In Monopoly Deal, the player's goal is to make three full sets of properties of different colors. Each set consists of specific number properties of the same color (depending on the color, e.g. Browns have a two property requirement while the Light Blues have three). Each turn, a player draws two cards and plays up to three cards, either placing a property, adding money to their bank, or using an action card. Players can use payment cards to make their opponents pay from their bank or give up their properties if not enough cash is saved. Deal cards bypass payment and allow the player to instantly take away properties from their opponent.
A variant named Monopoly Millionaire Deal (out of print) changes the goal from collecting sets to collecting one million Monos (Monopoly Dollars, stylized as M). There is also a video game version of the original Deal game for the PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One.
In 2020, a spin-off called Monopoly Bid was released. While the goal is again collecting three complete sets, players now bid on properties and trade them with others. There's no charging rent, but properties can still be stolen.
Note: In the 2008-2017 versions, card values were written as M[number]m; most websites simplify the notation as [number]M. The 2018 and 2024 revisions mark the values as M[number]. This article uses the prior version's simplified notation.
Monopoly Deal provides examples of:
- Adaptation Distillation:
- No Chance or Community Chest, Go to Jail, Free Parking, taxes, mortgages, auctions, and trading. It's all about collecting properties and charging money on other players. As such, the game as a whole takes far less time to complete than the board game. It's even the main selling point posted on the box's front.
- Monopoly Bid goes further by only having properties, bidding, and trading. Even the properties are simplified as none of them are named. The wide variety of action cards from Deal are reduced to four in Bid.
- Anti-Magic:
- The Just Say No! cards in Deal repeal any action card targeted at the player. The attacker can also play a Just Say No! card to remove the target's card and so on.
- Bid has the similar Nope! card that repeals Wild!, Steal!, and other Nope! cards. It is the only card that any player can use at any time.
- Area of Effect: The It's My Birthday! and dual-color Rent cards affect all players except for those who play a Just Say No! card.
- Auction: The main gameplay element in Bid. Players secretly choose the amount to bid and reveal it to each other at once. The highest bidder wins that property and places their money cards onto the discard pile; the rest return their money back to their hand.
- Awesome, but Impractical: The House and Hotel cards add rent value to properties. Like the standard Monopoly rules, a House can be only be placed on a complete set, and a Hotel then added after a House. Houses and Hotels cannot be added on Utilities and Railroads. There are also a scarce amount of House and Hotel cards to begin with. By the time one of the building cards are played, someone has taken your property by either a Deal Breaker or by payment.
- Boring, but Practical: The lower ranked property sets are not worth much in rent but owning one complete set is useful to meeting the winning requirement.
- But Thou Must!: If the player doesn't have enough money in their bank to pay, then they must use their played properties (as each property has its own value). There is also no such thing as change; the attacker gets all of the target's money even if it goes above the original payment.
- Cap: Deal and Millionaire Deal have a seven card hand limit; any excess cards are removed after a turn ends. Both games also have a three card play limit, and a player who makes a complete set of a color cannot make another set of that color. All of these limits are removed in Bid.
- The Cameo: The various iconography from the Monopoly board game appear as decorative backgrounds in Bid.
- Color-Coded for Your Convenience:
- Just like in the board game, the properties are coded in their respective color (e.g. Baltic Avenue is brown, Boardwalk is dark blue). This is useful for the dual-color Wild Property cards and Rent cards, as these work for the two colors shown on the card.
- The Money cards have different colors for each value. Action cards have their background color match their monetary value; for example, a Deal Breaker (worth 5M) and a 5M card are both purple.
- Compressed Adaptation: Morrisons, a UK supermarket, had a limited promotion of select card games given for free after a certain amount of products were purchased (or for £3). A simplified version of Deal was among one of them. It reduced the card deck from 110 to 52, so some properties and action cards were either reduced or removed. Interestingly, it added the exclusive Forced Purchase card, where a player is forced to sell a property from an incomplete set for double value.
- Discard and Draw: The Pass GO card makes the player draw two cards. A player has a hand limit of seven cards, so any excess cards are discarded at the end of the player's turn. Should a player start their turn with no cards, their hand is refilled to five.
- Equipment Upgrade: A player can upgrade their House to a Hotel. While the official house rules say that the added value increases rent from 3M to 4M, unlike the board game, the House is not removed from the property set.
- Fun Size: A keychain version reduces the size of the cards in half.
- Instant-Win Condition: Subverted. A player can alter their property sets to ensure a three complete set win, but only in their turn. Doing this out of turn (due to a sudden realization) is not allowed, and doing it anyways will give opponents the opportunity to take away the player's now known winning properties.
- Joisey: The same Atlantic City streets from the board game appear in Deal. Millionaire Deal has unique locations and Bid has no names.
- Lethal Joke Weapon: The Brown properties and Utilities are not worth much in rent, but it only requires two cards to complete their set.
- Money for Nothing: Only cards on the table can be used for payment, meaning that a player with a low bank amount has to forfeit properties even if they have money on their hand. Also, change is never given—you will have to overpay if you can't (or won't) do anything better.
- Money Multiplier: The Double the Rent! card can be played (and counts toward one of the three plays) alongside a Rent card to make players pay double the rent of a property set. Using a Rent card and two Double the Rent! cards quadruples the rent.
- No-Sell:
- Sly Deals and Forced Deals are ineffective against full property sets. The inverse works for Deal Breakers.
- A Multicolored Wild Property has no monetary value and thus cannot be given away as payment. Only Deal cards allow opponents to take them.
- The Steal! card in Bid only works on incomplete sets. A complete set is safe from being compromised.
- Non-Indicative Name: The Deal cards are basically "Steal" cards. The target in question gets little to nothing in return from a deal.
- Obvious Rule Patch: The 2024 version no longer allows a complete property set to consist entirely of Wild properties.
- Power Nullifier: Any Action card can be played as a Money card at the expense of becoming only money for the rest of the game.
- Rags to Riches:
- Everyone starts with no money and properties. The players use their cards in hand to build a steady set of cash in the bank in order to avoid using properties as payment. Subverted in the sense that money is not the overall goal of the game and bankruptcy does not kick a player out of the game (unlike the board game).
- Played straight with Millionaire Deal as the main goal is to reach one million Monopoly Dollars.
- Rare Money: There is only one 10M card in the game.
- Ridiculous Future Inflation: All currencies are increased to the millions mark, except in the 2018 and 2024 revisions, which are reduced to the ones mark. Downplayed with Millionaire Deal, despite its flashier themes, money is counted in the thousands.
- Themed Stock Board Game: Not to the extent of the board game, but Deal's popularity has earned it some licensed themes. Averted with Millionaire Deal which has none and is out of print.
- There Is No Kill Like Overkill: Unless a Just Say No! is in play:
- The rent for a complete Dark Blue set plus a Hotel is 12M or 15M (depending on how one interprets the building cards). Adding the Double the Rent! cards increases its value to 24M/30M for one card and 48M/60M for two cards. Playing a single Double Rent! is enough to take away everyone's assets.
- Playing two Deal Breakers in a single turn while owning one complete set is an instant victory.
- Tiebreaker Round: In Bid, players who tie in an auction get to bid again. If a second tie occurs, then no one wins, and all players take their money back.
- Updated Re-release:
- The game was updated in 2018 with a blue box. The cards' artwork is more colorful, and most cards sport illustrations of Uncle Pennybags. The denomination has changed from millions to ones.
- Another update was released in 2024 with a green overall theme, more simplified and modernized artwork, and larger text.
- Zillion-Dollar Bill:
- Denominated in millions, so a M3m card is worth three million Monopoly Dollars.
- Subverted starting in the 2018 revision, the values are dominated in ones, so a M3 card is worth three Monopoly Dollars.
