The Jackbox Survey Scramble review

The team at Jackbox Games are held in pretty high regard in our household. They consistently have us laughing, bickering and having an all round jolly good time throughout the entire Jackbox game series and this latest effort is no exception. The Jackbox Survey Scramble has a straightforward premise. Using only single words, guess the most popular answers to a chosen subject, much like the popular mid-nineties Saturday night British gameshow, Family Fortunes. Simple, yes. Easy? Not so much.

These categories can range from “Names beginning with T” to “Things that are blue”, or “Favourite sandwich fillings” to “Good one word movie titles” (which ends up being a fair bit harder than it might sound). With answers taken from real people, there’s a broad spectrum on display, from the fairly obvious to the utterly maddening. I’m not sure who would choose lettuce over tuna as a sandwich filling and I’m not sure that we could ever be friends.

There are four games currently on offer at release, with more modes promised in a free update in the future. These include “Hilo”, a surprisingly tactical mode where you must guess the top answers or the bottom answers against your competitors in rounds, the wrinkle here being that points will be split if you all choose the same answer. You’ll have to think a little more left-field to ensure that you can grab all of the points for yourself by not always giving the most obvious choice. It’s the most simplistic mode on offer but is also the most pure. It’s become a favourite in the collection and I can see this being played a heck of a lot at get togethers for years to come.

“Speed” sees you thinking fast and frantically, trying to get as many high ranked answers as you can whilst battling against both a strict time limit and before they are stolen by your enemies, sorry, I mean friends. Requiring both quick thinking and an even quicker typing thumb, it’s a great twist on the overall premise.

“Bounce” is my least enjoyed of the set, a bizarre mash-up of Arkanoid and Family Feud. Played in teams, you must move an on-screen paddle left and right by providing more or less popular answers. Use this to block a slowly moving ball from reaching the bottom of the screen and you’ll deny the opposition a point. Miss and they score, with the first to five being declared the winner. This mode puts the most pressure on players, as the ball advances whilst you desperately guess at the right word. It’s more stressful than the other games in this pack and sits a little at odds with the pacing and mood of the pack overall.

Finally there’s “Squares”, a fresh take on noughts and crosses. Another team based effort, you’ll compete to make a row of three squares on a 9×9 grid. Answers start most popular on the top row and work their way down the grid. Guess the most popular answer in the square and you’ll lock it, stopping your opponent in their tracks. This one has become a family favourite, as you’ll soon get competitive over “Most popular song subjects” when there’s that final square at stake and pride hangs in the balance.

Games can be played at your leisure, or you can go for a full Grand Prix. This Tour mode takes you through everything on offer to finally prove you are the best guesser of your generation. I’m a big fan of the more simplified, slick presentation on show in The Jackbox Survey Scramble. Although there’s a fully voiced host as per many games in the series, this time around it’s more streamlined and gets you into each game mode quickly, meaning more time to marvel at the madness of the general public. There are a plethora of options available to tailor your experience including an option for less US-centric content, a choice of the English speaking locale from where the player data is taken (including Australia) or a toggle for a more family friendly presentation including naughty word filtering, making this suitable for pretty much any occasion, even those where you can’t utter “dash it!” or “darn!”

It’s another great game from the Jackbox team, sure to elicit laughter and create hotly debated answers between players. Simple to grasp and easy to play, anyone with a phone can join in on the fun, with the online lobbies being super quick and easy to connect to. Just scan the on-screen QR code and you’re in. With new answers being added to the pack with every game played, there’s always a good reason to come back and see what fresh craziness other players come up with. So get Granny to pack up Monopoly this festive season and get Uncle Dave to pull his iPhone out. The Jackbox Survey Scramble is a new game in town just in time for Christmas and it has the potential to be a classic.