I lost my wife to Monopoly Go!
A long time ago I was contacted by a PR firm about Monopoly Go! I passed on any coverage of the thing because I really don’t have too much time for anything, let alone an app version of a board game that notoriously ruins families. Cut to about two months ago when my wife showed me a screen and asked if I thought I could predict where the third diamond ring was.
I told her where I assumed it was, and it was there. This repeated several times a day with my choices being far more accurate than they reasonably should have been able to be leading me to the conclusion that there was trickery the likes of which I had seen before in another game I quit because it became world-consuming. That game had most of my fellow players spending $30 a month just to be powerful enough to not be fodder. The choices didn’t matter, you got what you got and it was predictable.
One day we went out and she left her phone at home and when she got back I heard “arrrrrr… the Walrus destroyed me!” and I gathered a mutual friend had 1) been sucked into the vortex that is Monopoly Go! and 2) raided / stolen / something to that effect while my wife was away from her phone. She never forgot her phone after that.
Movie nights started to become an effort to explain what she had missed because she looked away at her phone to attack a co-player I assume. “Well, if you’d been watching the movie you would know that person died in a car explosion.” She developed the ability to tune out her surroundings to I guess go another round, I’m not exactly sure what she’s doing, just that she has a group of opponents and she’s sticking it to people in said group.
I still am asked to find the last diamond ring regularly, and I find it or I know before I choose that I have not found it and have no clue why I know this. I still find this odd and am wondering if there’s a tell on the screen I’m not consciously picking up on.
It is evidently a neat little game and addictive in its free form, but reminds me a bit of the tricks Last Shelter and other world-building games institute to keep you coming back day after day. The reviews tend to indicate that there may be an invisible pay to play glass ceiling, but that’s not something I’ve been asked to look at and none of my Google Play Millions have been requested (I’ve got $41 something for reasons).
The children ask when she’s coming back from Monopoly Go! and I just don’t know.
I’m curious about this game, but someone has to feed the cats.
