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Mr Jack Game Breakdown:
Our Rating:
User Rating:
(based on 4 votes)
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 | Strategy |  |
 | Luck |  |
 | Knowledge |  |
 | Creativity | |
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Details:
Number of Players: 2 to 2
Ages: 9+
Avg. Time to Play: 30 minutes
Time to Learn: 25 minutes
Released: 2007
Publisher: Hurrican
Designer(s): Bruno Cathala & Ludovic Maublanc
Awards:
- 2007 International Gamers Award Winner (General Strategy, 2-Player category)
- BoardGameRatings.com Best 2-Player Game 2007
See the details
In the Box:- 1 game board
- 8 characters
- 6 lit gaslights
- 2 manhole covers
- 2 police cordon
- 1 turn counter
- 8 character cards
- 8 alibi cards
- rules (English, French, German, Dutch)
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Mr Jack |
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Availability:
In stock
List Price:
$42.99
Our Price:
$30.95
You Save:
$12.04 (28%)
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Description:
The night covers the gloomy alleys with darkness and only a few corners are still illuminated by the gaslights. Eight investigators have gathered to catch the cunning Jack the Ripper. But Jack is in fact cleverly impersonating one of them.
In Mr. Jack, one of the players must help the investigators. By moving each character into light or shadow, the detective player makes successive deductions to uncover which investigator is in fact Jack, then he/she must try to catch the infamous ripper.
The opponent, playing Jack, must do his best to delay the investigation. He can even try to use the darkness to secretly flee the district!
A thrilling game for two players!
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 | | Mr Jack Images: | | | | | | | | | |  | | Our Rating:
Our Review:
Mr. Jack is a fabulous 2-player game that is easy to learn but hides secrets that players will still be discovering after playing many times. The setting is London, as Jack the Ripper attempts to wriggle his way out of an intense investigation by several of London’s top dogs. One player is trying to discover the true identity of Jack while the other player attempts to help Jack escape or avoid being caught until the end of the game’s last turn. Players take turns moving characters around the streets, in and out of proximity with each other and the street lamps. Open manholes provide quick passageways across the board, and police cordons (which can be moved occasionally) block Jack’s escape. At set intervals, the player representing Jack must tell his opponent whether the character on the board who is really Jack the Ripper is hidden in darkness or is visible in lamp light or next to another character—thus the detective player can narrow down the possibilities and hopefully catch Jack before he escapes. The game’s eight turns represent a single London night. As the game progresses, the hour grows later and street lamps turn off one by one, allowing the cover of darkness to aid Jack in his efforts to escape.
Mr. Jack is a game where the two players play different roles and have different goals; yet Mr. Jack successfully maintains its balance. The result is that there is twice as much strategy to learn, and twice as much fun to be had in playing the two different roles. Players will likely discover that after one game, they want to switch places and play again. There is definitely luck involved when drawing character cards to move, but there is more strategy than first meets the eye, and in the end the careful deductions of both players, not luck, will determine the outcome.
Mr. Jack took a little longer than we would have liked to learn (25 minutes), but game play is quick (30 minutes) and the rules are easy to remember after the first game. Don’t be surprised if you don’t feel like you know exactly what you are doing during the first several turns of your first game—just keep playing, and the main strategies will quickly come together. The short play time makes this an ideal late-night standby for two players who have 30 minutes to kill (no pun intended). The game board and game pieces are excellent quality (though shuffling the “cards” is a pain because they are as thick as graham crackers). The artwork is fun and inviting, and the general mood of the game as a who-dun-it mystery is successfully achieved. Anyone who had fun as a child playing “Murder in the Dark” or “Mafia” will get a kick out of Mr. Jack. We give a high recommendation to Mr. Jack as an excellent two-player game that will keep you playing again and again. Mr. Jack is the winner of our Best 2-Player Game Award for 2007.
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User Reviews:
| Still Lots of Fun
About three and a half years later, and my wife and I still enjoy playing Mr. Jack. We now end the game after six turns (instead of eight turns). Of course this shortens the game time, but it does give the Mr. Jack player a realistic chance to win.
by Larry (Jul 13 2011)
|  Jack never WINS
Pretty game; cool idea but Jack never wins. It's very disappointing.
by Megan (Jan 24 2009)
| Lots of Fun
My wife and I bought Mr. Jack a little over a month ago. Since then we've played it about twenty times. Once you learn the board set-up and simple rules, it's very easy and lots of fun. For a game so easy to learn, Mr. Jack really involves a lot of strategy (as well as a good dose of luck). The games are fast. You can play two or three times in a couple of hours. The "good guys" are racing against time and increasing darkness as Mr. Jack tries to either escape from the board or remain unknown until eight turns have passed.
The only possible catch to the game is this: My wife and I noticed that it was becoming increasingly difficult for Mr. Jack to win, so we started keeping some stats. In the last eleven games, Mr. Jack has won only once (and that was due to a bit of impatience/stupidity on my part). That's fine because we alternate who plays Mr. Jack and who plays the "good guys" every game. We each keep winning about 50/50 which is great for a marriage. Still, I don't know if the difficulty in getting Mr. Jack to win is due to our playing, or if it is just inherent to the game. But that's no big deal. We could always tweak the rules in Mr. Jack's favor (e.g., end the game after six or seven turns instead of eight).
In summary: Lots of fun. Easy to learn but filled with strategy.
by Larry (Feb 02 2008)
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All reviews become the sole property of Wasatch Game Company. |
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