SLAPDASH
(Trivia)
A series of questions is presented to a group of six players. Each question has three possible correct answers. Players have ten seconds to choose an answer by inputting the answer’s initial letter (the three initial letters are always distinct) to a device that records the players’ order of input. After the ten seconds have elapsed, the players are prompted, in the order of their inputs, to state the answer starting with their chosen letters. A player who answers correctly scores, but only if no other player who chose the same initial letter answered correctly beforehand. The scores for a question depend on how many of the answers were chosen and stated correctly by players: 1 point of all three answers are correctly stated, 2 points if only two answers are correctly states, and 3 points if only one answer is correctly stated.
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Slapdash was presented as an after-hours game at the 2005 NPL convention in Los Angeles. Beyond trivia knowledge, the game’s central strategy involved a choice between a quick input of the easy answer and a more deliberate what a player might predict to be the more difficult answer. This strategy makes an interesting dilemma, but the game as a whole was rather ordinary. I presented two rounds, one with single-word answers and one with two-word answers (players had to choose a bigram) and did not include any additional trappings such a “daily double” wagering opportunity or a finale. The answer-order-recording “device” used as that event was the set of rubber-band-connected paddles that came with the Split Second board game. The Split Second paddles would be used later for Sixth Sense.
life as a puzzle 