Monopoly (game)

Overview

Monopoly is a multiplayer economics-themed board game. In the game, players roll two standard dice (or one extra special red die depending on the game) to move their token clockwise around the board, buying and trading properties and railroads and developing them with houses and hotels. Players collect rent from their opponents and aim to drive them into bankruptcy. Money can also be gained or lost through Chance and Community Chest cards and tax squares. Players receive a salary every time they pass "Go" and can end up in jail, from which they cannot move until they have met one of three conditions. House rules, hundreds of different editions, many spin-offs, and related media exist. Monopoly has become a part of international popular culture, having been licensed locally in more than 113 countries and printed in more than 46 languages. As of 2015, it was estimated that the game had sold 275 million copies worldwide. The properties on the original game board were named after locations in and around Atlantic City, New Jersey. The game is named after the economic concept of a monopoly—the domination of a market by a single entity. A core strategy is to buy up (or trade for) every property of a certain color, or all the railroads. The game is derived from The Landlord's Game, created in 1903 in the United States by Lizzie Magie, as a way to demonstrate that an economy rewarding individuals is better than one where monopolies hold all the wealth. It also served to promote the economic theories of Henry George—in particular, his ideas about taxation. The Landlord's Game originally had two sets of rules, one with tax and another, on which the current rules are mainly based. Parker Brothers first published Monopoly in 1935. Parker Brothers was eventually absorbed into Hasbro in 1991.

Early history

The history of Monopoly can be traced back to 1903, when American anti-monopolist Lizzie Magie created a game called Landlord's that she hoped would explain the single-tax theory of Henry George as laid out in his book Progress and Poverty. She devised the key features of the game. It was meant as an educational tool to illustrate the negative aspects of concentrating land in private monopolies. She took out a patent in 1904. This shows the game's characteristic features of a square circuit consisting of corner squares (one the starting point) and a series of intervening spaces where players went round and round until the goal was reached. The railway stations were hazards, demanding a $5 fine. Players received money after completing each circuit. This design was different from other board games of the time. It is possible, but not definitely known, that she was inspired by a game called Zohn Ahl, played by the Kiowa which had a similar shaped board and different rules, and was described in a book about games in 1898. Her game was self-published beginning in 1906. Magie created two sets of rules: an anti-monopolist set in which all were rewarded when wealth was created, and a monopolist set in which the goal was to create monopolies and crush opponents. Several variant board games, based on her concept, were developed from 1906 through the 1930s. They involved both the process of buying land for its development, and the sale of any undeveloped property. Cardboard houses were added, and rents increased as they were added to a property. Magie patented the game again in 1923. According to an advertisement placed in The Christian Science Monitor, Charles Todd of Philadelphia recalled the day in 1932 when his childhood friend Esther Jones and her husband, Charles Darrow, came to his house for dinner. After the meal, the Todds introduced Darrow to The Landlord's Game, which they then played several times. The game was entirely new to Darrow, and he asked the Todds for a written set of the rules. After that night, Darrow went on to utilize it to distribute the game himself as Monopoly. His only change was to add symbols for the electricity and water companies and for the railway stations. Darrow used oil cloth to create a game board, drawn by an artist, which is now in the collection of The Strong National Museum of Play after a $146,500 bid at Sotheby's in 2010. The Parker Brothers bought the game's copyrights from Darrow. When the company learned Darrow was not the sole inventor of the game, it bought the rights to Magie's patent for $500. Parker Brothers began marketing the game on November 5, 1935. Cartoonist F. O. Alexander contributed the design. U.S. patent number US 2026082 A was issued to Charles Darrow on December 31, 1935, for the game board design and was assigned to Parker Brothers Inc. The original version of the game in this format was based on the streets of Atlantic City, New Jersey.

1936–1970

Parker Brothers began licensing the game for sale outside the United States in 1936. In 1941, the British Secret Intelligence Service had John Waddington Ltd., the licensed manufacturer of the game in the United Kingdom, create a special edition for World War II prisoners of war held by the Nazis. Hidden inside these games were maps, compasses, real money, and other objects useful for escaping. They were distributed to prisoners by fake charity organizations created by the British Secret Service.

1970s–1980s

Economics professor Ralph Anspach published Anti-Monopoly in 1973, and was sued for trademark infringement by Parker Brothers in 1974. The case went to trial in 1976. Anspach won on appeals in 1979, as the 9th Circuit Court determined that the trademark Monopoly was generic and therefore unenforceable. The United States Supreme Court declined to hear the case, allowing the appellate court ruling to stand. This decision was overturned by the passage of Public Law 98-620 in 1984. With that law in place, Parker Brothers and its parent company, Hasbro, continue to hold valid trademarks for the game Monopoly. However, Anti-Monopoly was exempted from the law and Anspach later reached a settlement with Hasbro and marketed his game under license from them.

Hasbro ownership

Hasbro acquired Parker Bros. and thus Monopoly in 1991. Before the Hasbro acquisition, Parker Bros. acted as a publisher, issuing only two versions at a time, a regular and deluxe. Hasbro moved to create and license many other versions of Monopoly and sought public input in varying the game. A new wave of licensed products began in 1994, when Hasbro granted a license to USAopoly to begin publishing a San Diego Edition of Monopoly, which has since been followed by more than a hundred more licensees including Winning Moves Games (since 1995) and Winning Solutions, Inc. (since 2000) in the United States. The company held a national tournament on a chartered train going from Chicago to Atlantic City (see § U.S. National Championship) in 2003. Also that year, Hasbro sued the maker of Ghettopoly for violation of trademarks and copyrights and won. In February 2005, the company sued RADGames over their Super Add-On accessory board game that fitted in the center of the board. The judge initially issued an injunction on February 25, 2005, to halt production and sales before ruling in RADGames's favor in April 2005. The Speed Die was added to all regular Monopoly sets in 2008. After polling their Facebook followers, Hasbro Gaming took the top house rules and added them to a House Rule Edition released in the fall of 2014 and added them as optional rules in 2015. In January 2017, Hasbro invited internet users to vote on a new set of game pieces, with this new regular edition to be issued in March 2017. On May 1, 2018, the Monopoly Mansion hotel agreement was announced by Hasbro's managing director for southeast Asia, Jenny Chew Yean Nee, with M101 Holdings Sdn Bhd. M101 has the five-star, 225-room hotel, then under construction, located at the M101 Bukit Bintang in Kuala Lumpur and with a 1920s Gatsby feel. M101's Sirocco Group would manage the hotel when it opened in 2019. Hasbro announced in March 2021 that it planned to update the Community Chest cards with ones that would be more socially aware, inviting fans of the game to vote on the new versions. In April 2022, Hasbro announced another poll. This vote would see the reintroduction of one previously retired token in exchange for an existing token. The result would see the Thimble return and the T-Rex phased out by fall 2022. Hasbro revealed an overhaul on January 7, 2025, for release that year, changing the box to a square, renovating the Banker's tray, and enlarging the tokens by roughly 20%. Oriental Avenue was renamed to Rhode Island Avenue, another street in Atlantic City.

Board

The Monopoly game board consists of forty spaces containing twenty-eight properties—twenty-two streets (grouped into eight distinct color groups), four railroads, and two utilities—three Chance spaces, three Community Chest spaces, a Luxury Tax space, an Income Tax space, and the four corner squares: GO, (In) Jail/Just Visiting, Free Parking, and Go to Jail.

US versions

There have since been some changes to the board. Not all of the Chance and Community Chest cards shown in the 1935 patent were used in editions from 1936/1937 onwards. Graphics with the Mr. Monopoly character (then known as "Rich Uncle Pennybags") were added during that same time frame. A graphic of a chest containing coins was added to the Community Chest spaces, as were the flat purchase prices of the properties. Traditionally, the Community Chest cards were yellow (although they were sometimes printed on blue stock), with no decoration or text on the back; Chance cards were orange, also with no text or decoration on the back. Hasbro commissioned a major graphic redesign to the U.S. standard edition of the game in 2008, along with some minor revisions. Among the changes: the colors of Mediterranean and Baltic avenues were changed from purple to brown, and the color of the "Go" square was changed from red to black. The Luxury Tax amount was increased from $75 to $100, and a flat $200 income tax was imposed (formerly the player's choice of $200 or 10% of their total holdings, which they could not calculate until after making their final decision). The amount was originally $300, but was changed a year after the game's debut. There were also changes to the Chance and Community Chest cards. For example, the "poor tax", "receive for services", "Xmas fund matures", and "grand opera opening" cards became "speeding fine", "receive $25 consultancy fee", "holiday fund matures", and "it is your birthday", respectively. Though their effects remained the same, the player must pay only $50 instead of $150 for the school tax. In addition, the player now gets $50 instead of $45 for sale of stock, and the "Advance to Illinois Avenue" card now includes added text indicating that the player collects $200 if they pass "Go" on the way there.

All the Chance and Community Chest cards were altered in 2008 as part of the game's redesign. Mr. Monopoly's original line illustration was typically replaced by renderings of a 3D Mr. Monopoly model. The backs of the cards now feature their respective symbols, with Community Chest cards in blue and Chance cards in orange. Additionally, recent versions of Monopoly replace the dollar sign ($) with an "M" symbol including two horizontal strokes through it. In the US versions shown below, the properties are named after locations in (or near) Atlantic City, New Jersey. Atlantic City's Illinois Avenue was renamed Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in the 1980s. St. Charles Place no longer exists, as the Showboat Atlantic City was developed where it once ran. The values on the board reflect real estate property values of 1930s Atlantic City. The two cheapest properties, Baltic Avenue and Mediterranean Avenue, were situated in a low-income, African-American neighborhood; higher-value properties, such as Pennsylvania Avenue, Park Place, and Ventnor Avenue, were situated in wealthier neighborhoods. Various Monopoly-inspired board games have since been created, typically following a similar naming convention suffixed with "-opoly".

Marvin Gardens, the furthest yellow property, is a misspelling of its actual name, Marven Gardens. The misspelling was introduced by Charles and Olive Todd, who taught the game to Charles Darrow. It was passed on when their homemade Monopoly board was copied by Darrow and then by Parker Brothers. The Todds also changed the Atlantic City Quakers' Arctic Avenue to Mediterranean, and shortened the Shore Fast Line to the Short Line. It was not until 1995 that Parker Brothers acknowledged the misspelling of Marvin Gardens, apologizing to the residents of Marven Gardens. Short Line refers to the Shore Fast Line, a streetcar line that served Atlantic City. The B&O Railroad did not serve Atlantic City. A booklet included with the reprinted 1935 edition states that the four railroads that served Atlantic City in the mid-1930s were the Jersey Central, the Seashore Lines, the Reading Railroad (now part of Norfolk Southern & CSX), and the Pennsylvania Railroad. The Baltimore & Ohio (now part of CSX) was the parent of the Reading. There is a tunnel in Philadelphia where track to the south was B. & O. and track to the north was Reading. The Central of N.J. did not have a track to Atlantic City, but was the daughter of the Reading (and granddaughter of the B. & O.) Their track ran from the New York City area to Delaware Bay and some trains ran on the Reading-controlled track to Atlantic City. The actual "Electric Company" and "Water Works" serving the city are respectively Atlantic City Electric Company (a subsidiary of Exelon) and the Atlantic City Municipal Utilities Authority.

UK version

In the 1930s, John Waddington Ltd., known as Waddingtons, was a printing company in Leeds that had branched out into packaging and the production of playing cards. Waddingtons had sent the card game Lexicon to Parker Brothers hoping to interest it in publishing the game in the United States. In a similar fashion, Parker Brothers sent over a copy of Monopoly to Waddingtons early in 1935 before the game had been put into production in the United States. Victor Watson, the managing director of Waddingtons, gave the game to his son Norman, head of the card games division, to test over a weekend. Norman was impressed by the game and persuaded his father to call Parker Brothers on Monday morning—transatlantic calls then being almost unheard of. This call resulted in Waddingtons obtaining a license to produce and market the game outside the United States. Watson felt that for the game to be a success in the United Kingdom, the American locations would have to be replaced, so Victor and his secretary Marjory Phillips went to London to scout out locations. The Angel, Islington is not a street in London, but a building (which also gave its name to the road intersection where it is located, as well as an area of the city and a Tube station). It had been a coaching inn that stood on the Great North Road. By the 1930s, the inn had become a J. Lyons and Co. tea room and is today offices and a Co-operative Bank. Some accounts say that Marjory and Victor met at the Angel to discuss the selection and celebrated the fact by including it on the Monopoly board. In 2003, a plaque commemorating the naming was unveiled at the site by Victor Watson's grandson, who is also named Victor. It might be expected that the railway stations in Monopoly would have been chosen to allow travel in the four compass directions—for example: Euston, St Pancras or King's Cross (north); Liverpool Street or Fenchurch Street (east); London Bridge or Victoria (south); Paddington (west). However, all four stations had been owned by the same company, LNER, prior to nationalisation as British Rail(ways). It has been suggested that Waddingtons chose LNER stations because this was the company that served Leeds where they were based. During World War II, the British Secret Service contacted Waddingtons, as the company could also print on silk, to make Monopoly sets that included escape maps, money, a compass and file, all hidden in copies of the game sent by fake POW relief charities to prisoners of war. The standard British board, produced by Waddingtons, was for many years the version most familiar to people in countries in the Commonwealth, except Canada, where the US edition with Atlantic City-area names was reprinted. Local variants of the board are now also found in several Commonwealth countries. In 1998, Winning Moves procured the Monopoly license from Hasbro and created new UK city and regional editions with sponsored squares. In December 1998, the game was initially sold in just a few W H Smith stores, but demand was high, with almost 50,000 games sold in the four weeks before Christmas. Winning Moves still produces new city and regional editions annually. The original income tax choice from the 1930s US board is replaced by a flat rate on the UK board, and the $75 Luxury Tax space is replaced with a £100 Super Tax space. In 2008, the US edition was changed to match the various European editions, including the same flat $200 Income Tax rate and increased $100 Luxury Tax amount.

Here and Now

Beginning in the UK in 2005, a revised version of the game, titled Monopoly Here and Now, was produced, replacing game scenarios, properties, and tokens with more modern equivalents. Similar boards were produced for Germany and France. Variants of these first editions appeared with Visa-branded debit cards taking the place of cash—the later US "Electronic Banking" edition has unbranded debit cards. The success of the first Here and Now editions prompted Hasbro US to allow online voting for twenty-six landmark properties across the United States to take their places along the game-board. The popularity of this voting, in turn, led to the creation of similar websites, and secondary game-boards per popular vote to be created in the UK, Canada, France, Germany, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, and other nations. The US edition of Monopoly Here and Now was released in September 2006. This edition features top landmarks across the US. The properties were decided by votes over the Internet in the spring of 2006. Monetary values are multiplied by 10,000 (e.g., one collects $2,000,000 instead of $200 for passing GO and pays that much for Income Tax (or 10% of their total, as this edition was launched prior to 2008), each player starts with $15,000,000 instead of $1,500, etc.). Also, the Chance and Community Chest cards are updated, the Railroads are replaced by Airports (Chicago O'Hare, Los Angeles International, New York City's JFK, and Atlanta's Hartsfield–Jackson), and the Utilities (Electric Company and Water Works) are replaced by Service Providers (Internet Service Provider and Cell Phone Service Provider). The houses and hotels are blue and silver, not green and red as in most editions of Monopoly. The board uses the traditional US layout; the cheapest properties are purple, not brown, and "Interest on Credit Card Debt" replaces "Luxury Tax". Despite the updated Luxury Tax space, and the Income Tax space no longer using the 10% option, this edition uses paper Monopoly money, and not an electronic banking unit like the Here and Now World Edition. However, a similar edition of Monopoly, the Electronic Banking edition, does feature an electronic banking unit and bank cards, as well as a different set of tokens. Both Here and Now and Electronic Banking feature an updated set of tokens from the Atlantic City edition. One landmark, Texas Stadium, has been demolished and was replaced by the Irving Interchange exit ramps the join Texas State Highway 183 (Airport Freeway) to Texas State Highway Loop 12. Another landmark, Jacobs Field, still exists, but was renamed Progressive Field in 2008.

In 2015, in honor of the game's 80th birthday, Hasbro held an online vote to decide which cities would make it to an updated version of Here and Now. This second edition is more a spin-off as the winning condition has changed to completing a passport instead of bankrupting opponents. Community Chest is replaced with Here and Now cards, while the Here and Now space replaced the railroads. Houses and hotels have been removed. Hasbro released a World edition with the top voted cities from all around the world, as well as at least a Here and Now edition with the voted-on U.S. cities.

The Mega Edition

Winning Moves Games released The Mega Edition, with a 30% larger game-board and revised game play, in 2006. Other streets from Atlantic City (eight, one per color group) were included, along with a third utility, the Gas Company. In addition, $1,000 denomination notes (first seen in Winning Moves' Monopoly: The Card Game) are included. Game play is further changed with bus tickets (allowing non-dice-roll movement along one side of the board), a speed die (itself adopted into variants of the standard edition; see below), skyscrapers (a tier of building after hotels), and train stations that can be placed on the Railroad spaces. This edition was adapted for the UK market in 2007, and is sold by Winning Moves UK.

Empire

Monopoly Empire has uniquely branded tokens and places based on popular brands. Instead of buying properties, players buy popular brands one by one and slide their billboards onto their Empire towers. Instead of building houses and hotels, players collect rent from their rivals based on their tower height. The first player to fill their tower with billboards wins. Every space on the board is a brand name, such as Xbox, Coca-Cola, McDonald's and Samsung.

Token Madness

This version of Monopoly contains 8 of the 56 tokens from the 2017 Token Madness event. That includes a penguin, a television, a race car, a Mr. Monopoly emoji, a rubber duck, a watch, a wheel and a bunny slipper. The Penguin and Rubber Duck, alongside the T-Rex, (which was not present in Token Madness) would eventually become part of the main game, replacing the Boot, Wheelbarrow and Thimble. The T-Rex would be replaced by the returning Thimble in the 2022 Throwback Token Vote.