Quiz Board Games

" I bet nobody ever wants to play you at Trivial Pursuit !"
Be honest, many of you are bound to have been told this before, at one time or another. It's been a few years now, but only last week, at the Ton Pentre quiz this one was unleashed once again. I brought it upon myself by winning the quiz playing as a singleton. Cards on the table, winning as a singleton is not a thing which I would advise anybody to make a habit of doing, but once in a while it can be quite fun. Still, it does draw attention to yourself. If there's two of you, then you can pass all the credit onto your team mate while he's at the bar, or in the gents. On your own, though, you can only pass so much off as being lucky guesses.

Well, as I say, the comment was made , to which the correct reply is , " Ha, ha, well, I'd never thought of that. But you're right, nobody does ever want to play me at Trivial Pursuit. " Which did actually lead to a train of thought, along the lines of, well, nobody I know actually plays Trivial Pursuit anyway, me included. Come to think of it, does anybody still play Trivial Pursuit at all ?

I always had mixed feelings about the game. I loved the fact that actually knowing a lot of quiz stuff gave me a distinct advantage, but I hated the fact that a lot of the questions were boring, unguessable, and in some cases just plain wrong. Yet I was always a lot more interested in the questions than collecting the cakes, or cheeses, or whatever they were.

Once upon a time, though, Trivial Pursuit did give birth to a bewilderingly wide range of board based quiz games, or quiz based board games. Hardly any of which I have ever played. My kids did buy me the University Challenge game from a car boot sale, which doesn't have a board, but does have buzzers, which is a huge plus. Questions are not that difficult, but its quite fun, albeit that the only times I have been allowed to play have been as question master.

Did anyone ever play any of these other games ? I'm thinking specifically of the Trivial Pursuit - inspired quiz based games, many of which were spin offs from TV - A Question of Sport in particular comes to mind. If so, were any of them actually any good ? I have my doubts, but I am very willing to be convinced otherwise.