New Monopoly token will replace old piece. Is the car or thimble at risk?
Monopoly, everyone鈥檚 favorite game of real estate development and financial ruin, is shaking things up a bit.聽 And it means some players will have to make a change from their default tiny metal avatar.
In a new upgrade of the popular board game, parent company Hasbro is replacing one recognizable Monopoly game piece with a new Monopoly token, and it鈥檚 letting the public decide which one.
鈥淚n an unlucky roll of the dice, every Monopoly token has landed in jail,鈥� a promotion on the game鈥檚 Facebook page reads. 鈥淥ne will be locked up forever and replaced with a new piece. Luckily, you鈥檒l have the chance to vote to save your favorite token every day. Don鈥檛 skip your turn!鈥�
Voters can choose to save one of Monopoly鈥檚 seven iconic tokens: the battleship, the car, the Scottie dog, the top hat, the old shoe, the iron, the wheelbarrow, or the thimble. Additionally, the public will vote in one of five new tokens. The choice is between a robot, a helicopter, a guitar, a diamond ring, and a cat.
鈥淭he tokens are one of the most iconic parts of the Monopoly game and we know that people are emotionally tied to their favorite one,鈥� Eric Nyman, a senior vice president of Hasbro Gaming, told the Daily Mail.聽鈥淲e can鈥檛 wait to see which iconic piece will 鈥榞o to jail鈥� and which new token the fans will choose to become part of one of the world鈥檚 most popular games.鈥�
The voting runs until Feb. 5, and the new edition of the board game will be available later this year.
Aside from a few small tweaks here and there, Monopoly has stayed much the same since its launch in the mid-1930s by Parker Brothers. The color-coded properties, for instance, are named after streets in Atlantic City, New Jersey 鈥� some of which no longer exist.聽
But there has been some variance in the game pieces, originally made companies who also made charm bracelets (many of the original tokens, in fact, were popular charm pieces as well).聽 Discontinued pieces from the original version include a lantern, purse, and a rocking horse. Others, including a cannon, a man on a horse, and a sack of money, have come and gone.
And losing your favorite metal avatar, be it by way of corporate forces or being out-argued by a demanding fellow player, can be rough. When my family played Monopoly, my mom was always the man on the horse, a piece no longer in the classic edition of the game.聽 I always wanted the dog but usually ended up with the car or the hat.
But which piece will get the axe this time around? We may have an answer already. In the forthcoming book 鈥淢onopoly, Money, and You,鈥� author and Monopoly expert Phil Orbanes conducted an online survey to determine which game piece was the most popular, as well the personality profile of users of each piece. Orbanes, and the book, 聽in American Public Media鈥檚 radio program, Marketplace.
According to the survey, the most popular piece was the car, used by one out of four players. Tied for second were the Scottie dog and the top hat, each used by one out of five players.
The loser, by far, was the wheelbarrow, preferred by only 3 percent of players. 聽A British bookmaker, Paddy Power, is placing the wheelbarrow at 4/5 odds to be the piece to go.
If you鈥檙e a wheelbarrow who wants to save your piece, you can vote on Monopoly鈥檚 , or on Twitter with the hashtag #tokenvote.聽
