Point of Law
An Exciting Involvement Game
3M Company - 1972
Any Number of Players
Point of Law is best described as a trivia game based on the legal system. Any number of players can play. A summary of a court case (from a book of 100) is read aloud to the players along with four possible outcomes. The players discuss the case among themselves, then decide which of the outcomes is the correct one.
The actual result of the case is then looked up. Each player who reached the same verdict as the court receives a good result. Those who selected a legally valid outcome, but one other than the one the court reached, get a fair result. Players who selected a legally invalid outcome get a poor result. Players get points based on which outcome they selected. They get additional points if their outcome was the one selected by the majority of the players even if that outcome is an incorrect one. The game runs for ten cases and the player with the most points at the end of that time is the winner.
Point of Law is a different subject than your typical trivia game. It is apparently based on a radio show of the same name. The fact that the players discuss the case among themselves adds an involvement level normally missing from most trivia games and increases the social aspect of the game. The same discussions would probably make the game useful for educational purposes.
The only downside to the game is that there are only 100 cases and so after ten games you really can't play anymore (unless you have a really bad memory). Expansion sets would take care of this but I don't know if any were ever produced. Also, the only really important part of the game is the book; nothing else in the box (score pads and a master scoreboard) is really necessary.