, I played Patently Stupid from Jackbox Party Pack 5 from Jackbox Games. This game is played using a host PC to start a session that multiple players can join using either a mobile device or computer. Thus, this game can be played either asynchronously using a video call platform or with everyone in the same room.
All Jackbox Party Packs have an ESRB rating of T for Teen, implying the intended audience to be youth ages 13 and older. Jackbox games also seem to cater to geographically separated friend groups by providing them an opportunity for shared laughter and fun even across distance.
Patently Stupid specifically is a drawing-based judging game, with the premise of creating absurd inventions to solve problems. Considering that our game is also a drawing-based judging game with the similar premise of pitching startups, finding a way to differentiate ourselves from Patently Stupid in particular was crucial for my team.
After playing through a round of Patently Stupid, I found that needing to draw and pitch your own inventions made rejection feel more personal and put players with minimal artistic experience at a substantial disadvantage. Additionally, despite being a game meant to facilitate social interaction, Patently Stupid offered very few opportunities for player interaction. These are problems our game aims to avoid replicating by having players pitch each other’s cards instead of their own, and building in time for discourse.
Patently Stupid has players receive a problem prompt, and then create and present an invention to the other players. The strength of this mechanic lies in the idea of reciprocity. Pitching is fun and socially validating when you can get reactions out of the other players in the room.
However, the likelihood that a presentation generates reactions is highly dependent on the player’s drawing ability. For instance, though Noe had a good response to the prompt, his stick figure drawing was not able to communicate his idea fully, leading to confusion from the other players, generally considered a negative reaction.
As I was presenting, I felt a sense of slight anxiety when I got minimal reactions. Because I was pitching my OWN idea, the poor reception felt more personal, like it was due to my own shortcomings that I was unable to make the crowd laugh. When I was able to get a reaction, the feeling of recognition and achievement was immensely satisfying, but the negative feelings when my ideas were not received well were amplified as well.
For our game, we wanted to find a way to reward bad drawings by turning them into opportunities for laughter, while still preserving the feelings of achievement from a successful pitch. We decided to accomplish this by having players pitch another player’s drawing instead of their own, without knowing what the drawing is supposed to be of. For one, this creates a sense of detachment from the drawing; having an unsuccessful pitch now feels somewhat out of your control, making it feel less personal. Secondly, the poorer the drawing the more freedom of interpretation the presenter has, creating opportunities for humorous logical leaps.
If Patently Stupid did want to keep it such that people present their own inventions, adding additional text based fields players can fill out can help reduce the weight of the drawing aspect. For example, having players write a few reviews from customers could give an additional opportunity for humor if the drawing falls flat.
Another shortcoming of Patently Stupid are the long periods of “heads-down” working time. A VERY large portion of each round (writing prompts, filling out the presentation, voting, all of which have time allotments of ~2 minutes) is played without speaking a word to each other, which is counterintuitive for a game meant to facilitate social interaction.
The way to improve this would be to identify moments where individual work can be shortened or made more collaborative. For example, voting can have time for group discussion built in, and shortening the time allotted for building the presentation can simultaneously reduce the socialization gap and level the playing field by encouraging rougher drawings.
This is a notable difference in our game, which opts to shorten the drawing time to 45 seconds by also removing the need to come up with a title and tagline, which would limit spontaneity in our case. However, since our judge role, the Investor, does not draw anything during this time, one player is disengaged during this period, whereas in Patently Stupid, a strength of the game is that everyone is ALWAYS doing something.
Another strength of Patently Stupid is the judging system. Having everyone be involved in the social judging, and being able to see who voted for what, does appeal to a player’s need for sensuality. Receiving acceptance and approval from others, and seeing who exactly is giving that approval, builds person-to-person closeness even in a group setting.
This is a shortcoming of our own judging system, which has just one judging figure. Having one judge does create a breath of fresh air for a player every few rounds, and the role can be enjoyable as it is a source of power that is both powerful and limited in the amount of time it is held. However, players who are not one of the pairs currently presenting and being judged are likely to feel bored during judging if they cannot participate, unless we build in discussion time.
Overall, I found Patently Stupid to be generally enjoyable but lacking that sense of social chaos and spontaneity that makes me love social judging games. Whether it’s through making the game more discourse heavy or experimenting with more pitching dynamics, focusing more on creating moments of shared laughter is an area our game can stand out.
