Wanna Bet Review

Overview

Wanna Bet? Is the family party game where players put bets on whether they think others can rise to a series of challenges. One player will get a challenge from a drawn card, the others place bets on if they think they can do it.

How to play

This is one of those games you understand the first time you see it played.

Players roll a dice and move their pawns around a board. Where they land, they draw an “active” card, a “passive” card is drawn for them, or gain more money by passing go.

Active cards have a task on them which need to be performed. Read them out and continue. Passive cards involve less actions and more thinking. Another player reads it out to you, then continue.

Whichever card is drawn & read, other players then place bets on whether they think you can do the task or not. They do this by putting either their “yes” or “no” card face down on the table, committing it to their bet. They can also bet up to half of their total money in any one bet.

Then you’ve got to try and do the task, usually involving a time limit of some sort. If you manage it, you win an amount from the bank equal to all the other money bets. Also, players who guess correctly using their “yes” and “no” cards will get their money and the same amount again from the bank. Anyone who got it wrong loses their money. Then the turn rotates to the next player and the round begins again.

Fun for everyone

Wanna Bet? Is the most fun when you don’t take it, yourself, or the whole gaming session too seriously.

Interestingly, many of the cards have a junior option on them. This is a variation of the challenge on the card which is a bit easier for 8-12 year olds to try. This makes it very natural to play as a family & include more people, a neat design element which isn’t present in many games. It’s not quite a difficulty setting or level, but makes it a game you can much more easily break out at a family event.

Card types and upsides

As mentioned above, there are 2 types of cards - 144 active and 144 passive cards. The active cards involve some kind of action, like balancing or dexterity or something physical. The passive cards involve some kind of thinking, like word play, general knowledge, or memory.

There’re a range of topics covered by all the cards - from the physical challenges to geography knowledge and beyond - meaning there’s something for everyone.

Board isn't super necessary, as the fun is in cards & not tracking where you are. Even more, the most fun of the game - depending on who you play with - is the Active cards.

To get the most out of it, change things up and don’t be afraid to be creative, expanding the rules as you see fit to make it the most fun for you.

Although it is technically a competitive game, it really doesn’t feel like it. Because you win money from the bank, and only lose it if you’ve bet wrong, it still doesn't feel adversarial. Instead, it’s more like a cooperative game but at the end one player has done best. Again, I can imagine this is great for a younger audience - no risk of board flipping as can happen in CERTAIN family games.

Downsides

Wanna Bet? Is a good fun game - but although it’s fun the first time you see the cards, and although there are a big range of cards so you can draw new pens every time, they can get a bit stale after they’ve come up a few times. You’d benefit from shaking things up with some creative thinking, and working out how to make the game more challenging etc.

There’s also a question of audience. Maybe this isn’t for people who game regularly or seriously. However, it’s an easy one to teach to kids & bust out on occasion. It’s in my collection as one I pull out when my nieces and nephew come round, and they love it, but it rarely comes off the shelf outside of this. If you’re a regular and/ or serious gamer, don't expect to be playing it regularly, though it may be a fresh break between heavier games on long days.

There are a few cards where you're betting with or against a player, some light-hearted fun to see if they can do a wee challenge. However, there are a few where you're doing so against/ with pure luck, e.g. dice rolling. The challenge in the active cards against other players are where the most fun are, so some of these cards based purely on luck are a bit of a miss for me.

The artwork is nothing to write home about, but it truly doesn’t have to be - the game wouldn’t meaningfully be any better if it were added to.

Final Thoughts

Overall, Wanna Bet has found an underserved niche in the family section of our board game collection. It’s not one I would play regularly, but in the right situation it becomes very clear when it can bring the most fun.