Card Game Review: ‘Bob Moog’s Dad Jokes’ from University Games

Bob Moog’s Dad Jokes Card Game from University Games brings all the fun of a best-of joke book to play around the tabletop. Dad jokes with cringe-inducing puns and rimshot riddles have been around as long as there have been dads. With this new card game, players can compete to match setups to punchlines to tell the joke themselves. The deck even comes with a “Write your own ‘worst’ joke here” pair so that players can add their all-time favorite bad dad joke.

Bob Moog’s Dad Jokes Card Game shares matching mechanics with time-tested games like Go Fish and Old Maid. Each player receives five cards with the rest of the deck stacked as a draw pile. The cards are marked either with a setup such as “Birds like to stand on what kind of fish?” or with a punchline, like “A perch.” The jokes and punchlines are matched with the same icon, making it easy to tell which one goes with which.

In each round, players take turns revealing a card by reading the joke or punchline to another player. “Where did the young oak go to school?” If the target player has the matching punchline or joke to complete the pair, they immediately hand it over to the reader. “Elementree school.”

What’s the Best Way to Win?

If the reader gets the card, they add it to their hand and may ask another joke or punchline. If not, they draw back up to five to end their turn, and play continues with another player. Even if it is not their turn, players should pay close attention to the jokes and punchlines being asked since, if they have the missing match in their hand, it will make for an easy pair to collect as soon as it becomes their turn. It could even be considered “protected” since no one else could have the match, but players will have to have sharp memories to keep track of who has what.

Play continues until one player is the first to collect eight pairs, rereading the pairs as they lay them out for the count. “What is big and red and eats rocks?” “A big red rock eater.” Half the fun of playing Bob Moog’s Dad Jokes Card Game is simply reading out the jokes, and players will be eager to play again to work their way through the deck. Discards and drawing out of the discard pile add flexibility to reveal more cards more quickly so the jokes can come fast.

Dad Jokes: Play by the Rules

Bob Moog’s Dad Jokes Card Game is a card game for two to five players aged eight and up. With 110 cards in the entire deck (54 joke setups, 54 punchlines, and two write-your-own cards), games can last a half hour or so as players search through the deck to make matches. Players might even build a fast-play deck with their favorite jokes to have the matches come quickly. As Bob Moog writes, it “will make you laugh and grimace as you play.”