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The difference between a pierogi and a bodega is that one is filled with sauerkraut and potato and the other with cigarettes and lottery tickets.

I was playing Bananagrams this weekend and came up with some game-play variations to expound upon the existing, boring rules. Try and let me know what you think.

Super Anagrams
The objective is to construct as few a words as possible that are all connected. Distribute all the tiles evenly and say “split” to start.  If you are the first person to finish you say “bananas” and the other players have 2 minutes to finish (or risk being disqualified). The first person who finishes gets to subtract the number of other players from their total word count. For instance, if three people are playing, and I go out with 10 words, then I subtract 2 giving me a score of 8. The second person who finishes would subtract 1. The person with the lowest score wins.

This game is interesting because even if you go out it doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll win. This game also makes it much more about making large anagrams quickly.

No Repeats Method:
This is a modification of the original game. Play the game normally except when someone yells “bananas” everyone else continues until they finish their letters as well. Also, players are not allowed to repeat any of their words. The first person who finishes then reads all their words aloud. If any words or configurations are repeated or illegal, that person is disqualified and then the second place person reads their words. Continue until you have a winner.

I like this as the standard game because it encourages everyone to finish and prohibits excessive use of redundant two-letter words.

Banana Sprint
After a standard game is over, have each player shuffle their tiles up on the table. Then have each player select tiles (2 players = 4 tiles, 3 players = 3 tiles, 4 players = 2 tiles) and pass the tiles faced-down to the person to your right. Say “split”, flip over the unknown passed tiles and play normally–obviously without the dump or peel. Create connected anagrams as fast as you can.

We started playing this way because we were too lazy to flip over all the tiles at the end of the game. Everyone is familiar with their tiles at this point so this goes much faster–hence sprint.