The Final Boss

Party games are games that encourage social interaction. The Final Boss can also be an entertaining teaching tool; it can show how to be mindful of others when you are in charge, how to keep your cool when you are being treated unfairly, and that nothing in life is certain. But who cares? You are here because you want to beat your evil Boss!

Preparation: Cut out the 6 icons. The Boss gives one of each, to any 2 players that engage in a Fight. The Boss holds the instructions card, as a symbol of authority. The card shows to all who's the Boss!

How to play: The game works in rounds. If the Boss wants to start a new round, the rest of the players have to comply. If they don't follow orders, then they might not get many coins!

A round has 3 phases:

1) Bossing around: Whoever owns the Boss’ card, can give small chores to the other players: “Make my bed, calculate 3x7, do 5 push-ups, sing some lyrics, lick your elbow”, whatever! It has to be a task that it can be done in under a minute.

During this phase, the game is more like a social experiment. The Boss may try to make the players feel incompetent, so that they will make mistakes when they Fight. This is both a physical and an emotional challenge, as the workers try to not be affected by the Boss' remarks. Remember, this is just part of the game. No hard feelings!

2) Pay the workers: After the minute is over, the Boss decides (by any criteria) who deserves to get paid more, and gives coins to each player. A player gets 1 coin, another gets 2, the next gets 3 and so on. No two players should be given the same amount of coins. The "coins" can be represented by anything, from paperclips to small rocks.

The Boss may comment how good or bad the players did with the tasks.

3) The Tournament: The first 2 phases could cause frustration to some players. Just enough to want to be the Boss and teach him/her a lesson! Or be the Boss just to have their room cleaned by other players. I don't know, humans have weird motivations! What matters is that the Boss now challenges every worker into a Fight! Whoever has the guts to face the Boss has the chance of taking the Boss' title! Yeah, hardcore stuff. The biggest challenge however, may be a player's own psychology, as the negative feelings can cloud their judgment and end up losing the fight. The 3rd phase is mostly a mental game that will test the players' endurance, clear thinking and how well they manage their emotions.

The participation in a Tournament Fight costs 1 coin. If you run out of coins as a worker, you are out of the game and you can't become Boss this round. The Boss remains in the game until someone takes his/her place. If a player gets removed from the game, they can still cheer for whoever they support. But this might backfire with next round's chores!

Tournament phase: If 2 or more players have the same amount of coins, the most recent winner among them, chooses who to fight next. If that is not the case, then the player with the most coins chooses option 1 or 2:

1. Pick a player to Fight. The winner gets 1 coin from the loser.
2. Spend 1 coin to Fight the Boss. If the player wins, loses all coins and becomes the new Boss. The new Boss receives the instructions card from the Boss that lost in the Fight. That card may change several hands during the Tournament.

Win conditions: The last remaining person in the Tournament, is the Final Boss. That person wins the game. Yes, the instructions card and the 6 icons belong to whoever gets to be the Final Boss! Until perhaps the next round!

The Fight: Fighters pick one of their 3 icons and reveal it at the same time. Whoever gets 5 points (pts), wins the Fight:

In case both players reveal the same icon, it’s a draw (0pts).

So, what kind of Boss will you be if you win the Tournament?