Aaah, the days of sitting around the kitchen table playing family board games. We still try to make time every week to play a non-digital game, but we recently received a copy of Hasbro’s Family Game Night for the Wii from Electronic Arts and we might be playing some classic board games on our TV. That’s right, Hasbro has released some of it’s most beloved family games for the Wii, including Operation, Jenga, Connect 4×4, Bop-It, and Pictureka. And, each game is playable in it’s classic mode or in remix mode, where you can do things not even imaginable in their real-life counterparts. Plus, the whole night is hosted by the loveable Mr. Potato Head, including the fun Family Game Show where you and your family compete with an audience and the “Challenge Wheel”. Here’s a good video walk through of all of the classic and remixed games as well as the Family Game Show:

What We Liked

Pictureka! Pictureka is hands down the most fun and whacky game of the bunch. The gameplay in classic mode closely resembles the original game and the remix version is just downright fun. Although this one may be a little tricky for the youngest members of your clan, it is by and large easy enough for everyone to play.

Connect 4×4. Aside from Pictureka, this was the other game in this bundle that was really well done. It’s completely addictive and the cool little features that were added to the remix mode make it especially fun. The kids love the “levitating” flying saucer that makes your pieces hover in place for a short time. The fireworks effect is cool too, raining down bunches of Connect 4 pieces when a player lands their piece successfully on a firework icon.

Music/Jukebox. The music in Family Game Night 2 is so much fun and so varied. It ranges from really funky, almost infectious, electronica grooves to smooth jazzy riffs. The best thing is that if you don’t like the music, you can change it and customize your game jukebox whenever you want to. The music that you select in your jukebox is played during gameplay. You can even mix it up and make your own gameplay playlist.

Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head. Who doesn’t love Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head? They are your hosts throughout your night of gameplay and they are quite amusing. The fun part of the Potato Heads is that as you progress through different levels of gameplay or win games, you are rewarded with new parts and outfits for your Potato Head. This adds a lot to the lasting appeal of the game as it’s not all that easy to unlock some of the parts and outfits. Here’s a fun video of Mr. Potato in some of his grooviest outfits:

Family Game Show. All of the games in Family Game Night 2 are multi-player capable for up to four players. However, the most family fun is probably to be had in the Family Game Show mode where you compete head to head with family members in a series of mini-games based on the five games included in Family Game Night 2. Game Show mode has the just the right mix of funny game show cheesiness and exciting, fast-paced gameplay to keep everyone laughing and having a good time.

High Score Mania. Compete against the clock to get the highest score you can in 10 minigames picked at random from the 5 games in this title. This is yet another addictive mode of gameplay that keeps you coming back over and over again trying to beat your high score and unlock some of the cooler Mr. Potato Head parts.

Bang for the Buck. Talk about bang for the buck, you get $60 worth of board games for just $40. If you added up what it would cost to buy all of the board games separately, you’d save yourself $20 by buying the Wii version. So, this way, it’s cheaper than buying the real thing, easier to set up, and not only do you get all of the original games, but you get the remix version which contain cool features that you don’t get in the box version of the games. Add all of that up and Family Game Night 2 gives you quite the bargain for everything you get.

New York, London, Paris, Munich. Well, maybe not London, Paris and Munich, but you do get to play with some great backdrops like New York, Las Vegas and Tokyo. The graphics are super clean and really add a nice touch touch to the already entertaining gameplay.

Lasting appeal. With the multitude of remix games, mini-games, Family Game Show mode, great multi-player support and the music jukebox Family Game Night 2 is going to be a long time favorite around here. From family game nights with the kids to parties with friends and relatives, we can see ourselves playing this one a lot.

What We Didn’t Like

Bop It. Although we really loved Pictureka, Connect 4×4, and for the most part, Operation, we didn’t really dig Bop It all that much. For one thing, the game itself is kind of confusing to follow, but that’s just Bop It. What made this game fall into the not-so-great category was that the game didn’t seem to respond very well to the motion controls of the Wii remote. There were more than a few times when we were definitely doing the right move with the Wii remote and the game just didn’t recognize it. We’d have to do the same gesture several times before it worked. Then when it did work, we’d sometime overdo it with one extra gesture, which then registered with the game and made us lose because it wasn’t what the game was expecting next.

Jenga. I think this one was a lost-in-translation problem. Jenga isn’t that bad to play, it’s just that it’s very hard to replicate the real-life physics of Jenga in a virtual environment. Something about it just didn’t feel right. That said, it is impressive that EA/Hasbro even found a way to make Jenga work on the Wii. I just wish it felt a little more like the real thing.

Good for the Kiddos?

Hasbro Family Game Night 2 is rated E for Everyone with Comic Mischief. The ESRB issued the comic mischief rating because “…the Pictureka game includes several jumbled puzzle images, one of which depicts a cow emitting a smoke cloud with a flatulence sound effect”. So, if you can handle a farting cow, everything else in Family Game Night 2 is pretty harmless. There is no foul language, no suggestive themes, and no violence of any sort.

As for educational value, Family Game Night 2 definitely delivers. Pictureka is all about finding objects that match the cards you get. You need to use picture matching skills, color skills, deductive logic, memory skills, counting skills (sometimes you need a certain number of matches), spelling skills and listening. Connect 4×4 is a classic strategy game that will really make your kids have to do some thinking to win. Operation classically introduces anatomy (well, maybe a whacky version of it), but also makes fighting germs fun. Bop It, although hard to control, does reinforce memory skills in a big way, as well as listening skills and color recognition. Jenga is great for teaching the basics of physics and engineering. Overall, Family Game Night 2, while fun and very entertaining, also provides a great platform for putting those learning skills to work.

Golden Egg Rating

We give Hasbro Family Game Night 2 4.5 out of 5 Golden Eggs. The fact that this game is intended to and does bring families together for an entertaining night of gameplay is great. Most of the games are really fun and entertaining and they have a lot of educational value to them too. The music and graphics are fantastic and really add a level excitement to the games. And, this title gives you a lot of bang for the buck with over $60 worth of board games crammed into a $40 Wii game. We wish Bop It would have worked a little better with the Wii remote than it did and that Jenga had a better real-world feel to it, but overall this is a game that you shouldn’t miss out on if you like to have family game nights, especially on your Wii.

Slideshow and Screenshots

Check out the lightbox slideshow below for images of the new game Hasbro Family Game Night 2. Simply click on a thumbnail to start the slideshow. Details and information for each screenshot are located at the bottom of the image in the slideshow. Images courtesy of EA.

FTC Required Disclosure Statement

FiveHens.com received a free review copy of Hasbro Family Game Night 2 from Electronic Arts in order to provide you with this review. Although the product was provided to us free of charge, that in no way affected this review in either a positive or negative way. For more information about the new FTC blogger disclosure rules, please visit here for the full text of the code.