Released in 1983 by Milton Bradley, the Inspector Gadget game players assumed the role of the iconic cyborg detective and tried to stop the nefarious activities of M.A.D. (Mean and Dirty) villains.
GAMEPLAY
Two to four players chose an Inspector Gadget pawn and placed it on the START space. The eight MAD Villain tokens were also placed on pre-determined locations on the board.
The player that played first had to move all the Villain tokens forward the number of spaces indicated on each token before taking their turn. The first player repeated the action in every round of gameplay.
Regardless of whether the MAD Villains were on the move, a basic turn required a player to spin the spinner to determine the number of spaces they should move their pawn along the circular path that ran around the board.
Players captured the token when they landed on a MAD Villain by exact spinner count, provided it was not on a space marked MAD on the board. To add a bit of intrigue to gameplay, players could steal tokens from each other by landing on the same space occupied by another Inspector Gadget pawn.
Various Command Spaces on the board also provided positive and negative directives for players, including the ability to “use your extending arms” to capture tokens, lose a turn, and jump to various locations on the board.
The first player to capture three or more MAD villains and drop them at the Jail space was declared the winner.
IN THE BOX
A complete game included a board, four Inspector Gadget pawns, four plastic pawn bases, 8 MAD Villain tokens, one spinner, and one plastic spinner arrow. Instructions were printed on the bottom of the box.
COLLECTOR CONSIDERATIONS
The Inspector Gadget game is an excellent addition to collections of simple family board games published by Milton Bradley, and games based on television series. The colourful game board makes for a nice display piece, but those wanting to preserve the game should be wary of colour degradation due to light or other environmental factors.
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