This is my 4th review of the Jackbox Party Pack series and while it's still better than the earliest couple packs, this one isn't one of the best. It does feature my personal favorite version of Fibbage and with the right group, Survive the Internet is a pretty good time.
Usual disclaimers: I'm writing this review after having played a lot of Jackbox already, so I'm often speaking about my impressions in the context of the full release library so far (up through 9 at the time of this writing). I generally play over Discord stream with a group of 3 (including me). I'm skipping games that require more people for now if I've not had a chance to play them with a larger group otherwise, though this pack didn't have any such games. My rating will mostly be based on a holistic look at the pack based on individual impressions of the different games contained.
Civic Doodle
In this game, you're all artists designing murals and art pieces for the local government, such as what will be painted on the local school or drawing portraits of local residents. The image will start with a small piece partially drawn. Each round, two players add on to the drawing and the rest of the group votes on the best one. Then two other players will have to add on to that drawing, improvising from the first set of additions, which continues on a few rounds. The game changes slightly in the rules as it goes on, but that's the basics. We didn't really find this game that great. It has some funny moments but there are only so many ideas you'll come up with (and let's be honest, most people just default to drawing penises after a while). So it's decent on occasion, but I wouldn't consider it a staple for the average Jackbox session by any means.
Bracketeering
This game is about as a straight-forward as it gets for a voting-based Jackbox game. You'll get a prompt like "A name for a nasty flavor of ice cream." You each then get to think of two answers to the prompt which will be placed into a tournament bracket against each other. Each match up is voted on by everyone (meaning you can vote for or against your own answer) until only one answer is voted the grand champion. You also get to place bets during each round on one of the match-ups to come for which one you think will win. You get some bonus points if you're right, even if you bet against yourself. In later rounds, the game will change the prompt everyone actually answers. So for instance, after you've put in your ideas for funny gross ice cream flavors, instead the tournament bracket will have you vote on those answers instead for how well they answer a different question like "A name for a brand of sexy underwear." Otherwise there's not much to the game. I think the idea of the game is decent. It's not one I'd play over and over but as a heavily voting-based game, it's also not great for a group of 3 like mine so larger groups may have a better time with it.
Survive the Internet
This is one of those games you probably only want to play with your closer friends who know when to take your jokes as jokes. The premise of Survive the Internet is that each of you will be asked a question to answer, usually requiring a more open-ended response (ie "how do you feel about Nickelback" rather than a yes/no question). Another player will then see your answer but not the question you were asked and instead will have to make up the prompt that it was answering, usually with an internet theme like "this would be X's response to a crowdfunding campaign titled ______." As you might be guessing, you can easily make it look like your friend said some pretty fucked up stuff and that is most of the appeal of the game, how awful you can make people look...with of course the caveat that everyone playing knows who REALLY set that fucked up combo up. You then vote on which person looks the worst, awarding points to the person who set them up. This is a long-time go-to for my group for a quick round to start the night off with some (really awful) hilarity. About my only real complaint is that since the prompts and answers are usually full phrases, when the game flashes each one on the screen, it usually doesn't linger long enough to really take in the joke until you get to the voting stage. One quick note, the game format sort of requires 4+ players but if you have 3, the game will insert an AI player named "Gene." Gene's pretty awful at the game and his answers often make no sense whatsoever, but while that sometimes wastes a good prompt, we usually find his goofy answers entertaining in their own right.
Monster Seeking Monster
This game takes the form of a monster-based dating sim in which each player assumes a secret monster identity and seeks to get the most points by getting the most dates across a series of rounds. Each round you get a limited number of text messages to send to each other to privately convince someone to date then choose who to approach that night. If you both approach each other, you get a date, but if you pick someone who picked someone else, you get rejected. Each identity follows certain individualized rules, getting bonus points for achieving certain things, like dating the same person twice in a row or something. These criteria can be kind of complicated but often yield the primary advantage you want to aim for. There is also a robot character who anyone can date easily but if the robot never gets a date, everyone loses. Each round also reveals the winning player's hidden identity and rules so the other players can try and play around it, which is where it gets a little complicated, incorporating their aims into your strategy. As this description may entail, the game logic can get a little overly complicated for my tastes when I'm playing Jackbox to just have some simple fun. Personally, I thought the game was clever, but I didn't enjoy it too much. I think my friends liked it more, but we all agreed that it would probably be better with a somewhat larger group of maybe 5 people. I will also hazard that while I didn't time it, this felt like one of the longer Jackbox games out there and could be time-consuming.
Fibbage 3
This version of Fibbage is probably my favorite. They dispensed with the "difibrillator" mechanic of Fibbage 2, but otherwise, the game generally works pretty much the same as the previous two editions. The biggest difference is the addition of a separate playable mode called Fibbage Enough About You. In this mode, you each answer (honestly) various personal questions like "if you had one wish, what would it be?" or "who is your biggest celebrity crush?" Your friends then get to make up an answer they think would fool the other players—pretty much like regular Fibbage except it's based on your knowledge of the player—then the players who made up lies have to guess among the truth and the made up answers. The final round is sort of like two truths and a lie, but you just type one truth and one lie, with no real prompt. Your goal is to fool the other players into picking the lie. This mode is pretty short but I personally find it much more fun than regular Fibbage (which is still pretty great), and weirdly, it's actually pretty fun whether you know the other players super well or barely at all as it's fun to both come up with convincing answers for people you probably have an idea of the truth for, and to try and guess at what might be a good answer for someone you don't even know much about. My friends aren't as crazy about this mode as I am (probably because I often win), but I think it's great and also happens to be quite short and sweet, probably one of the shortest Jackbox games out there. Even if you don't like this mode though, this third Fibbage is a once more fine-tuned version of the Fibbage of earlier packs.
All in all, this is a plenty fine Jackbox pack with some really fun games, mainly Fibbage 3 and Survive the Internet. The other games generally aren't bad, but I wouldn't really get this pack specifically for them. However at least Monster Seeking Monster and Bracketeering would probably have been more fun with a larger group.
My other Jackbox reviews:
Jackbox Party Pack 1 ★★
Jackbox Party Pack 2 ★★★
Jackbox Party Pack 3 ★★★★★
Jackbox Party Pack 5 ★★★★★
Jackbox Party Pack 6 ★★★★★
Jackbox Party Pack 7 ★★★★★
Jackbox Party Pack 8 ★★★
Jackbox Party Pack 9 ★★★★★
Jackbox Party Pack 10 ★★★★★
