Password
A game for Kibitzers
There’s a strange (cultural) difference between game and sport. When someone says “I’m into sports” or lists sports as a hobby, they usually mean watching sports. But when someone is “into games,” they usually mean playing games. Without deeply psychoanalyzing, it may be that people enjoy watching others do things they’d like to be able to do (like hit a home run or make a pick-6), but can’t (or perhaps “can’t anymore”).
But anybody can play (most) games. But there are a category of games that are more watched than played — Game Shows. Invariably, the most popular seem to be the type where you can ‘play along,’ shows like Jeopardy or Wheel of Fortune where you shout out the answer before the contestants, or slap your forehead when they get it wrong1.
A great game show can run for decades and often has a cross over board game. But while Jeopardy is over-shadowed (in the board game world) by Trivial Pursuit and Wheel of Fortune is no match for crosswords and acrostics, one game show was also a board game phenomena.
Password (the board game) is pretty much a straight lift of the game show and (as such), doesn’t really have a designer. There are two teams, and each round there’s a secret word and teams take turn giving one word clues and then trying to get partner to guess. That’s it. Oh, there are rules and arguments about what constitutes a legitimate clue, but its not difficult.
There are many, many different editions of password. That’s because each set had new words, each card2 a full game with a set of words. How many versions were printed? Wikipedia says Milton Bradley printed 24 editions, which is passing strange since I have a set in my closet that calls itself the “53rd” edition.
No matter the exact number of sets, it was clear that there was a near insatiable demand for this game. According to the Boardgame Geek community wiki, the first edition of Password sold a million copies in under a year. Little wonder new sets kept coming out.
And they are still around. Perhaps there aren’t as many couples competing across the kitchen table; but I’ve taken my set to game night and seen tournaments at a board game convention. And yes, some people were Kibitzing that game, and occasionally “oohing” and “aahing” a well constructed clue.
Hollywood (always happy to avoid inventing something new) recently brought back Password as a game show; no doubt more board game editions have hit the shelves (or will, soon enough). Given modern trends, I doubt they’d plaster “94th edition” (or whatever it is) on it, but it’s still around over fifty years after it was first published.
But even if it’s star has faded since it’s heyday, Password was one of the earliest in the genre of “games where you try to get your partner to guess something.” Sure, those had always existed as Charades or other “parlor games,” but Password marks the evolutionary crawl out of the parlor and into a board game box.
Which is why I consider Password a strong candidate for inclusion into the 100 Most Influential Games of the 20th Century.
Or grumble “I knew that” when they answer first.
Printed as cards with blue text on a red background, that you need to slide through a holder with a red film so you can read.
Never heard of it. 😄
However, the explanation makes it clear that I have played versions of the parlour game - where the participants provide the words (usually names) to begin with (then drawn randomly). (As I recall, a variation of this was a fixture at the Gathering, once upon a time. )
And my family knows it as the ovipositor game. My sister gave "short word, lays eggs" to our father as a clue to the first syllable of 'Henson'. Quick as a flash, he responded "ovipositor".