This review contains spoilers, click expand to view.
Monopoly Plus (PS3) was a $5 PSN download during Xmas, I wanted to try a new version, so i did and i thought it was enjoyable, until i found some things to criticize about it.
The Pros: Basically a fun and enjoyable download that runs in 4 languages, and has three modes to play in, plus some silly DLCs, and UPlay. First, I need to say did not buy the extra DLCs, or play My Monopoly, or UPlay, or the Online mode, i just played the Local mode against the AIs and my friends.
You're asked to play on either the Living board or the Classic board. The Living board is full of simple fun animated graphics, which to me were enjoyable and probably would be to all ages. (However, i did end up playing the Classic board later for its simplicity and relation to the way i played as a kid. We did not pay to play on the extra possible "My boards", so i can't review those features.)
You have a choice of one additional rule to play by in the Rules Selection section, which may be a pro as they cover some useful changes to the classic rules; and you can have up to 5 more players or AIs, AIs have 4 levels of play - from Very Easy to Hard, we always chose Hard, but kids may want Very Easy AIs for fun.
The game play is full of sounds, music, and a MC voice too, all controlled in Options menus. Graphics are well done for a Hasbro game and very animated, especially on the Living board choice. I especially liked how the dice were animated to crash into things and scatter houses and player pieces as they rolled, always wanted to do that IRL, but everyone wouldn't like that. Definitely try the Living board to see everything going on, worth the $5 for fun.
The Cons: The UPlay stuff is annoying and really obtrusive, it seems to have been added on after the game was made and slows the game load/start and at times interrupts the game in play. The AIs have some exploits even on Hard level, the biggest example is that AIs do not factor costs associated with mortgaged proprieties during trades, i feel like a real-life mortgage criminal during those moments of unfair trades, used repeatedly i can unfairly bankrupt a whole board of AIs!
The main problem i had was the Rule selection did not allow more than one rule, i really thought it was designed to select multiple rules like Property Auctions & Free-Parking, etc. But the game designers and the game makers missed the mark, or they wrote/read the game design specs wrong, this miss takes a lot of fun out of the game, sigh
And there's the time it takes to animate the rolls & moves, you can't speed-up any of that except the actual post-roll move, waiting is a pain, i tried every button combo to somehow speed-up the play, it should be there, or in settings, but it's not, sigh.
And last, there seems to be bugs, one that after trading a AI or player into Bankruptcy and the sell-off auction(s) finishes, the player move order is reset, you can lose your turn on doubles, or won't be able to trade further, etc. And, another bug is that the game's random generator is broken big time, you will see the AI players moving to the exact same spots right after each other like they're all following each other because the rolls are the same results. Lol, i had all five AIs follow me as i rolled first, and they each had to pay rent on every property i bought. And the game appears to hang if on a Counter offer from an AI you trade any property that completes a set and thee AI can't afford to completely pay off the mortgage(s) of all the matching set of properties it got.
This is a game that should be played for fun, or with friends, but not in any competitive way against the AIs.… Expand