Payday > Reviews (8)

Payday is a game for between 2 and 6 players to play and from ages 8 to Adult. The object of the game like so many of this type is to make as much money as possible in the time limit.

The board is made up of a typical month in the life of a normal human being with 31 days and various pitfalls and good fortune in each of the days. At the start of the game everyone agrees on how long you want to make the game I suggest no longer than 6 months as if it is still interesting after the agreed time you can always increase the length while playing the game.

Setting up the board is very easy as all you have to do is shuffle the cards (2 types) that come with the game and place them on the space allocated for them on the board. Give out £3500 to each player and make sure you remember to place a deal card (more about later) under the car boot sale space, pick a coloured counter and you are ready to go!

Each person rolls the dice and moves the appropirate number of spaces then reads the caption on the square. It can be bad news like New Family Pet Pay £300 or Weeks Shopping Pay £600 or good like You Won The Pools Collect £5000 or It's Your Birthday Collect £100 From Each Player. The other spaces on the board are both interesting and what makes the game. At the end of the month you collect your salary of £3500, pay off any bills and return to the start to plough through another month.

Landing on a POST square means you have to take a pre-determined number of Post cards from the deck and there is no junk mail let me tell you! However these are again either good or bad and can make or break the game. By recieving a Bill card you wait till the end of the month to pay it. Some are asking you to pay someone else who you are playing against a certain amount of money but the good thing is you can choose the person with the least money as they have done a task for you. Some of them even ask you to give money to charity. The good things you can recieve are entitled MAD MONEY and let you ask the person with the most to give you the amount quoted on the card. Other items in the postbox are MOVE AHEAD TO THE NEXT DEAL OR BUYER SPACE which allow you to make or conclude deals however the Post usually contains bad things.

The other type of card is a DEAL card. this allows you to pick up, made up companies for a certain price then when you land on a FIND A BUYER square you can sell one of the companies you have purchased for a profit. Each one makes a certain amount of profit some are more worth the buy than others which again makes it interesting - deciding to buy a poor card or wait till you get another chance is up to the player however if you are left with any DEAL cards at the end of the game unsold you can't claim ANY money for them which is another way the game is made interesting

If you are losing money and don't have enough to purchase a DEAL card then the bank will offer you a loan but interest has to be paid on it at the end of the month so you have to be careful how much you borrow and when and if you borrow if you don't need it.

Both these types of cards are very easy even for children to understand as different colours are used along with big bold headings which explain what the card is about.

The parts which add extra fun to this already exciting game are the Lottery squares (which can be landed on every Saturday) as each player who wants to take part puts in £100 the bank then puts in £1000 each player shouts a number and takes it in turns to roll the dice. Whoevers number is rolled first (by anyone) gets the money so you could roll your enemies number and give him the cash! Another situation is the RADIO PHONE-IN where the first person who rolls a 3 gets £1000 so everyone is franticly waiting to roll a 3. Also the square marked CAR BOOT SALE is also great as you get a deal card for £100 x the number rolled so if you rolled a 1 you pay £100 a 2 is £200 and so on but if the one chosen at random to go under there is worth £20,000 then the game could be changed in an instant! As well as this any money that is given to charity or spent on any of the squares on the board is collected together and put on a Jackpot Square and whenever anyone rolls a 6 they can take all the money in the pot.

Overall i thought Payday was a very enjoyable exciting experience which i have played many time since recieving it. I am however unsure how well an 8 year old would understand how to play it fully because with loans and interest available and needing to keep money back for certain bills might make it too difficult for them to understand. One thing that i am sure they will get to grips with and learn a lesson for adulthood after playing it a while is that when they are older they might have to keep extra money back to pay for some bills!

Purchasing a copy of Payday couln't be simplier, it is sold in all good toyshops and you should find it in the high street in places like W H Smith or Woolworths priced under £20