Can you play it big in Mighty Mumbai?

My friends and I may be many years and crores away from the dream of owning real estate in this city but for a few hours we did get to experience the joy of buying property in Mighty Mumbai as well as luxury cars and even our own sports teammdashall for a few thousand rupeesThe Mighty Mumbai wersquore referring to here is a new board game thatrsquos just been launched and is set in the Maximum City At first glance it seemed to be a combination of Monopoly and The Game of Life both of which account for a large share of our childhood memories so we were pretty excited to get our hands on this setupAt a listed price of R1999 we found the game to be a tad expensive and felt quite that a few of the design elements could have been more premium to match the price point For example when we first heard wersquod get to play a game themed on life in this city we had hoped to see player tokens in the form of Mumbaispecific icons like say Kala Ghoda a lunch dabba Flora Fountain or a kaalipeeli The actual cardboard tokens are not as exciting and itrsquos quite hard to keep track of which token belongs to whom especially because some of the meeplesrsquo colours were almost identical The packagingmdashshaped like a doubledecker BEST busmdashis charming but has little to do with the actual game We wish this theme would have carried over on to the board with a BEST bus meepleOn the other hand we enjoyed the fake cash which looks quite close to Indian currency when seen from a distance So much so that as we were setting up the board at one of those chess tables on the Carter Road promenade a chaiwallah came over to us with eyes shining to ask ldquoItne saare note Asli hain kyardquoPaul picks lsquoTRP Tandonrsquo female media mogul as her player character from a total of 16 optionsWe also loved the eight very ldquoBambaiyyardquo professions players can choose frommdashcricketer actor businessperson ad executive fashion designer real estate magnate media mogul and stock brokermdashwith male and female versions of each These characters go on to determine where you can earn crucial gameplay tokens what your career milestones will be potential earnings and lossesThere are two levels of gameplay to mirror life in the big citymdashall players start out in the Outer Circle which symbolises the rat race and daily grind the common man is subjected to This is where you can encounter misfortunes such as road accidents and tax notices but itrsquos also where you can make money and accumulate assets Just like real life the rich get richer in this gamemdashonce you qualify for the Inner Circle all your assets yield exponential returns Herersquos a protip Learn to hoard wealth like the worldrsquos top one per centLife in the Outer Circle is harsh Irsquom not sure whether it was our combined bad luck or whether the game is purposely designed to be this punishing in the first level but we encountered far more misfortune than windfalls At one point the game felt depressingly close to my life as a journalistmdashevery time my ldquopay dayrdquo came around Irsquod end up losing all my money within a few turns to loan payments pickpockets or some other woe My friend Avinash a huge board game buff quipped ldquoTheyrsquove made it realistic Itrsquos very tough to make it big in this city and break into the elite circlesrdquoNow for the biggest protip we can give for this game If you land on ldquoHire a CArdquo be sure to do it even if you have to take a loan in ordr to do so Having sound financial advice can protect you from the impact of bad luck and in this game waives R500 from every penalty Itrsquos the difference between winning and losingAll jokes aside if I had to point out one complaint with the game it is that the gameplay in the Outer Circle can feel a bit stretched because the punches keep coming There are far too many ways to lose money and not enough chances to make more of it or enough chances to buy property I wish the designers had earmarked some iconic landmarks or neighbourhoods on the board and made them available as properties for sale Imagine buying Marine Drive or Bandra station like one can with Monopolyrsquos Piccadilly or Kingrsquos Cross StationWe loved the packaging which resembles a doubledecker bus but wished the player tokens were Mumbaithemed too like Flora Fountain Kala Ghoda or a kaalipeeliAfter a gruelling two hours the first player among three of us made it into the Inner Circle and money finally started flooding in We also discovered the joys of collaboratingmdashwhile only one person can win the game players are encouraged to share resources in strategic partnerships so everyone gets ahead in life To me this symbolises all my friends who form my support system in the city progress for one of us is cause for cheer among all of us Half an hour later all of us get into the Inner Circle and start reaping the benefits of all the assets wersquod hoarded My rotten luck didnrsquot stay away too long though Mere minutes later I got ldquoarrestedrdquo and was booted back out into the Outer Circle Vijay Mallya could never relate It took about twoandahalf hours for a winner to emerge and complete the game although players can also choose to set a time limit and simply declare the richest one as the winner when the timer goes offThis is a fun game for a night in with family and friends Itrsquos also an excellent tool to explain the importance of savingmdashand more crucially investingmdashto children The rule book can be a bit ambiguous at times so set aside three to four hours for the first time you play to give you enough time to learn the rules If some of the instructions donrsquot seem entirely clear try referring to the game website mightymumbaicom Whatrsquos the TLDR version We love that therersquos a game themed on life in Mumbai and that it stays so faithful to the daily hustle Wersquod have loved it even more if there was more Mumbai in it