YOU can tell a lot about a person from playing a board game with them. One minute you are enjoying the jolly japes of Hungry Hungry Hippos or Boggle, then the next you are staring deep into your opponent's cold, black soul – a bit like when Pandora's Box opens and all the bad things come flying out.

It was a thought that crossed my mind the other day when perusing a list of new board games out this autumn. There was one called Ultimate Arrogance which is billed as a "high-stakes game of bluffing and deception" with the aim to be "the most arrogant person in the room".

There's an obvious joke to be made here about it being based on [insert name of the politician who irritates you most], but that would be a cheap shot. Whoops. Too late.

Besides, isn't wily cunning the sum total of what all board games come down to? I've long been dubious of the happy families you see on TV shows enjoying harmonious rounds of Monopoly, Cluedo and Scrabble. Where are the tears, tantrums and Machiavellian tactics?

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I remember playing Trivial Pursuit with my late father circa the early 2000s. The game itself dated from the 1980s and it's fair to say the question cards were a tad out of date.

My dad: "What European country comes last alphabetically?"

Me: "UK … No, wait. Vatican City."

My dad: "Wrong."

Me: "Wrong?"

My dad: "Yugoslavia."

Me: "The former Yugoslavia broke up a decade ago."

My dad: "I can only take the answer on the card. No blue wedge for you."

I was also caught out by where a true Bohemian lives ("Czechoslovakia"), what country took part in the 1952 Summer Olympics after a 40-year absence ("The Soviet Union") and the location of the Black Forest ("West Germany"). No prizes for guessing who won.

To be fair, my father inherited that fierce competitive streak from my grandfather. It still stings decades later to recount the bitter climax of a particularly ruthless match of Connect Four against my grandpa when I was seven.

The object, as the name suggests, is to get four matching counters in a row. I had three lined up and was about to place a fourth for the big win when my grandpa moved with lightning speed to block the slot I was reaching for before neatly dropping his counter into a neighbouring row.

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He declared victory. My sobs of outrage were so anguished that my gran came rushing from the kitchen fearing I had fallen headlong into the two-bar electric fire.

During lockdown, I have often thought about getting the board games out but with everything else going on it didn't feel right to start World War Three over a game of Buckaroo.

I know what you are thinking: learn to play nice. But where's the fun in that?

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