Description:
Spy Web is a game I’d best describe as Battleship meets Guess Who? in as much as you try to outsmart your opponent via clever placement of your pieces and determining through simple questions how they’ve placed their pieces. Confused yet? I’ll get into the details, just hold on.
Researching Spy Web was a bit of a tricky task since the first thing that pops up in Google for “Spy Web” is naturally anti-spyware software. Also, don’t do a Google image-search for Spy Web, unless you have your preferences set to filter inappropriate content, because you will get a few pages full of very, VERY adult images. Even Wikipedia,
Spy Web is a game I’d best describe as Battleship meets Guess Who? in as much as you try to outsmart your opponent via clever placement of your pieces and determining through simple questions how they’ve placed their pieces. Confused yet? I’ll get into the details, just hold on.
Researching Spy Web was a bit of a tricky task since the first thing that pops up in Google for “Spy Web” is naturally anti-spyware software. Also, don’t do a Google image-search for Spy Web, unless you have your preferences set to filter inappropriate content, because you will get a few pages full of very, VERY adult images. Even Wikipedia, my go-to for research, doesn’t list Spy Web as a thing. Dang, is this game really that obscure?
So the premise of Spy Web pits two factions of spies against each other, one with names based off sea creatures such as “Beluga” and “Manta,” and the other with names based off birds such as “Buzzard” and “Osprey.” Each side has nine spies to place in a 3-by-3 board very similar to the way you place ships in Battleship, i.e. hidden from the other player. The first player to accurately determine the other player’s spy arrangement wins the round.
Also, I love the colors here. Doesn't it look spy-like?
The way this is determined is through asking three questions: “Who is [character name] pointing at/looking at/listening to?” You know this because every character tile is either pointing in some direction, looking in some direction, or listening in some direction, sometimes all three at once.
For example, you could ask “Who is Buzzard pointing at?” and you might get an answer like “Buzzard is pointing at Vulture.” You’d then have to use this knowledge to determine where to start placing your enemy’s character tiles. Oh, and in case you were curious, unlike real spy tactics, lying is totally uncalled for here, otherwise the game doesn’t work.
Snazzy characters. Why didn't Guess Who? have spy gadgets in it?
The concept is fairly simple, I admit, but something about it resonated with me as a kid. I became mildly obsessed with creating the perfect, “uncrackable” combination of spies by looking for formations that resulted in a spy not being looked at, pointed to, or listened to by any other characters, or better yet, making it so that no spies connected to any other spies on the board. It’s set up so you can’t really do this, but it ‘s fun to try.
Adding the spy theme to the game really sold me as a kid. It could easily be a sort of board game version of “telephone” whereas the nine characters are just kids set up on the grid, but that would have been sort of lame. Spies are cool, and unlike zombies, they haven’t overstayed their welcome.
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Manufacturer: Parker Brothers
Release date: 1 January 1997
EAN: 0073000407209 UPC: 073000407209
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