So, my nephew (12) and my niece (10) talked me into playing Monopoly Banking (called MoBa from now on) with them. I haven't played Monopoly for about 20 years, but what the heck, let's go!

The Components

First thing you notice: there is no money. Of course! This is the most advanced 21st century edition with... credit cards! Just as real credit cards they had the same bland look&feel. To do any transactions, or even checking your account, you have to use that beeping and buzzing machine that breaks your nerves after two minutes.

Apart from these electronic gadgets, you have a normal board, the two card decks, dice and some "modern" shaped meeples like a cell phone or rollerblades.

And of course houses and hotels are available. Houses are stackable, unfortunately they are ugly too...

Different to my boring ancient version of Monopoly, MoBa has street prices set in the millions instead of thousands. Wow, there is even inflation in Monopoly world! I was quite impressed.

Less impressive was the quality of the playing cards. They felt cheap and looked poorly designed. The card texts were modernized to the some yuppie lifestyle crap. Whatever.

The Gameplay

This is Monopoly after all. However, without money, and this means: without house rules too! I thought taxes had to be put in the board center and anybody getting on "Free Parking" gets the jackpot. Seems I played it wrong for years and years, but MoBa brought me back on the path of truth.

Also, the gameplay is reduced to waiting for transactions. This banking gadget is so SLOW. For example, when you have to pay some rent, you have to put your credit card to the minus slot and the opponents credit card to the plus slot, key in the amount to transfer and wait for the machine to finish beeping. Yawn . After one hour, not even all streets were sold. Luckily dinner was ready at that point and we stopped playing for good.

Otherwise, well, see Monopoly, no improvements whatsoever!

My Opinion

Monopoly is already bad, but is this is much worse! What a pile of junk! The credit card stuff makes the game slower, you don't have an overview of how much money you own (like in real life) etc. The new neo-liberal texts on the cards look like misplaced propaganda for a lifestyle of consumption. Children are trained to get used to credit cards. And, my brother-in-law paid 50 EUR for this crap! Just imagine what great games you get for 50 EUR, but no, it had to be MoBa AVOID!


2/10 This game is a ******* insult!