Hasbro The Game Show on Carnival Legend

Many people grew up playing Hasbro board games. Who hasn’t played Sorry, Yahtzee, Operation, Simon, Connect Four, Monopoly, or other Hasbro games? As part of Carnival’s Funship 2.0 upgrades they added life size versions of old favorite games done in Hollywood game show style. These giant versions of familiar games include Sorry Sliders, Yahtzee Bowling, Operation Sam Dunk, Connect Four Basketball and the dreaded Simon Flash. Winners each select a Monopoly game card to determine the grand prize winner at the end of the game show style production involving passengers as contestants.

Sorry Sliders on Carnival Breeze

When we took the transatlantic cruise on the Breeze they had several episodes of Hasbro the Game show on several different days of the cruise and my husband John got selected to play in one of them. On our Carnival Australia cruise on the Legend they had the Hasbro game in the evening after my daughter Sheri put her kids to bed. Since John had already played he watched the kids while Sheri and I went to the show.

For the first game they used scattergories questions to select audience participants. They split the audience down the middle, one side has a chance to get on the red team and the other on the blue. Sheri is big into board games so when they asked for a board game starting with C for the blue team she jumped up ready to answer. The cruise director picked someone else. The first guy couldn’t think of anything to say in spite of the fact that the giant Connect Four basketball game sat on the stage ready to go. The CD turned to Sheri. Though her first thought had been Carcassonne, her favorite of the million or so board games she has, she went with chess instead figuring more people would give the obvious answer giving her a better chance at the win. Sure enough, chess was among the acceptable answers and Sheri took her place on stage with the blue team.

Looks like a done deal for the reds and hopeless for the blues while Sheri takes a shot

Initially the red team had a scoring streak, getting a lot of basketballs into the giant Connect Four game board, but not the four in a row they needed for a win. Sheri’s team on the other hand all missed except for her. On the next round the other team didn’t score as well and still didn’t get beyond 3 in a row. Sheri scored again. Somewhere along the way the little girl on her team got a ball in the same line with Sheri’s, but the other two adults never got a single ball on the board for the entire game. They missed every shot completely. Lucky for Sheri, the reds lost their early luck and she got the fourth ball in a row before they did, scoring 3 of the four balls for her team’s win all on her own, plus one other in another row. The red team had more balls in, but mostly all over the board. They just couldn’t get that last one in the right row to win.

Sheri picks her monopoly card

The red team went back to their original seats and the blue team each picked a card from the giant Monopoly ATM. Sheri got first choice and picked the horse.

For the second round they had Trivial Pursuit for the qualifying round. When they asked the ingredients of Rice Krispie Treats for the first blue team question, I knew I could win….but the cruise director called on someone else. He said Rice Bubbles (which is what Rice Krispies are called in Australia – even the box says so), marshmallows and cocoa. Apparently Australians usually make their Rice Krispie cookies chocolate because when they said he was wrong I was all alone jumping around waving my hands in the air while everyone else had a blank stare. So the Cruise Director pretty much had to call on me even though Sheri already played the first game. I said Rice Krispies, marshmallows and butter. (Butter is a key ingredient. Even if you used cocoa you would still need butter.)

“Isn’t that the same thing he said?” The CD asked.

“No,” I replied. “He said cocoa, I said butter.”

waiting for a team

So he checked with the answer fairy and they said I was right. I took my place on stage with some space between me and the red team while I waited for them to select the rest of the blue. Each team had 5 players this round, four to play and one to direct while we played the dreaded Simon Flash, the one game of all of them everyone says they hope will not be the one used if they get selected to play. We had four adults on the stage and a little girl to direct us.

um…nobody moved

The cruise director made sure to confuse everyone saying that we would line up opposite what we see in the colors when they flash because we needed to be in the order of what the audience sees. Only the colors flashed one at a time, not in a line of them like the audience sees. We couldn’t see the color on the front of the big blocks we wore, and the tiny light on top that told us what color we had did not light up until the sequence was over. They had a practice round and the red team scurried about while us blues stood there looking stupid trying to figure out what the CD meant about the backwards thing.

everybody find your spot

The game started for real and we just lined up normal. Not fast enough though, first round went to the reds. Next round my light started out blue and about the time I got into place it changed to green so I had to move. Luckily although the reds lined up first they had the wrong order so we got into the right order first. Last round we got quicker and the lights on top the blocks didn’t change color midway through. Our little girl director had the hang of it by then and we all got in place faster than the other team – and in the right spots for the win.

Monopoly Train Card

Each of us got to pick a Monopoly card. They had two big racks of them so unless you were the first person there while they were talking there was no time to look them over to see what they were as we just had a few seconds pick one while passing by on the way to the stairs. I just grabbed the closest one which happened to be the train.

All the winners came back up on stage and they asked each person why they picked the one they did. Sheri went first. She said she picked the horse because she grew up riding. I never asked her if she just happened to grab the horse or if she intentionally picked it, but she did go first so she probably had a chance to look at them.

one of the contestants checks their card

Everyone had a good story for their choice so instead of saying totally random when asked why I picked the train I said because my grandsons really like Thomas, which they do. Sometimes you have to think on the fly, or at least in that moment I felt that way. Looking back just saying because it was closest might have been a more entertaining answer.

Sheri went first.  She put her card in the giant Monopoly ATM thing and the dollars just kept whirring around. It went all the way up to $115,000. She stood aside in the current winner’s spot. If anyone scored higher they’d take over and she’d go back down the stairs. One by one everyone put in their card. Mine was $15,000. The second highest was $20,000. Each person was handed a travel size Yahtzee game as they exited the stage while Sheri looked on.

Sheri wins!

The CD and his helpers said they had never seen it go anywhere near as high as Sheri’s score before. One of them wondered if it was broken. Too bad it was Monopoly money, who couldn’t use a spare $115,000? Sheri won the grand prize by a mile, which she rightfully deserved since she nearly singlehandedly won Connect Four basketball. Her prize consisted of a selection of travel sized games (which her kids had fun with the rest of the cruise) and $150 onboard credit. On ships sailing out of the USA the winner gets a certificate to pick a selection of games from Hasbro rather than the onboard credit. Perhaps the cost of shipping the games to Australia is too high.

It’s fun to watch Hasbro the game show, but it’s even more fun to play even if getting picked does involve attracting attention to oneself, something that goes totally against my normal blend into the background nature.

Copyright My Cruise Stories 2015