Game: Facts in Five

Thread: Re: Classic Parlor Game Gets a Make-over

Guantanamo — 2008-10-25T00:33:53+00:00

Randy Cox wrote:
Mike, I'm surprised you looked at this one. Didn't I read somewhere that you said you didn't like long reviews? Anyway, there wasn't much controversial in this one, but I've included that disclaimer ever since my infamous Blue Moon City review.

I don't like reading long reviews. But, you let me know right off the bat that you actually had an opinion, so I skipped down to read your opinion on it.

Thread: Re: Classic Parlor Game Gets a Make-over

Randy Cox — 2008-10-24T23:36:58+00:00

Mike, I'm surprised you looked at this one. Didn't I read somewhere that you said you didn't like long reviews? Anyway, there wasn't much controversial in this one, but I've included that disclaimer ever since my infamous Blue Moon City review.

Thread: Re: Classic Parlor Game Gets a Make-over

Guantanamo — 2008-10-24T20:51:38+00:00

Randy Cox wrote:
Disclaimer: I didn't think I had to say this, but my reviews are my opinions. While they are intended to be useful to the reader they are not intended to be unbiased, objective discussions of the game. You can get that elsewhere. My reviews reflect my opinion of the game's merits. This is part of the IWTRTMTWWW (I Write the Reviews That Make the Whole World Whine) series, as are all my reviews.

IMO, the best reviews are about stating an 'opinion', even if I don't agree with the writer I want to know how the game makes them 'feel'.

Thanks!

Thread: Re: Classic Parlor Game Gets a Make-over

Randy Cox — 2008-10-23T20:32:15+00:00

Great_Mazinga wrote:
If you can get an older copy, I'd go for the 3M. It has a better quality case and letter tiles, but plays the same as AH.I'll have to check mine tonight. I've got a couple of 3Ms, about six AHs, plus the new one and now that I think of it, I may have never really looked at the 3M copies very much. If the tiles are different, I probably would have noticed.

However, the new letter distribution is radically different and, arguably, better than the 3M/AH editions. So that's another reason to buy the UG version.

Thread: Re: Classic Parlor Game Gets a Make-over

Great_Mazinga — 2008-10-23T20:21:21+00:00

If you can get an older copy, I'd go for the 3M. It has a better quality case and letter tiles, but plays the same as AH.

Regarding the UG version, it does sound like it's been watered down for dumb masses. Even said, I'd probably just as well like the new version, making it a more accessible party game, than a scholarly game.

Thread: Re: Classic Parlor Game Gets a Make-over

tonguepaste — 2008-10-23T18:09:49+00:00

Wow, that fix made quite the difference, Randy! Nice work! I am going to pick up the University edition & try your suggested improvements ...

Thread: Re: Classic Parlor Game Gets a Make-over

Randy Cox — 2008-10-23T17:49:38+00:00

I'll have to go back and check the review. That's what I get for writing it over three days during meeting breaks. Edit: I found the problem and it's a bug in BGG. You can't use a "less than" sign. That terminated the review many paragraphs too soon. It is now corrected.

I would suggest purchasing the new edition. I like the newer categories a ton more than the old ones. I particularly disliked the "spelling of foreign words" type categories and anything that said "Of ________ descent." The new set doesn't include any whammy categories. There is always a pretty simple option on every card and the rest are only moderately difficult.

Without a doubt, I'd go with the new version over the old.

Thread: Re: Classic Parlor Game Gets a Make-over

tonguepaste — 2008-10-23T15:58:05+00:00

Great review, Randy, thanks! I grew up with this game and am still very fond of it ... It feels like your review trails off a bit at the end, though. I missed a sort of summary paragraph, possibly? But I'd love to hear what you ultimately think of the University Games edition in particular ... I still have my old Avalon Hill copy of the game but could be interested in picking up the updated version. Do you yourself feel that the new edition as been "dumbed down" or not? Thanks!

Thread: Classic Parlor Game Gets a Make-over

Randy Cox — 2008-10-23T15:33:10+00:00

Disclaimer: I didn't think I had to say this, but my reviews are my opinions. While they are intended to be useful to the reader they are not intended to be unbiased, objective discussions of the game. You can get that elsewhere. My reviews reflect my opinion of the game's merits. This is part of the IWTRTMTWWW (I Write the Reviews That Make the Whole World Whine) series, as are all my reviews.

Facts in Five is listed in this database as dating from 1967, but the boxed version is older than that. Tim Stabosz is a fellow I receive periodic e-mail listings from. See, he gathers and sells games, writes up a lengthy catalog with his prices, and allows you to purchase from him. One of the games he has attempted to sell in the past for a high price is an original version of this game, published by some entity with the name "Research" in the title. And I think he says it dates from the 1950s (or maybe 1965). Anyway, it was pre-3M. But that's not all that important, because I've played the game with people who simply refer to it by its parlor game name, "Categories." It’s been around a long time.

Anyway, it's a simple fill-in-the-matrix trivia game. Get five categories and five letters and there you have a 25-cell grid to fill in--in five minutes. Ready, set, go! But I'm ahead of myself. Let's discuss the game.

Components

I own many versions of this game--3M, various packagings by Avalon Hill, and the most recent release (2007) by University Games. They are all just about the same. You get a deck of many category cards. In fact, the card-back artwork is the same in the 1967 version and the 2007 version. The cards are of a little less quality in 2007 (stiff, nearly brittle), but otherwise, things are essentially the same.

The card contents, however, have changed radically. The game as published from 1967 through 1995 had some very 1950s-style categories.

]]>Sample Cards from older set -- Photo Credit: DCosby

]]>Sample Card from older set -- Photo Credit: Lemming

See, the original game allowed for multi-layered choices of categories (e.g. "Music Composers, Symphony: Of Latvian Descent" or "Military Figures: Medieval"). These could cause some grueling rounds of brainsweat.

Compare that to today's types of cards:

]]>Sample Card from 2007 set

]]>Sample Cards from 2007 set

The story is that the original designer redid the cards in 2007. Now, they're much simpler. Fewer options and only two levels of category, some of which have a main category of "General." I don't know that there are any military categories now and the types information you now must stretch for are more geographic or pop-culture based. Some might call this "dumbing down" the game; others may call it "making it more marketable and accessible."

In addition to the cards, you receive many score sheets for game play (double-sided, which means that if you play the suggested 5 rounds, you'll waste the back of one sheet for each player). You'll get another, smaller, pad of master score sheets (to track scores). In addition, you get a bunch of little letter chits. From memory, I think older sets had a couple of chits for each letter in the alphabet plus two wild cards. The newer edition has a much more varied frequency count for the letters (see image below). Finally, you'll get rules and a "five minute" timer (mine clocks in at 5:51). All this is housed in a nifty book-like case in the newest version.

]]>Game components in 2007 set

Except for the lessened quality of the cards (mighty stiff and hard to shuffle), the components are fine.

Rules

The rules are easy to understand and do a good job of documenting the proper use of people's names (use last name unless they have only one common name or the category calls for first names). There is also a very good example that shows how to score a round.

Give them an "A" for rules.

Play

The game is played in five five-minute rounds. Each round consists of choosing five categories (deal cards out to players, some may get more cards than others, but that's fine, as the last player dealt to is the dealer next round). Then choose five letter tiles. Then go at it. Fill in all rows (letters) and columns (categories) with answers that fit the category and begin with the letter of the row. Edit to answer a query: All players will be playing identical grids of categories and letters. And don't duplicate any of your own answers (it's OK to have the same answer as other players). Wild letter tiles can be anything and can even change from column to column.

After five minutes (I suggest using a kitchen timer as it is audible and you don't have to keep checking the sand timer), everyone put down your pencils and pass your sheet to a neighboring player. At that point, the neighbor "grades your paper," like in school.

Anything that is obvious gets marked as correct (check). Anything that's questionable is asked to the group of players. If any one player (other than the person who wrote the answer on the paper you are judging) agrees that the answer is valid, then it is valid. If no one else agrees, then the answer is wrong, even if the writer knows damn well it's valid.

In a way, this was the original incarnation of What Were You Thinking. I'm of two minds about this. If two or more people at the table think that Ben Franklin was a president, then it counts. But if only one person knows that Draco is a constellation, that person is hosed. I like the hosing rule, because it keeps one geek from choosing a wild card category (there are wilds in the deck) of something like "NCR cash register computing platforms: 1978-1986." So what if I once didn't get credit for Frankfurt as a US State Capital simply because no one else at the table knew it. You have to know your audience or be very persuasive with them during the scoring round. But as to the groupthink part of the game (the “Franklin Was a President Conundrum”), I'm not so happy. Fortunately, that almost never comes up because mature players realize you’re playing the game, not the system.

When everyone has graded, it's time to score the round. Here, it gets unnecessarily tricky, but that is part of the old-school charm of this game.

You will have five columns of answers, each column representing a category. At this point, the relative positions of the correct answers are no longer important. Your paper-grader must take each of your columns and draw a tick-mark (or check) on your scoring grid (another, much smaller, 5x5 grid) starting in the top cell of each column, filling in downwards, until they have as many tick marks as you had correct answers in that category.

Let me give an example.

Boardgames .......... Cities ... Trees.. Songs................ Children's Books D Davinci's Challenge Denver ... Dogwood Down in the Boondocks ------ F Fearsome Floors ... Frankfurt. Fruit.. Farfale ............. ------ M Medici ............ Milan .... Maple.. Make Me Smile ....... Mary Poppins E Emerald ........... Evansville ------- England Swings ...... ------ R Reiner Knizia's.... Richmond.. Ragweed Roll Over Beethoven.. Ramona the Pest ..Decathlon

In this instance, your grader (and opponents) did not allow Knizia's Decathlon, saying that game doesn't officially start with "R". They also didn't give you "Fruit" or "Ragweed" for trees (rightly so). You should have known your audience better, as they weren't familiar with either of "England Swings" or "Farfale," no matter how much you recall playing those 45s (and 78s) as a child. And amazingly, someone else put "Mary Poppins" on their list of books so they obviously voted to allow it. So your grid of proper answers (noted with an "X") looks like this:

X X X X - X X - - - X X X X X X X - - - - X - X X

But the scoring grid looks like this (I'm putting in 1s for the 'tick marks').

1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 . 1 . 1 1 . . . . 1 . . .

See how everything "bubbled to the top"? That is one of the harder things to explain about the scoring of this game. From there, it's easy. Just sum the "1"s along the rows and down the columns and square your sums. Then add your squared numbers together. Like this:

1 1 1 1 1 = 5x5= 25 1 1 1 1 1 = 5x5= 25 1 1 0 1 0 = 3x3= 09 1 1 0 0 0 = 2x2= 04 0 1 0 0 0 = 1x1= 01 =================== 4 5 2 3 2 ...... 64 (General Knowledge Score) x x x x x 4 5 2 3 2 16+25+04+09+04=56 (Specific Knowledge Score) Total Score: 64+56=120

It's not that hard, mind you, but it is different. The gist of it is, I believe, to see how much "General" knowledge you have (total answers) and how much "Specific" knowledge you have (dominance of categories). It doesn't really matter, though, as you add the scores together and don't compare general vs. specific across players.

In fact, at the WBC, they have dispensed with the whole scoring system and simply count total correct answers in the matrix (in this case, 16) and let that be your score for a round. In almost all cases, this works exactly the same as doing the convoluted math. But I kinda like the funny math.

Anyway, you do this five times and total score determines the winner.

Our Play – 10/19/2008, 3 player

Three of us sat down to play Sunday evening--D, R, and J. (I'm D, by the way.) After explaining the rules, we started out with two wildcard categories, one about Judaism and one about literature. The non-wildcard categories were no better and after the first round, scores were very low: D-80, R-72, J (playing his first game)-44.

The second round wasn’t much better for two players, but happened to have a lot of good categories for me (song titles, famous quotes, boy names 6+ letters, girl names names less than 6 letters). Scores: D-174, R-94, J-40.

We had only a few questionable answers and usually shot them down, even if they were valid. The audacity of someone trying to show off their knowledge of arcane facts! They should know that to succeed, you must display your knowledge of common facts. So over the next two rounds D scored 90 and 80, R 80 and 90, and J 90 and 62. If not for the skewed second round, we would be pretty equally matched.

Scores going into the final round: D-424, R-336, J-236.

At this point, J asked if there was some sort of “all in” aspect to the final round, which is interesting and we’ll get to later. I can see the reason for the question, from his perspective. He would have had to outscore me by almost 200 points in a game with a maximum score of 250 per round.

Anyway, the final round had much easier categories for the group, though I can’t recall them right now. Last round scores were: D-130, R-160, J-146. Final scores: D-554, R-496, J-382.

It clocked in at 73 minutes and was enjoyed by all.

Findings

That question about all-in got me to thinking about modifications to this game. After all, the game would have been more fun for all involved if the final round had yielded more sway. It would also have been more fun if that runaway early round hadn’t pretty much secured victory. Here’s a graph of how the game played with some additional blips and blops that I’ll explain below.

]]>Game Graph

The solid lines show our game-by-game scores. The darker red shows my scores (D), with a big blip in Round 2, but pretty average performance otherwise. J shows a very shaky start, then ramps up, falls a bit, and jumps mightily at the end, having gotten the hang of things. And R played, arguably, the best game of all, steady or gaining in respect to the other players all the way to a dominant final round.

You may also notice that I dropped the score for D from 174 to 144 in Round 2. That’s the first of my enhancements to the game. I think it would be a better game if

- No player can win a round by more than 50 points.

It’s a pretty simple thing to do, trebling scores for the winner of a round to be no more than 50 above the second place finisher. In fact, it happens pretty rarely, but when it does, it pretty much kills the game. So let’s call that Major Improvement #1.

And Major Improvement #2 belongs to newbie J in this game. What if we still kept Major Improvement #1 but then doubled all final round scores? That would put more on the line for the final frame.

In our case, you can follow the ascending lines to see our total scores (the scale for total score is on the right side of the graph, individual game score is on the left Y-axis). You can see that I held a lead after four rounds and that using the regular rules (no doubling), my score (follow the dashed line) ended up at 524, winning by 28 points. But if you double the final round and follow the steeply increasing graph, you see that R slipped past me by a score of 656-654 (J was still last, with 528).

I think that these two Major Improvements should be incorporated with any future plays of this game.

So, it’s a great game that has been repackaged to include categories that make an old classic even better. And by incorporating the two suggestions above, I think it can be an uber-classic, or something like that. As they say on eBay, “A+++++”.

The curmudgeon has spoken, so be the word.

Edit note: way up above where it says "girls names less than 6 letters," I used to have a less-than sign. That terminated the entire review, rendering it pretty silly. I changed it to "less than" and now you can read it in all its glory.

Thread: Re: Scattergories for people with brains

Randy Cox — 2008-10-19T14:11:51+00:00

The rules are that you fill in a grid for scoring which is almost equivalent to your answer grid, only with correct answers "slid up" to the top of each column.

Example: your answer grid has correct answers in each space marked with an "X":

--- Categories ---- 1 2 3 4 5 Let1 X - - X - Let2 X - X - - Let3 X - X X - Let4 - - X X X Let5 X X - X X

Becomes a scoring grid as follows:

1 1 1 1 1 1 - 1 1 1 1 - 1 1 - 1 - - 1 - - - - - -

Now, summing each row and column yields

1 1 1 1 1 = 5 1 - 1 1 1 = 4 1 - 1 1 - = 3 1 - - 1 - = 2 - - - - - = 0 ! ! ! ! ! V V V V V 4 1 3 4 2

So, for row scores (General Knowledge), the score is 25+16+9+4+0 = 54 and the column scores (Specific Knowledge) are 16+1+9+16+4 = 46. Total score is 100 in this case.

Now this is really a pretty silly scoring mechanism because with only one or two exceptions out of all the permutations, simply counting up total correct answers will yield the same winner. In fact, at the World Boardgaming Championships, where this game has legacy status, that is precisely what they do now--simply count total correct answers.

Note: the above explanation was scoring for just one round of the five you play.

Thread: Re: Scattergories for people with brains

whac3 — 2008-09-17T12:06:16+00:00

I will freely admit that I may also have misunderstood the rules. If that is the case, thanks for the correction.
Like I said, this is not my style of game and so I didn't play it much. I do stand by my conclusion though that for those who do like this class of games this is probably one of the better ones.

Larry Welborn wrote:
whac3 wrote:

Really? That's not the way the rules are written in my copy (from before 1970). In my version, you pick five letter tiles and five category/subcategories and try to fill in as many squares in the 5x5 grid as you can. The scoring is, IIRC, the sum of the squares of the number of answers in each row plus the sum of the squares of the number of answers in each column.

Did they change these rules in the newer edition? Almost a different game.....

The rules to my Avalon Hill version are as you have written above. A new version came out a few years ago, I guess the rules were changed. From the description of the OP, I much prefer the old ruleset.

Thread: Re: Scattergories for people with brains

Larry Welborn — 2008-09-17T12:00:17+00:00

whac3 wrote:

Really? That's not the way the rules are written in my copy (from before 1970). In my version, you pick five letter tiles and five category/subcategories and try to fill in as many squares in the 5x5 grid as you can. The scoring is, IIRC, the sum of the squares of the number of answers in each row plus the sum of the squares of the number of answers in each column.

Did they change these rules in the newer edition? Almost a different game.....

The rules to my Avalon Hill version are as you have written above. A new version came out a few years ago, I guess the rules were changed. From the description of the OP, I much prefer the old ruleset.

Thread: Re: Scattergories for people with brains

whac3 — 2008-09-17T10:06:39+00:00

Either I took as five separate rounds what you're describing or you do have another game in mind.

sroney wrote:
whac3 wrote:

The game consists of five rounds. In each round, a player draws a tile with a letter on it and a card with a choice of either categories or sub-categories within a specific category. Sub-categories are optional however, at least in the basic game. Players then have until the sands in the timer [nominally 5 minutes] run out to write down as many items in the category and sub-category (when applicable) beginning with the letter on the chosen tile.

Scoring is by the correct number of entries tallied simply. The player with the most points wins.

Really? That's not the way the rules are written in my copy (from before 1970). In my version, you pick five letter tiles and five category/subcategories and try to fill in as many squares in the 5x5 grid as you can. The scoring is, IIRC, the sum of the squares of the number of answers in each row plus the sum of the squares of the number of answers in each column.

Did they change these rules in the newer edition? Almost a different game.....

Thread: Re: Scattergories for people with brains

JimA759 — 2008-09-17T02:38:06+00:00

I just reviewed my copy (the 3M version from 1971) and that is correct - you square the rows and columns and add for a total score. It mentions a perfect score of 250, with a 100 being very good; or with particularly hard categories a 50 being good. Looking at my past score cards, I didn't remember playing this that much. my memory must be going somewhere, I forget where.

JimA

Thread: Re: Scattergories for people with brains

sroney — 2008-09-17T00:56:28+00:00

whac3 wrote:

The game consists of five rounds. In each round, a player draws a tile with a letter on it and a card with a choice of either categories or sub-categories within a specific category. Sub-categories are optional however, at least in the basic game. Players then have until the sands in the timer [nominally 5 minutes] run out to write down as many items in the category and sub-category (when applicable) beginning with the letter on the chosen tile.

Scoring is by the correct number of entries tallied simply. The player with the most points wins.

Really? That's not the way the rules are written in my copy (from before 1970). In my version, you pick five letter tiles and five category/subcategories and try to fill in as many squares in the 5x5 grid as you can. The scoring is, IIRC, the sum of the squares of the number of answers in each row plus the sum of the squares of the number of answers in each column.

Did they change these rules in the newer edition? Almost a different game.....

Thread: Scattergories for people with brains

whac3 — 2008-09-16T22:00:27+00:00

1.Introduction

This game is not my cup of tea, because I like games of strategy and tactics; this is not intended to be such a game. For people who like this style of game however I think it an excellent game-- so much so that I am about to pack it up as a belated birthday present to one of my dearest friends in the world whom I KNOW to love this type of game. The title of the review is not meant to demean Scattergories, albeit I happen to loathe that game as much as my firend loves it, but rather to both suggest the game most people know to which this is most similar and nevertheless explain what is different about this game at the same time.

2. Components

The box-art is frankly gorgeous and is reproduced for both the front of the rules pamphlet and the backs of cards. A timer with light blue sand is included in the copy I am looking at. The score-sheets are plentiful but simple so that when and if they ever do run out, this is not a big deal.

3. Game-play

The game consists of five rounds. In each round, a player draws a tile with a letter on it and a card with a choice of either categories or sub-categories within a specific category. Sub-categories are optional however, at least in the basic game. Players then have until the sands in the timer [nominally 5 minutes] run out to write down as many items in the category and sub-category (when applicable) beginning with the letter on the chosen tile.

Scoring is by the correct number of entries tallied simply. The player with the most points wins. Rules are also included for play in teams, with childen or with people who wish to make things more diificult; for example, one can either make sub-categories no longer optional or even combine sub-categories so that an item must belong to both sub-categories. Thus the game has a vaiety of play-options and therefore replayability.

The thing that I imagine people would be most concerned about with this sort of game is that it would become dated. This is certainly not the case. The categories and sub-categories are broad enough not to be noticably effected by passage of time, except that where specific wars are mentioned conflicts such as Viet-Nam are conspicuously absent. Likewise, the game is tailored to Americans. For example, on a card listing the category "living statesmen/politicians", something like a quarter of the listed sub-categories are US-specific [US Congressmen, State Governor (U.S.) and so on].

These examples also serve to point out that this game draws on genuine knowledge. For example, one card lists the category scientists with sub-categories like chemist and physicist. This is a game for the educated or at least genuinely knowledgable.

Image

garygarison — 2008-05-12T22:57:29+00:00

3M catalog listing 1970

Image

ForbiddenDonuts — 2008-02-27T23:50:34+00:00

Newest reprint (used with permission)

Thread: Re: Question on Missing parts

Komodo — 2007-11-18T19:54:27+00:00

My 1967 3M version has the following letter count:

3ea - B,C,H,P,*
2ea - A,E,F,G,J,L,N,R,T,W
1ea - I,K,O,U,V,X,Y,Z

For a total of 43 letters. There is no chance at all that this set was mixed with another. My parents bought it new and they played it a grand total of one time. I do believe that it is a 1967 first edition, so I am not sure what 3M did between editions to change letter counts or if they just grabbed a random handful of little plastic letter chits and threw them into the box.

Image

DCosby — 2007-10-07T03:24:49+00:00

Here is just a sampling of the cards.

Thread: Re: Question on Missing parts

Randy Cox — 2007-10-01T17:43:43+00:00

The new University Games edition (2006) features the following letter breakdown:

1 tile only: I, K, O, Q, U, V, X, Y, Z
2 tiles: A, E, F, G, J, L, N, R, T, W, *
3 tiles: B, C, D, H, M, P, S

Image

Randy Cox — 2007-09-15T18:48:55+00:00

2006 edition - game card plus score sheets

Image

Randy Cox — 2007-09-15T18:47:00+00:00

2006 UG edition contents

Image

Randy Cox — 2007-09-15T18:46:16+00:00

2006 edition letter distribution

Image

Randy Cox — 2007-09-15T18:45:26+00:00

2006 UG edition sample cards

Image

Randy Cox — 2007-09-15T18:44:36+00:00

Other games in UG bookshelf series (from back of 2006 box)

Image

patrel — 2007-09-06T01:46:03+00:00

Facts in Five AH newer boxfront better scan

Image

patrel — 2007-08-28T20:05:10+00:00

Facts in Five newer box

Thread: Re: Question on Missing parts

rri1 — 2007-08-19T16:24:23+00:00

edosan wrote:
The good news is that if you're missing parts for Facts in Five, just go to another thrift store. They'll have another copy waiting for you.

Five minute timer is easy to come by. It doesn't have to be a sand timer. My watch can be set up for five minutes, but also cooking timers, etc. will work.

Letters are easy to make replacements as chits or cards. Also you may want to leave out the Q and X or make special wild tiles like "Any Other Vowel" or "Any other Consonant" (Meaning Vowels of consonants not also selected for the round--If H, V, W were selected, "Any Other consonant" could not include answers with those 3 letters.

Thread: Re: Question on Missing parts

pintech — 2006-12-15T06:59:30+00:00

Yes - 56 cards, a five minute timer, 30 letter tiles (all letters being represented once) and four asterisk tiles, plus the Score pad and Master Score pad and Rules. Found an unused copy at thrift just last week. I've got a scan of the Letters with them still joined if anyone needs it.

Thread: Re: Question on Missing parts

edosan — 2006-09-29T04:52:01+00:00

The good news is that if you're missing parts for Facts in Five, just go to another thrift store. They'll have another copy waiting for you.

Thread: Re: Question on Missing parts

personwholives — 2006-09-21T00:38:46+00:00

I just got a copy of this, and it appears to have more then one of many of the letters, 3 asterisks, and no 'Q'. I was wondering if anyone else had one like that. Mine is also the 3m version.

Thread: Re: Question on Missing parts

fractaloon — 2006-09-10T21:50:22+00:00

My copy also has 56 cards, but it has 30 tiles (26 letters and 4 asteriks). The rules don't really mention anything about parts. This is the 3M version.

Thread: Re: Two Variants

JonBob — 2005-07-08T17:27:30+00:00

We deem the wilds far too powerful, so we remove those entirely. We also allow each player one card re-draw and one tile re-draw throughout the course of the game, which helps in our case to make the game a little less frustrating (few players will allow an X to get picked).

Thread: Re:Question on Missing parts

cktjharris — 2005-04-26T18:42:10+00:00

The timer lasts for 5 minutes.

Each letter of the alphabet should have 1 tile. There are also 3 asterisk tiles, which act as wilds.

We have 56 cards in ours, and I'm pretty sure that's right.

Thread: Question on Missing parts

Oiler — 2005-04-26T03:06:20+00:00

My Wife picked this up for me in a thrift store, bless her heart.

Anyway it's missing the egg timer and I believe some letters of the alphabet. First question. How long does the timer last? Second. Are all letters of the alphabet used in this game and how many wildcards are there.

Oh lastly how many cards come in the deck?

Thanks
Kallen

Thread: Two Variants

BalanceUT — 2005-01-16T18:51:56+00:00

Here are two variants to try, neither of which is listed among the variants in the rules. If you try them, post below how they worked out.

One thing we've noted is that the best laid strategic selection of categories can be crushed by the luck of the draw of letters. The influence of luck can be somewhat eliminated if you draw letters before selecting categories. The strategic decision of category can no longer be ruined by the letters. However, this might slow the game down too much. If you have a watch with a timer, put a 15 second limit on selection of each category so a person can't come up with too much of a pre-planned list of answers before choosing. If the person doesn't come up with a category in 15 seconds the card passes to the next person in line who makes the selection with the same 15 second restriction.

Another variant to try is all answers that are matched by other players do not score for those players. Played with the above variant, it makes the strategic selection above a bit more problematic. This puts a premium on unique answers.

Give them a try!

Thread: User Review

Dreadnaut — 2004-12-16T14:07:55+00:00

Facts in Five is a strategy word game issued by 3M/Avalon Hill. This review is based on the Avalon Hill version, which I believe only differs slightly in components from the 3M version (the letter markers are on cardboard in the AH version).

The gameplay of Facts in Five is based on the number five (if you haven't guessed that yet). The game is played in five rounds. Each round 5 classes are chosen and then the players choose 5 letters. Players then have 5 minutes to complete the round.

Each round, 5 cards, each reflecting a class or multiple classes, are dealt out. The class card will usually also list multiple categories to choose from. For example, the class may be Living Statesmen/Politicians. Then it will list multiple categories, such as: American, Foreign, U.S. Mayor, U.S. Senator, etc.

Each player announces the class of the card they received and then has the option to select a category. Generally, the selection of a category will make it more difficult to complete. Then, 5 letters are drawn. Facts in Five includes all 26 letters of the alphabet, plus four asterisks which are used as wilds. The 5-minute timer is turned and players fill out their sheets. When the timer runs out, players pass their sheets to the left for their opponent to score.

The opponent validates your entries and scores your sheet. Unlike Scattergories, which this game is often compared to, duplicate answers between players are not voided. Scoring is done on an exponential basis. If you had 5 acceptable answers in a row or column, you would receive 25 points, 4 correct answers would yield 16, 3 correct gives 9, and so on. Therefore, you have the opportunity to score from 0 to 250 points in a single round. This continues until 5 rounds are completed and the highest score wins.

Facts in Five is a great game. One that, for me, has had many repeat plays. The interaction of individuals choosing the classes in a round allows for strategic play, in that one can choose classes in which they are strong. Conversely, opponents may choose classes where you are weak. Therefore, as the game progresses and you need to close a scoring gap, you can choose harder categories more to your liking. I highly recommend this game to any individuals that enjoy word games and trivia games. It is a great, probably the best, melding of the two.

Thread: User Review

JeffGoldsmith — 2004-11-02T05:33:47+00:00

Facts in Five is mostly a trivia game. The idea is simple. Players choose categories from a set listed on randomly dealt cards. Some cards have a single category (e.g. Famous Persons of the Past) and the player may choose a subcategory (e.g. American, Female, Heads of State, of Serbo-Croatian Descent). Some just have lists of categories from which the player must choose one. Players select five such categories. Then five random letter tiles are drawn from a cup. Some of the tiles are wild. The players write the categories above the top row of a 5x5
grid and the letters down the left side. A timer is started and players must come up with a word or phrase which fits the category and begins with the given letter. After the timer runs out, answers are checked for correctness by the other players. Then correct answers are "moved up" in the grid and recorded in a second, smaller chart. Scoring is done by reading across and down each row and column; a player scores the square of the number of correct answers in each row or column. A perfect score, therefore, is 250.

Each round is fairly fast, so a group might play four or five rounds and total the score. Groups use lots of variant rules; for example, some groups will pick categories by acclamation or consensus. Tournaments typically pick categories and letters in advance so that all tables will play the same grid. If children are playing with adults, they are usually not required to meet the subcategory constraint; to be fair, the adults have to pick those or every personality is of Serbo-Croation or Zimbabwian descent. In such cases, just tinker to make sure the game is fair.

As games of this sort go, it's decent enough. I like "What Were You Thinking" better, but we play Facts in Five every year or two.

Thread: User Review

gamesgrandpa — 2004-11-02T05:32:41+00:00

Facts in Five is a 1971 release in the very good 3M Bookshelf Games series. The series was noted generally for good to high-quality boards, cards, pieces, and other components, and Facts in Five lives up to that expectation. The letter tiles are made of stiff plastic, rather than the usual cardboard; the cards are near to playing card quality; and the score sheets are of a very practical and useable size and layout. The instructions are succinct and complete, with some minor variations to offer optional play. The 5-minute “sand” timer in my set actually runs 4 minutes and 52 seconds – close enough for this type of game.

For those familiar with Scattergories and similar games, Facts in Five will be easy to learn. However, this game can be much more difficult to play and is aimed at a more sophisticated group of players. The word “Five” in the game title refers to three parts of the game: (1) each round is played in a five-minute time period; (2) players must fill in answers to fit five different categories; and (3) the answers in each category must match each of five different letters. A completely-filled score sheet has 25 answers.

The categories for this game are actually of two levels – class and category, categories being a sub-group of classes. The game is ideal for five players (another five reference), but may be played by any number from solo to large groups and teams. The game begins with each player, up to five, drawing a card from the deck. The player drawing the card makes a selection of class or class and category from the card he draws. As each is announced, players write this information in the columns on their score sheets. Then, five letter tiles are drawn, and players enter these on the rows of their sheets. The timer is set and players attempt to fill in the grid with answers meeting the score sheet grid’s criteria.

The reason this game can be more challenging than Scattergories lies both in the requirement to fill in answers for five categories and five different letters simultaneously and in the fact that the category cards contain an enormous number of choices, most of which can be very daunting. There are four types of cards. The Choice Card – Class Only card allows a choice of class (higher-level category) only. Here are the selections available on one of these cards – Musical Instruments; Units of Currency; Household Appliances; American State Nicknames; Jewelry Items; Kitchen Utensils; Slang Words; Foreign Tribes; American Indians/Tribes; Heraldic Terms; American State Flowers; Restaurants; Bakery Products; Communications Means. There are nine cards of this type, each with 12-18 choices.

The second type of card is the Choice Card – Class and Category. These cards require the player to select one class, and allow the player to also select a category (lower level, more specific category), if she chooses. For example, one card contains these class/category combinations: (1) Diseases or Sicknesses / Human or Animal or Skin or Communicable; (2) Drugs/Medicines / Tradename or Chemical Name or Patent Medicine or Pill Tradename; (3) Tools / Hand or Machine or Carpenter or Engineering; (4) Guns/Firearms / Civilian or Military or American or Foreign; and (5) Fabrics/Cloths / Natural Fiber or Synthetic or Upholstery or Clothing Fabric. If the player is not too familiar with any of these classes, he might choose only a class, but if he is an expert in any of the classes, he might also select a specific category to make it very difficult for the other players. There are 17 cards of this type, each with 2 to 5 classes, and each class with 2 to 16 categories.

The third type of card is the Class/Category card. This card has only one class, so the player has no choice in that regard, but it also includes a wide range of more specific categories. The player may select a category or designate only the given class. Here are the categories on the card for Class: Music Composition Titles – Popular; Popular Vocal; Popular Instrumental; Symphony; Piano Concerto; By a Living Composer; Opera; Violin Concerto; By a Past Composer; Operetta; Christmas Music; Classical; Folk Music; By an American; By a Non-American; Jazz; By a European; Religious; Choral; Opera Aria. There are 26 cards of this type, each with one class and 18-24 categories.

Finally, there are 4 Wild Cards, which allow the player to name any class she wishes. She may choose one from the cards in the deck or create an original one; she may also designate any appropriate category that fits the class, if she wishes. This, of course, gives the player an extreme amount of leverage.

After the five classes/categories are selected, five letter tiles are drawn blindly. There are 30 tiles, one for each letter in the alphabet and four Wild tiles (marked with an asterisk). Wild tiles allow all players to fill in any answer that matches the class/category, regardless of the letter it starts with.

When the time is up for the round, players exchange score sheets for validation and scoring. If an entry is questioned and the answering player cannot convince the person checking his answers, the entire group considers it. If one person can validate it, it is accepted; otherwise, it is accepted or rejected by majority vote of the players. The scoring is interesting. Valid answers are scored both vertically, by column, and horizontally, by row. The correct number of answers in each individual column and each row is squared. The vertical (column) scores are added to give a Special Score, which indicates the player’s relative depth of knowledge in the specific classes of subjects. The horizontal scores are added to produce a General Score, indicating the player’s breadth of knowledge across a variety of subjects. The two scores are totaled for an overall score. After five rounds (another five item), each player’s three scores on the rounds are totaled separately, so that there will be from one to three final winners.

The odds of any two games having the same classes/categories and letter combinations are infinitesimal. The game may be kept reasonably simple by the judicious selections of the players and lucky letter tile draws, or it may be ridiculously difficult due to complex selections and hard-letter draws. I have participated in rounds with very few answers by any of the players, and I have seen some with most of the 25 answer spaces correctly filled. The game is much deeper than that of Scattergories, and takes longer to play. For people who like general-knowledge games, this is perhaps the ultimate challenge.

Thread: Session Report

BalanceUT — 2004-09-17T13:46:41+00:00

GF and I played the old copy of FiF which I picked up at a thrift store a few weeks ago. We've never played before, I hadn't even opened the box except to confirm that the components appeared to basically all were intact. She read through the rules quickly and made sense of them while I sorted out the components, tossing the used and residual from the previous owners.

We immediately recognized the strategic element (which I like a lot) of picking favorable categories. The rules are vague about how to handle the fact of an advantage to getting to pick from more than one card. So, we made an on the spot rule that the first round is randomly determined who would get the most cards. After that, the person who was behind in the game would get the most cards for that round.

For first timers we did well the first 2 rounds with scores between 102 and 134. First round class/categories were: Queens, Aircraft Military Designations, Mixed Drinks, Port Cities, Olympic Sports. Letters: 2 Wild, A, W, T. GF ran Mixed Drinks, I ran Military Aircraft. I opened a 32 point lead. By the way, is Tijuana a port city?

Second Round class/categories were: American Athletes, Foreign Words over 3 letters, Female Biblical Figures, Hand Tools, Authors of Children's stories. Letters: B, A, L, Y, Wild. I was horrid in that last one. Cleaned up in Athletes. GF did well with the Bible and authors. My lead lengthened, but not by much.

Third Round was agony, and it needn't have been. We did have some fun answers, though. Classes/Categories: Living Foreign Politicians, Public Corporations, Nobel Prize Scientists, Foreign Writers, Academy Award Winning Actors/Actresses. Letters: M, L, F, Y, I. We stunk up the joint big time. 23 and 28 points, me enlarging my lead by only 5 points. Best Foreign Writer pick was Karl Marx. Best public corporation: Martha Stewart Omnimedia. Best Foreign Leader: Yeltzin.

Fourth Round was after a lengthy phone call, we were getting tired as it was getting late. It was the Music Round! Categories/Classes: American Song Titles, Living Religious Leaders, (Wild) Songs by Madonna (GF's fave), Living Musicians, American Historical Monuments/sites. Letters: P, S, M, A, L. GF cuts into my lead a bit. Funny, GF loves Madonna, picked that category strategically. I got more songs!

Last Round, I'm carrying a 38 point lead. Actors/Actresses (GF former theater major), Camera Product Names, Colleges and Universities in Idaho (GF from Idaho), Card Playing Experts (I'm a bridge nerd), Comic Strip Characters. Letters: S, P, L, H, Wild. GF runs Actors, we both run comic characters. I run Cameras and get 4 of 5 card players. We tie Idaho Colleges. Yes! I prevail!

Paul 481
Stacey 397

We will play again.

Thread: Session Report

Chuckles — 2004-05-08T23:46:43+00:00

We had hoped for a five-person game day, but Ed canceled at the last moment, and Ron was running late. To fill time, Ben, James and I began a quick few rounds of Facts in Five.

Categories in the first round were Comic strip characters, European scientists, Living Governors, English Proper Nouns of 5-7 letters, and units of currency. I took the lead after the first round, producing proper nouns for each of the initial letters of J, C, P, R and U. Also did well in scientists with Joule, Curie and Pasteur, currency units with crown, pound and ruble, and a "P" comic strip character they didn't get in Peppermint Patty. Most of my other answers were covered by Ben and James. They each gained grond on me in the governors category with Clements and Perry.

Second round was the highest scoring round, with the categories being TV comedies, living athletes, European world leaders, Languages and dialects, and carnivores. Ron showed up during the round, and we apologized for our lack of greeting to him as we all scribbled frantically. Both Ben and I managed to fill every space of the grid except for two. Neither of us produced an "n" carnivore. I missed out on a "C" TV Comedy (failed to think of Cosby under time pressure), and Ben failed to get an "N" European leader (I had "Nero.")

After Ron's arrival, we moved on to other games, and only resumed our Facts in Five game at the end of the day.

Third round I extended my lead a bit, largely owing to my selection of "chess experts" as a category (Tal, Fischer and Spassky were my submissions, the only player to get three.) We had a temporary dispute until I proved that "Theodore" was a Catholic religious leader, having been the name of a pope. Our other categories were all fairly easy -- including American companies, Famous authors of the past, and non-sectarian colleges and universities.

Ben came back a bit in round 4. The categories were Authors of fiction, Famous Americans from the revolutionary war, Military position titles, English verbs with 6-10 letters, and English adjectives with 4-5 syllables. James and I exceeded Ben on the military leaders (Ben failed to recall Richard Henry Lee), but he beat us on the authors, including Ayn Rand, who both of us forgot. Ben and I both did well in the English words categories.

Ben was within striking distance in the last round. The categories were edible vegetables, poets of the past, tradenames of games, human bones, and past American military figures. Initial letters were O, N, P, W and B. Games were easy for us, obviously. Bones were harder -- patella was the only one I got. Ben thought of "watercress" in vegetables, which we hadn't, though everyone did well in vegetables overall. I gained distance on Ben and James in both military leaders (producing, in addition to the obvious Nimitz, Patton and Washington; Ord and Burnside) and in poets (Neruda and Pound to go with the W's and B's we all had.)

It's usually Ben who suggests Facts in Five rather than me, but I still find it a great game. It's also nice to have a game that I win with some consistency.

Chuck 769
Ben 668
James 374

Thread: Session Report

Chuckles — 2003-06-18T12:28:20+00:00

We had only played Facts in Five once before, some members of the group eschewing trivia games. Ben, having never played it, suggested that we try. This pleased me, as this was one of my old favorites, having been in my parent's house when I was a kid.

All of us were a bit out of practice in quick recall. When the category was American military leaders, for example, I managed to remember Ambrose Burnside, Norman Schwarzkopf, Ethan Allen (and a fourth one for another letter), but the obvious W escaped me (George Washington.)

Religious themes cropped up frequently for no reason that anyone could determine. Early on, James selected "sectarian" as the category for colleges/universities, and thereafter we kept pulling cards with categories like Religious Leaders/Figures. This last led to the biggest controversy of the day: The category was "Biblical," producing answers like Abraham, Aaron, Solomon, and Festus. Damon submitted "the Wise Men" for W, which I wanted to disallow, arguing that the category signified individual religious figures by their proper names, not descriptions of plural groups. With me comfortably ahead at the time, my more stringent interpretation of the category lost out to a group opinion to the contrary, and Damon's answer was counted.

My favorite category of the day was Children's Books: for some reason I kept coming up with "girl's books:" My "A" was "Are you there, God? It's me, Margaret," and my "S" was "The Secret of the Old Clock," the first Nancy Drew book.

My biggest embarrassment of the day was selecting the category "historians," and being outscored by everyone else in the group.

Ed good-naturedly played the game, despite his aversion to trivia games. Being the experienced player, I won fairly easily, though Damon and Ben also took very quickly to it.
Final scores:

Chuck 591
Damon 496
Ben 468
James 376
Ed 350

Thread: Session Report

shadowkeeper — 2001-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

Heidi had unearthed some old from a relative's attic, including "Botecelli In The Can" (?) and "Black and
White", a game about race relations that came out in the sixties. We instead chose to try "Facts in Five", an
old 3M game that I have seen in many a thrift store.

Facts in Five is a evolutionary link between the old parlor game "Guggenheim", and the modern game
"Scatagories." Each player gets a score sheet, which features a 5 x 5 grid. Along the top of the grid,
categories are written, ranging from the very specific ("Human organs") to the more broad ("Universities").
Along the side of the grid, everyone writes down the same randomly-drawn letters (e.g. "M, P, T, P, B").
Now a five-minute timer is flipped over. Players spend the time trying to come up with entries for each box
on their score sheet, entries that fit under the specific category on the top and start with the letter on the side
(So if the first category was "animals" and the letters were the ones mentioned above, a person could write,
going down, "Marmot", "Parrot", "Tiger", "Platapus" and "Butterfly' -- anthough the categories are never
as easy as "animals") When time is up, each player scores points for each row and each column. In each row,
a player gets points equal to the number of valid entries squared (so if you have four valid entries in a row,
you get 16 points). Ditto for each column. The totals for the rows and columns are added up for the final
score. Since each row or column can generate up to 25 points, and there are 5 of each, the maximum score
possible is 250 points.

Facts and Five is much more taxing that either Guggenheim or Scattagories, both of which feature much
broader categories and give you only a minute to come up with answers. (While either of these game might
have "Animals", Facts in Five would more likely have "Animals: African" or "Animals: Reptiles"). Also,
this game does not feature the rule in Scattergories in which players do not receive points for entries that
were thought of by other players (so if two players put "parrot", they wouldn't get points for them) which
adds a bit of psychology to an otherwise trivia-only enterprise.

Full disclosure: I don't really like trivia games and I can't stand Scattergories. But Facts in Five wasn't too
bad, although it would never be my choice as a game to play. For one thing, five minutes is a looooong time
to just sit around silently scribbling answers in a "party game".

We played twice. I don't remember who won the first time, although I am certin it wasn't me (I'm awful at
these kind of games). I do remember that James won the second round, though, because he did it with a
perfect score of 250. James, I should note, is some kinda freaky human trivia reservoir, and could clean
anyone's clock at a game such as this. If I ever get on "Who Wants to Be A Millionare", I'll probably be
calling him up as a lifeline on the $2000 question.