BREEK: u speelde Monopoly al die tijd verkeerd

Grond kopen
Als u terecht komt op onverkochte grond (d.w.z. een vakje waarvan nog niemand het eigendomsbewijs bezit), dan heeft u als eerste het recht om deze grond van de bank te kopen. Als u besluit tot kopen, betaalt u de bank het bedrag dat op het vakje staat aangegeven. In ruil daarvoor ontvangt u het eigendomsbewijs van het betreffende vakje. Dit kaartje legt u met de goede kant omhoog voor u neer. Als u besluit niet te kopen, moet de bank de betreffende grond direct bij opbod te koop aanbieden, te beginnen bij een prijs die een van de spelers ervoor geven wil. De speler die afzag van zijn kooprecht mag ook meebieden.

Monopoly is, and always was, played not by gamers, but by families; and inter-player shafting is liable to cause all sorts of upset.

Imagine you have a game being played by mum, dad, child one and child two. Child two needs Oxford Street (insert street name from your own regional edition) to complete a set. Child one lands on Oxford Street.

Now under the "shared cultural rules" there are only two outcomes here:

1) Child one decides to buy Oxford Street, making child two slightly unhappy.

2) Child one decides to pass on Oxford Street, meaning that child two still has the opportunity to buy it, which makes him slightly happy.

Now clearly, option one will cause upset to child two. But it is an upset that is more easily rationalised by a child's mind; it isn't like child one stole his property, simply that the dice favoured child one.

But now imagine that we're playing by the proper rules, and child one again lands on Oxford Street, a property that child two is looking to buy. We now have three typical outcomes:

1) Child one decides to buy Oxford Street, making child two slightly unhappy.

2) Child one decides to pass on Oxford Street, it goes to auction, and child two manages to buy it, which makes him very happy.

3) Child one decides to pass on Oxford Street, it goes to auction, and a vicious bidding war then erupts between child two and dad, which ends up with dad winning, child two bursting into tears, mum giving dad a "someone's not having any fun tonight look", and the game grinding to a halt amid tears and recriminations.

I think you can all see the picture. Somewhere along the line someone said, "Let's just leave out that stupid auction rule; we'll have much more fun that way."