Board Game Review: Wise and Otherwise

Wise and Otherwise is the intellectual elite big brother of party game Balderdash. But instead of words, you deal with proverbs. One designated Reader each round reads the first few words of a proverb, along with the country of origin. Everyone else then writes down an ending to the proverb and passes that to the Reader to be read aloud, along with the correct ending. For instance, an example proverb would be “There’s an old Croatian saying: ‘Those who eat porridge…’” So it’s your job to come up with a convincing ending! Once all the endings have been read aloud, everyone guesses the right one. You get points for being correct, and points if people guess your answer. I really enjoy creative games like this. It can be a little mentally exhausting, and ego bruising if no one ever chooses your proverbs, but it can also be hilarious. There’s always one person in the group who writes the most ridiculous, laughter-inducing phrases. Then there’s always those rounds when the actual proverb is so unbelievably weird and funny that no one votes for it! I recommend the game, especially if you’re looking to trying to spice up your party game repertoire.

My biggest criticism of Wise and Otherwise is that there’s a board included, which is just dumb. It helps with scoring, so the player who reaches the end of the board first wins the game. This just seems wasteful – it’s just as easy to keep score on a piece of paper (or smart phone) and announce when the first player has reached 20. The inclusion of an unnecessary board seems like a ploy to make you think this is a bigger, more expensive game than it should be. Lose the board and shave ten bucks off the price and now we’re talking.

THE BASICS:

Play Time: 45 minutes

Number of Players: 2-6.

Suggested age: 12 and up.

Published: By wiseandotherwise.com, 1997

Buy: I found it on Amazon for $42. Internet pickings seems slim. Board Game Geek doesn’t rate it very highly, so I’m wondering if this game just kind of died out. Don’t forget to check your local friendly board game store.

Wise and Otherwise is a great game for the collection with lots of re-playability. I recommend it if you're looking for a fun, intelligent party game