Board 8 > Para ranks every Jackbox Party Pack game.

(+) Yeah! (+)

Hi! With Jackbox Party Pack 7 on the way, I thought this would a fun ranking topic to throw together really quick, since we were talking about ranking the Jackbox games recently. So I'm gonna rank every Jackbox game. This is just one person's opinion, of course - everyone has different games they vibe with! That said, I think I only have one, maybe two truly controversial opinions in here, so I think my list will be relatively close to the consensus. No, wait, don't leave, I promise there's at least one hot take!

The list:

You Don't Know Jack
Drawful
Word Spud
Lie Swatter
Fibbage
Earwax
Bidiots
Quiplash
Bomb Corp
Trivia Murder Party
Guesspionage
Fakin' It
Tee K.O.
Fibbage: Enough About You
Survive The Internet
Monster Seeking Monster
Bracketeering
Civic Doodle
You Don't Know Jack: Full Stream
Split The Room
Mad Verse City
Zeeple Dome
Patently Stupid
Role Models
Joke Boat
Dictionarium
Push The Button

---The GOATs---
1.
2.
3.
---The Really Good Ones---
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
---Worth Getting In On---
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
---I'll Play Them If They're Happening---
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
---Only If I Have Nothing Else To Do---
25.
26.
---The Zeeple Dome Tier---
27.

I combined everything with a 2, a 3, or an XL at the end, since none of them are really all that different enough to rank, but I left Enough About You and Full Stream separate since they do have notable differences.

Good stuff, my friends and I did this informally like 2 weeks ago, cant wait to see where you land.

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Lol I had been planning on doing this when I found the time, but I knew deep down inside I'd never have the time. Look forward to this.

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reticulating splines

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27. Zeeple Dome

Two years later, it remains a mystery to me why they developed Zeeple Dome, and why they included it in Jackbox Party Pack 5. Did they think it would be a great selling point, or did they just run out of time to make another game and instead polish up a game jam project someone made like five years ago and throw it in there? It doesn't really feel like any other Jackbox game at all - it's just a pretty standard game where everyone is in a battle arena and flings themselves at enemies, no jokes or fun party game mechanics, no cool twist on the formula like Jackbox would normally introduce. If this had been released as a budget local co-op indie title in like, 2009, I think it could have gained some traction, but as a Jackbox title it feels dull and uninspired - probably the only serious misstep they've ever made, in my opinion. It's one of the four Jackbox games that you can't play over stream at all, which is just an added insult and further makes it totally unclear why this exists at all. Even if you get a group together for local play though, it's just not that fun or interesting - I've never seen someone not get bored of this after five minutes. If anyone really likes this game, I'd love to know! It's entirely possible that I just haven't gotten deeply enough into it and actually it's really fun if you give it a chance, but nobody, including me, has ever been willing to give it a chance.

Tag

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I'm looking forward to this ranking, partially because it's so subjective!

Each person in my group has certain ones they hate or love, and the best party packs have something for everybody

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26. Lie Swatter

It's just a really straightforward true-or-false trivia game and that's about it - the main draw of this is that up to 100 people can play, which is a pretty cool and useful gimmick, but the game itself is pretty watered down as a result of that. I recently had the opportunity to play Lie Swatter with a large group, maybe not quite 100 but at least 50 people, and I kind of wish I had done it just for the novelty of seeing how this game plays when you have a lot of people, but I don't think it's nearly as engaging as Jackbox's other trivia offerings. Pretty much only exists for the 1-100 player gimmick and that's it - a group of 8 are better off playing just about anything else, I think.

Awesome idea, tracking.

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Zeeple Dome remains the only Jackbox game I have never played

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that's a lie i also have not played Lie Swatter

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I haven't played most of them, but I remember seeing the description of Role Models and thinking it looked terrible, and then we played it for maybe 5 minutes before all agreeing it was awful and moving on.

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25. Role Models

I really can't get into Role Models! I'm sorry, I tried, but it's just a little too convoluted for me and not all that fun. I think the problem for me is that out of all the games, this one really demands more knowledge of your friends than any other to really get fun out of it, and I'm sorry, but I just don't know most of you THAT well! Most of the gags come down to fairly well known things about the players (Wigs is a Mets fan, etc), and whenever two people don't know each other super well there's sort of an awkwardness as people kinda shove each other into roles without having a really good idea of where to put them. It makes for a sort of terrible ice-breaker game in this regard, since it's all about other people telling you how they see you, rather than you sharing stuff about yourself. There's also the fact that a lot of the categories themselves require knowledge of the things involved - I'm not going to be able to tell you which Friend from Friends you remind me of, or which character from Game of Thrones you seem most like, or whatever. You get to choose your categories, and I tend to avoid those that I don't think the group will get into, but it comes up now and again. The mechanics of the game are a bit much too - I find the whole having to match each person with a role while ALSO predicting what everyone else will say to be kind of confusing, and I just can't really get into it that much. It's 6 players, so fortunately, I'm pretty easily able to sit out on this one - I just don't think it's for me. No, I have no idea which character from The Office this makes me.

Called it ~

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Role Models' floor is basement, but I think it's ceiling is pretty high. But that huge variance is way too much for how we normally do Jackbox

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24. Civic Doodle

Hey, remember Civic Doodle? I bet you... possibly don't! Aside from the non-streamables and the lesser played Pack 1 games, Civic Doodle is probably the most unplayed game, and that's for understandable reasons, I suppose. I don't dislike it, and I think it's probably a bit underrated, but it can be a little hard to extract fun from this one. The idea of a communally-drawn picture that you make sillier as you go seems like a solid idea on paper, and I'm sure the Jackbox team thought so too, but in practice it ends up slightly amusing at best, and just kind of hard to come up with anything good at worst. There's some creative fun to be had here but it's kinda tough to think of something to do most of the time, and it drags on a little bit too long to be worth it. Of the few Civic Doodle games I've played, none of them have been a bad time, but none of them have been memorable, either, and any of the other drawing games are a lot more fun. That said, I actually would like to try playing this one again, and I probably won't be upset if it comes up - I think there is some value here, but it doesn't seem like most groups are itching to play this.

taggg

I tried Zeeple Dome once with a group recently and it was strangely fun, but total nonsense and I wouldn't play it again.

Also I'm rooting for my boi wordspud

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Civic Doodle >>>> Tee KO

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Civic Doodle behind Earwax is wrong

Civic Doodle has been, on occasion, one of the funniest Jackbox games. At its worst, it's just fine.

The second round is much better than the first, though.

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uh oh

23. Word Spud

Another one of Jackbox's mostly unplayed games, Word Spud is probably the most relaxing and chill Jackbox game, where you just think of words that come after other words in a long chain. It's an underrated game, but I admit that I'm a competitive sort, and the first time I played this I was sort of confused at what the object of the game even was - granted, there doesn't HAVE to be an 'object of the game', but the simple approval-disapproval system just felt sort of weird, and it didn't really feel like there was much to do here except just try to be creative for the sake of it. Which is fine, but it leaves me feeling kind of unfulfilled because I just don't end up really racking my brain for good shit as much as I do in some other word and word-related games. I would like to play this one again and see if I can find it a bit more interesting, because I do like word games a lot, and I think it's fun to see the chain of words that people can come up with, but it's not a game that gets the crowd going - even when it was just Jackbox Party Pack 1 this didn't get a lot of play.

If Quiplash isn't in the top tier...

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I would probably put Word Spud below Civic Doodle, too, but I think I've only played it once or twice

Still can't believe Earwax is alive

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22. Dictionarium

It's fine! Dictionarium is just... fine. Won't say no to playing it, but it is a bit weak compared to all the other games that require you to be funny. I feel like every time we play this one, the ratio of good to bad answers is a lot worse than any other Jackbox game, and everyone just kind of ends up shrugging and going 'yeah, sure, guess I have to vote this one." Being funny while coming up with fake, silly sounding words is a tough one for me, and coming up with clever shit for the words given is rough - I always feel like I'm being too on the nose and not funny enough. That said, this is the first game on the list so far that has gotten some solid belly laughs from me, so it has its place, and I think it could be a bit higher ceiling with a really good prompt, but ultimately it's lower tier. Good ending song though. (This is true of most Jackbox games)

I actually like word spud a lot with a group in person but it's basically unplayable over stream so I get the ranking

dictionarium way too low though


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21. Monster Seeking Monster

Okay I told you I was gonna have a hot take! Monster Seeking Monster is overrated! It's not bad, there's some good laughs to be had here, but I could kinda do without it. Underneath all the flirting-based comedy here, my problem is that I'm just not a fan of games that have the mechanic of people cutting deals with other people in order to try to score points - this Diplomacy-esque stuff just really stresses me out, I don't really like negotiating with other people and I hate that feeling of accidentally getting into the lead and then having everyone avoid you because they're trying to win and they don't want you to win - just feels awkward all around, just feels like a big game of kingmaker at the end and from a gameplay perspective that doesn't really grab my interest. The fact that the amount of communication you can do is limited makes the whole negotiating thing go down a little easier, but the downside is that it also limits the most fun part of this game, which is texting silly flirts at people and making each other laugh. I wish this phase were like a good 30 seconds longer - I always end up running out of time trying to text things at people, which is too bad because farting around in the texting phase is probably the most fun. The game does drag on a little bit though, so it's understandable that each round is kept fairly short. I feel like there's two different games here, the one where you send text messages at people and the one where you're actually trying to play some kind of social deduction thing with other people, but that phase of the game just isn't that exciting for me and the roles that people get aren't super well balanced so it's sort of hard to take seriously. This might be the only game where the audience is arguably more fun than actually playing the game, because choosing prompts to send at everyone is hilarious.

the problem with Dictionarium is how poorly people do following the rules

if people did that better it might be top 15

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20. Split The Room

Split the Room is a weird one and I'm not really sure what to make of it. I think it's probably the most difficult game to actually come up with prompts for, since instead of making the funniest answer you're trying to make the answer that finds the closest sweet spot between yes and no votes, and for me that makes for a really interesting thought exercise. Unfortunately, interesting thought exercises don't really make for the best Jackbox games, and Split the Room sort of has a tough time winning a crowd - most of the times the prompts and the answers people give wind up not being too great, and I don't blame people because it's a really tough one. I think conceptually this one interests me more than anything lower than it, so I'm always willing to step into this one to see if I can try to figure out how to play it better, but it's a hard sell. The cool Twilight Zone aesthetics do win it some points here.

19. You Don't Know Jack: Full Stream

I appreciate what they were trying to do here, I really do, but it just doesn't quite work. Making a stream-friendly version of YDKJ makes perfect sense to do, and while it's still fun to play, the execution just isn't quite there - the lack of time restrictions sort of takes away from the frenetic energy of the classic trivia game, and the fact that the questions are all put into random order makes repeats come up surprisingly often, instead of being put into an episodic format where you can just avoid playing the same episode twice. Not to mention, that also means they can't do stuff like Wrong Answer of the Game, which is part of what makes YDKJ so interesting and cool, imo. The fact that you can play this with 8 people and over streaming does give it some value, and the one plus side is that I actually like how they do the final round here more than in the original. Some of the gags they do with the whole Binjpipe 'streaming service' conceit are really funny, too. But this does ultimately just kind of feel like a watered down version of YDKJ, and it just never quite feels right.

---The GOATs---
1.
2.
3.
---The Really Good Ones---
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
---Worth Getting In On---
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
---I'll Play Them If They're Happening---
19. You Don't Know Jack: Full Stream
20. Split The Room
21. Monster Seeking Monster
22. Dictionarium
23. Word Spud
24. Civic Doodle
---Only If I Have Nothing Else To Do---
25. Role Models
26. Lie Swatter
---The Zeeple Dome Tier---
27. Zeeple Dome

Next is the "worth getting in on" tier, for stuff that I will actually make active attempts to join before other people do. Every game from this point on is just one I really, really like.

honestly split the room is one of my least favorites

I just don't think it ever really ends up funny

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Paratroopa1 posted...

20. Split The Room

Split the Room is a weird one and I'm not really sure what to make of it. I think it's probably the most difficult game to actually come up with prompts for, since instead of making the funniest answer you're trying to make the answer that finds the closest sweet spot between yes and no votes, and for me that makes for a really interesting thought exercise. Unfortunately, interesting thought exercises don't really make for the best Jackbox games, and Split the Room sort of has a tough time winning a crowd - most of the times the prompts and the answers people give wind up not being too great, and I don't blame people because it's a really tough one. I think conceptually this one interests me more than anything lower than it, so I'm always willing to step into this one to see if I can try to figure out how to play it better, but it's a hard sell. The cool Twilight Zone aesthetics do win it some points here.

CherryCokes posted...

the problem with Dictionarium is how poorly people do following the rules

if people did that better it might be top 15

same energy

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18. Bidiots

I'm a little bit torn on Bidiots. This is another one of the higher-concept Jackbox games, and I think there's pros and cons to this. I feel a little bit similar to MSM here where it's always difficult for me to tell exactly how seriously I should take this - the concept is interesting, but the mechanics are crazy imbalanced, so do I really try to win or do I just sit back and not worry about it? I feel like this game could really do with a bit more mechanics explanation and polish in general - are everyone's two drawings worth an equal amount? How many high value and low value drawings are going to be out there? Is it totally random in what order each person's drawing comes up? It feels like, if you have a drawing that isn't high in value, or it comes up too late in the order, then you get really screwed, because not only do you make less money but you also need to make that money early in order to make more money. The bidding mechanics can be rough, too, because there's always someone in the group who's going to make annoyingly poor bidding decisions that end up propping someone else up to an easy win. But all complaints about the mechanics aside, the concept here is fun. Drawing games are always a good time and I REALLY like the idea here of people getting similar but subtly different prompts, and having to try to tell the difference between them - I feel like I wish there was more of a way to interact with the concept of 'very similar drawings with subtly different prompts' than bidding, because a lot of the time I'll have theories about a drawing but I won't be able to say them or make guesses because I don't have money to bid. All that is to say, Bidiots is a lot of fun but it falls apart for me just a bit when I think about it too much. It goes on a little long, too, and it doesn't work that great over stream. I do enjoy it though! Predatory Loans is a good touch.

the Predatory Loans jingle alone should put it higher than 18th

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17. Fakin' It

Hey, it's the one that nobody ever plays, because it absolutely requires everyone to be in the same room together! You actually probably could do it over webcams but I'm not sure anyone has really tried, it sounds like kind of a pain in the ass. Anyway, Fakin' It is fun, and absolutely worth playing if you get the chance. It's kind of like a proto-Push the Button, in which everyone gets a real prompt but one person, the faker, don't get anything and just has to make it up. I think the biggest weakness of this game is that it makes things pretty hard on the faker, sometimes giving rough or outright unfair prompts for them to try to lie their way through - on occasion it just dicks over the faker just for a cheap laugh and, well, it usually earns that cheap laugh, including from me, but it's another one of those Jackbox games where it's hard for me to decide how seriously I should take it. I'm a serious-business Jackbox player, damn it! I do think Push the Button is largely a better version of this concept, but I do think Fakin' It has some stuff going for it - the 'make a face' round is pretty inspired and most of the other rounds are pretty fun too. I might rank this one higher if it were easier to get a group to play it with.

CherryCokes posted...

the Predatory Loans jingle alone should put it higher than 18th

This is completely fair

good list so far

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Fakin' It is really good but needing to be an in-person game probably puts it 5 slots lower for me, I think.

Especially now. I wish Jackbox would tell us how many instances of each game have been played during the pandemic

Fakin' It has gotta be getting basically 0 plays per day this year

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16. Joke Boat

I feel like this one SHOULD work better than it does, and I'm not sure why groups keep finding this one to be kind of a rough play. I think you guys just need to get better at writing jokes, tbh. Okay, I admit that this one is basically just a worse Quiplash with different packaging, but I do really like the packaging - the nautical theming and the catchphrases are both fantastic, and I think the way that prompts get determined is a lot of fun and sometimes even preferrable to Quiplash. I also really like the idea of the final round being taking someone else's joke and trying to do it better. For whatever reason though, much like Dictionarium the ratio of good to bad responses just doesn't work out, and it feels like people tend to struggle being funny in Joke Boat, which is kind of understandable because it forces the humor into a slightly more hackneyed format that almost feels it demands subversion and anti-humor at times. And although most Jackbox games are basically like Whose Line where the scores are practically made up anyway so the winner doesn't REALLY matter, Joke Boat does have an extra annoying problem here where people make more points based on whether or not people select their jokes to go up against in the final round. All that said I think it's a solid offering in Party Pack 6 but it's understandable to just want to go back to Quiplash instead, and I imagine with the release of Quiplash 3 we'll probably see less of Joke Boat.

Fakin' It is a favorite with my group of friends but yeah, the fact that it's pretty much strictly an in-person thing makes a middling ranking totally fair.

I don't really take issue with anything so far, really. Dictionarium I'd probably have a bit higher, but I wouldn't call that an egregious one by any means.

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Joke Boat is frustrating for me because it should be better than it almost always ends up being. It's a perennial disappointment with a few bright spots.

There's probably an athlete comparison here but I can't --

it's Jeff Green

it's the Jeff Green of Jackbox games

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15. Bomb Corp

Okay, uh... I know this one like almost kind of belongs in the Zeeple Dome tier of "Why is this even a Jackbox game" but it's actually really really good? It's only 4 players, and you can't do it over stream, but if you ever get the chance to play it isn't totally worth checking out. It's like a less heavy version of the bomb-defusal game Keep Talking And Nobody Explodes, where people each get unique lists of instructions and have to relay them carefully to the others in a limited amount of time while someone has to defuse a bomb. There's a lot of fun and clever twists here and it can be really frantic and entertaining, albeit a bit frustrating if you lose and have to go back to the start of the level. It's probably the weirdest Jackbox game since it's fully cooperative and has a linear campaign that you can actually beat, which is unusual, but I'm still ranking it here because I've had a really good time with it. It does at least kind of fit the Jackbox vibe more than Zeeple Dome. I don't think I've ever actually played it all the way through but someday I'll get around to it.

14. Survive The Internet

It took me a while to realize it, but this game is a dark horse - it's surprisingly a lot better than it seems at first and over time I've come to appreciate it a lot more. It's a game with a low ceiling, but a high floor, and after you've played enough Jackbox games with low floors like Joke Boat and Dictionarium you really come to appreciate that Survive the Internet just consistently delivers - it's always going to successfully draw a few laughs. I remember someone said that this game is really contingent on people giving really good pitches to knock home runs off of, and I think that's exactly right - when you play Survive the Internet, it's crucial that whatever you right for the prompt is a good setup that the other person can deliver a spike with, and once you get used to doing that the game works well. The ratio of good to bad answers here is better than most Jackbox games and I feel like most people have a handle on how to make at least passably funny answers here, even if the concept seems kind of strange at first. I don't think any of my very fondest memories playing Jackbox games comes from Survive the Internet, but this game is a really solid addition to the repertoire that I'm never sad to see come out.

13. Earwax

This game is the opposite of Survive the Internet. This game might be the most love-it-or-hate-it game in the entire franchise, and I fall more on the side of 'love it.' That said, this is also probably THE single biggest hit-or-miss game in the franchise, as well. I have had games where Earwax didn't crack even a single smile in the whole group, and I have had games *with the same group* that completely slayed everyone and left us on the floor gasping for breath. You just never know what you're going to get with this one - it's totally dependent on the options the players get, and dependent on whether or not the group is in a silly, loosened up enough, or just plain drunk mood to find it funny. It can really be top 5 or bottom 5 depending, in my opinion, but I'm giving it credit for having a high ceiling here. It's dumb, but on occasion you'll get a prompt or a choice of sound effects that just catches everyone off guard and it's too stupid not to laugh at. The fact that someone plays judge and can only award one winner for each round is a little annoying, I sort of wish everyone as a group could decide which one is their favorite each round, and the fact that you play until someone gets 3 points means the game has really variable length, which is strange. But I think Earwax is worth it for the times that it really clicks. Even at its best, it's stupid, but it's a good kind of stupid.

oooooh yes good topic, jackbox games range from SO terrible, to so amazing.

yep I don't like any of these games so far EXCEPT Survive the Internet, I like that one. people have to be pretty clever to get it to work though.

I think you can play Bomb Corp with a screen share! I did with some friends and it seemed to work. wasn't super fun though.

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Epyo posted...

oooooh yes good topic, jackbox games range from SO terrible, to so amazing.

yep I don't like any of these games so far EXCEPT Survive the Internet, I like that one. people have to be pretty clever to get it to work though.

I think you can play Bomb Corp with a screen share! I did with some friends and it seemed to work. wasn't super fun though.

Yeah it might actually work, I haven't tried it. Couldn't remember if it would work over screen share or not. You mostly look at your phones so maybe it does work???

We got Bomb Corps to work over stream.

You gotta communicate clearly and effectively but it's doable. Harder, though.

Earwax at 13 is mind-boggling to me

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I dunno, I've just had some games of Earwax that absolutely popped off harder than anything I ranked lower on this list, that's why I put it 13th.

I'm calibrating my own list as we go here and we're pretty similar on a number of points but there are a few where it's like

wildly divergent

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