The You Don’t Know Jack franchise has been dormant for several years now. The last full release in the series was “You Don’t Know Jack Vol. 6: The Lost Gold” back in 2003. Jellyvision has finally decided to revive the franchise and bring this fresh and fun trivia game into 2011.
You Don’t Know Jack is set up like an episodic television show with each episode consisting of 10 questions with a final bonus round at the end. The game comes packed with 73 episodes with additional dlc episodes already announced. Since the game is set up episodically once you complete an episode you have seen all the questions and answers that episode has to offer. The game does not draw from a question bank so each new episode will only have new questions so you don’t have to worry about seeing the same question again. In many other trivia games you end up seeing the same questions over and over which takes away from the trivia experience.
The questions in You Don’t Know Jack are presented in a unique style. Questions are more like mind-teasers that players must decipher exactly what the question is truly asking. Questions can tie Albert Einstein’s theories and Jennifer Aniston’s movies together or compare “octomom” to an actual octopus. Each episode has a “wrong answer of the game” that is tied to a fake company. By selecting the “wrong answer of the game” that player will be awarded a large sum of money to add to his or her total. Each question is timed and requires players to answer within 20 seconds. The longer a player takes to answer a question the lower the score he/she will receive. Questions in Round 1 are worth up to $2000 while questions in Round 2 are worth double. Though, if you lock in the wrong answer your score will be deducted by the same amount.
The game features several specialty question types including Who’s the Dummy?, Funky Trash, Cookie’s Fortune Cookie Fortunes, DisOrDat, and Nocturnal Admissions. Theses questions range from listening to Cookie’s poor ventriloquism skills to playing Freud and decoding Cookies wacky dreams. One question type that always pops up in each episode is called DisOrDat. These questions are presented to the player with the lowest points (if not playing solo), but provides the ability to steal for the other contestants. In this question type players must match the correct answer between two different choices such as matching answers to the name of a boy band or a brand of insect repellant. These added question types keep players on their toes and provides a nice break between the standard question and answer monotony.
The game is narrated excellently by You Don’t Know Jack veteran Cookie Masterson (voiced by Tom Gottlieb). Cookie provides a comical intro and outro to each question, plus, pokes fun at you if you answer the question incorrectly. The game does a good job explaining the correct and incorrect answers which actually provides some interesting facts. You will learn something by playing this game. In some cases, Cookie does tend to drag on a bit in certain sections that will have you tapping the skip button when it’s present. Many players enjoyment will really stem from if you care for Cookie Masterson’s brand of comedy. Those who like it will really enjoy the game others will be turned off completely.
Overall, You Don’t Know Jack is a great trivia game that requires you to really think before you answer. Cookie Masterson does an excellent job presenting the questions and keeping you laughing throughout each episode. The game is priced at just $30 and is easily worth every penny. All trivia fans with a sense of humor should pick up a copy.
Pros:
- $30 price point is a steal
- Episodic presentation means no repeating questions
- Players will learn something
- Very entertaining when playing with friends
Cons:
- Some may be turned off by Cookie Masterson’s brand of humor
- Occasionally the intro and outro for a question tend to drag on too long
