Customer Reviews

Make Your Own Opoly Board Game

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

This is a wonderful concept. The kit comes with a box, game board, special paper and software to help with the templates. The properties and game play are similar to a simplified version of Monopoly. You chose the names for each property and put a unique picture on each space. When you enter the photograph and the name for a particular space, the program will print up a picture to stick on the board and a corresponding property card. You can customize the money with the faces of family members, famous people or your pets. (Give some thought to which people are on the higher and lower denominations of the money!) THe project works best if you have a digital camera and a scanner. If you are making the board for family, a scanner is particularly handy because they will probably want you to use some old non-digital pictures.

I have made up several customized games for family and for a church auction. I enjoyed making the customized game board. The end result looks quite professional if you work carefully. Be advised, though, this is not a quick 3 hour project. It takes a lot of time to make up a game board. The games come out best if you put some thought into the pictures on the game spaces. There are "Good News" "Bad News" cards that can be customized to reflect good, bad and funny things that might happen to a family or organization. Making the game board can be a fun family project. Everyone enjoys picking out the pictures and arguing about what you should put for good and bad news. You would proably want to have an adult or an adolescent actually paste the pictures onto the board because getting them straight is so important.

I have bought and used several versions of this item. The newest version is easier to use than the original version. It really helps to have a high resolution printer because the images that you stick on the board are quite small. You can definitely use photographs, but due to the size of each space, I would avoid using too many group pictures. Some reviewers have complained that the customized game is less complex and less challenging than real Monopoly. True, there are no houses and hotels. However, when I wanted to make a game more interesting, I added a few phrases to some of the "Bad News" cards. I was also able to use my computer to alter the rule sheet to add some game variations that fit with the particular family or organization that would be using the game.

The game's educational value can increase depending on the way you use it. For instance if you were making a game board for a church or synagogue, you could customize the board to reflect the various committees and rituals that make up the life of the congregation. If used in this way, it can stimulate productive discussion. On the other hand, you can also choose to customize the board to simply be a fun, lightearted game.

If you are a true Monopoly lover then, you may be very disappointed in "Make-Your-Own-Opoly". There are some major differences in the board from the original Parker Brother's game such as the jail and free parking and "go to jail" have been all changed to loose a turn and roll again and things of that nature. Also, there are no hotels or houses so you were not able to increase land value by developing properties. All in all I found it too far from the concept of the original (or parker brother produced variations) monopoly game to be able to enjoy it as a "Monopoly" alternative.
Other deterrents include that there are only a couple of plain sheets of paper sent with it for your money and property cards to be printed on. One would need to use their own printer paper if they wanted much money at all.

Although this game is a GREAT gift idea in that it is personalized for the recipient, it was discouraging to find that it is not "American" compatible. What I mean is that the board displays the properties in "american" dollar amounts, however, once you complete the entire "creation process" (which if you are creative, can take hours) you find that everything prints out in POUNDS (english monetary units!) Therefore, the deed cards and the instruction sheets do not coincide with the board game. I contacted the vendor immediately, whose representative advised me to download the "latest version" from the internet, which actually turned out to be more of a hassle than anything else since I had already created the entire game! In other words, the game ships with an OLD version, which you only find out AFTER you finish creating your game. I think it is entitely unfair that you pay for this product and are not even shipped a modern/ updated version. Why should I pay for an English version? All in all, it is a great concept and a fun gift to personalize, but disappoints in the final product and constumer service who merely says "whoops - sorry about that...start over." If you purchase this product be careful: even though you choose the "american version" upon initial installation, you will STILL have your monetary units/ deed cards printed in pounds. Therefore, before investing hours on this "project" download from the internet and make a "test run." Otherwise, you may be disappointed.

I really like the concept of the game, however, in my opinion it has some big shortcomings. Every die hard Monopoly fans knows that there are 10 spaces from corner to corner - this game gives you nine. Why? I have no clue. I think it could have been a lot truer to the original format. There aren't transportation squares on each side, and only two places equivalent to chance/community chest. It's a good idea, just whoever designed it didn't do a good job of bringing it to life. Copyright issues? I don't know... it just think it's annoying.

Overall, I was pretty happy with my purchase of this game. The only really annoying problem I came across was the fact that since this isn't actually a game produced by Parker Brothers, the games basic stand-by's don't apply. For example, there aren't 'RAILROAD' spaces on the board. They've been replaced by 'GOOD NEWS', 'BAD NEWS' (their versions of 'CHANCE' and 'COMMUNITY CHEST') and two 'LOTTERY' spaces. There are no 'JAIL' or 'GO TO JAIL' spaces, but there is a loose a turn space and a space called 'FATE'. And while the two tax spaces remain, both 'UTILITY' spaces are absent. Aside from these fairly minor issues, and the huge use of printer ink, the game is a very fun project. Actually, I found making the game more fun than playing it. It allows you to customize not only the spaces, but the pictures on the money, the deed cards, the 'GOOD/BAD NEWS' cards and the box. All of which lead to a fairy believable customised version of "Monopoly". I do recommend it.

When i was playing monopoly one day, i said. "Gosh, they really should make a blank board to make your own stuff." Then, I saw it! Make-your-own-opoly! Its genious! You receive a CD, and if for some strange reason you have no cd-drive, a disc too. It also comes with paper that is also a sticker. Why only 4 stars? Heres the problem. It assumes to much for the game. I dont want a "bid" square where the utiliers are, and free parking is "roll again." And JAIL is "fate". And sorry to break it to you, i want more than 2 chance and community chests, which are called "good news and bad news" Fortunatly, there is help. On the computer, you can print custom "good/bad news" cards and replace good and bad with something else. You can also edit things by printing them out and putting them on the board. Printing out the money is a waste of ink a big hassel to cut out, so it comes with pre-made dollars. Also, it comes with premade color-coded and dollar value cards so you can write the item you bought on the card. No houses either, which is a bummer.
All in all, i think they would do better not making the board they want it to be and let you do it. It gets annoying, which is why i only give it 4. I wish i could do 3.5, but i can't.

I returned the item because I mistakenly thought it would be essentially the same Monopoly board as I was familiar with. I was very diaspointed to see that there were only 9 squares on a side, no jail, no free parking and the Chance and Community Chest cards have been replaced with something more juvenile. It barely resembled the game I was expecting

I like it because I was able to make it about my favorite spot where I like to go swimming,kayaking,waterskiing,kneeboarding,
tubing, and looking for moose and deer. It was lots of fun. Me and my family love to play it.You should get it!

I just bought one for my own family but it makes an AWESOME gift! I bought it for my sister's family 2 years ago and they still rave about it and play it at family gatherings like thanksgiving and christmas time. ... My sister doesn't have a computer so I knew that I was going to have to make it for her. I had to download a working copy of the program used to make the personalized stuff from the website that was printed on the instruction book - the cd and the floppy disk did not work for me but that was by no means detrimental - didn't take long and the program is so easy to use. I was able to put a picture of my niece on the $500 bill and a picture of my nephew on the $100 - it's anything goes and only limited by your imagination. A VERY creative and highly entertaining game.

This is a very easy to use kit, but the game is only as good as you make it. We used it to celebrate the birthday of a favorite uncle and included everyone's childhood and adult homes; the end result was a touching and fun experience at the family reunion. It took over 12 hours to produce the finished product, but it was complete with photos on the money and game board. Of note, before you insert the sticker sheet, print a test page first, then make sure the precut strips on the sheet line up with the test sheet. There are no extra supplies. Also remember to print multiple sheets of the money.