With the meetup that we have planned for next week scheduled, it occurs to me that some of you may not fully understand the little details of this game, and so I feel the need to provide you with information on how to play. We're not talking about actual rules, here, mind you-- I assume everyone knows those. (Just in case: adjective goes down, everyone takes a noun from their hand to match the adjective and throws it in, judge picks the best one, they get to keep that adjective, first player to win a certain amount of adjectives that was pre-determined wins.) I'm talking about how to be a good Apples to Apples player. That said:

1. Either be funny or serious, but try to be on topic.
Yes, occasionally totally random cards are entertaining, but doing that is usually pretty worthless, because someone who is either more dead-on or funnier than you wil usually win the card. Let's say, for example, somebody puts down the adjective "sexy". "Marilyn Monroe" would be an awesome "straight" card for this, because she's a famous sex symbol. Something good that's funny for this card would be either somebody distictively NOT sexy ("Captain Kirk") or something incredibly disturbing that can result from sex ("AIDS"). Something like "paper" might make somebody giggle because of the randomness, but paper has nothing to do with sexy, and after a lot of rounds that go just like that, it can get irritating.

2. Inside jokes usually win, assuming most people know them.
Using the example from above, let's assume that Amber was in this game, and "sexy" came up, and you have "trees" in your hand. Absolutely play it! Other examples of this are just straight bemani jokes-- If the adjective in question is lovely, sweet, or pretty, and someone put down "a poodle," I know that I would give it to them...

3. Stating the obvious can be funny.
Let's assume the adjective that goes down is "fuzzy." If you play "fuzz," I don't know anybody that wouldn't give you that card. Same thing with "sex" for "sexy," and many other examples that I don't care to mention.

4. There are straight judges, and there are funny judges. Figure out who your judge is and take it into account.
Playing "the sun" for "hot" isn't going to get you anywhere with me if someone else plays "Hannibal Lector." I prefer the absurdly funny crap, personally. On the other hand, someone else might go for the best straight answers, which can also be awesome if done right. Learn everyone's judging style the first go-around, and stick with it.

Now that you've read this post, you are totally prepared to play a game of Apples to Apples with the Bemani community. :