Although the roots of Monopoly stretch back to 1903 when American economic activist Elizabeth Magie created The Landlord’s Game to demonstrate the evils of land monopolism, it wasn’t until 1935 when Parker Brothers released their greed-rewarding variation of this game that we all know today. Although Monopoly was an instant success in the USA and UK, its global popularity only thrived after World War II – and at that point, Hungary’s occupation by the Russians and subsequent inclusion in the Soviet Union meant that such a capitalistic pastime as Monopoly was effectively banned here.
However, illicit homemade copies of Monopoly were played behind the Iron Curtain, so in 1966 Hungary’s communist leadership decided to counter this with the development of a more collectivism-friendly version of the game: Gazdálkodj okosan!
– roughly translating to “Manage your finances wisely!”. As opposed to ruthlessly driving fellow players into bankruptcy as quickly as possible while amassing a personal empire of houses and hotels, the aim for every contestant in Gazdálkodj okosan!
is to buy one home for yourself and gradually equip it with such luxuries as a couch, sewing machine, and vacuum cleaner.
While accumulating appliances and furniture, Gazdálkodj okosan!
players also land on spaces forcing them to pay for various everyday expenses (such as riding the tram or trolleybus, buying groceries or shoes, and investing in a savings account) while some spaces provided free activities like visiting the zoo, the museum, or playing sports. Meanwhile, moralistic messages were clearly imparted with exorbitant prices for landing on spaces to buy alcohol, tobacco, or going out to a nightclub.
Despite its somewhat mundane character, Gazdálkodj okosan!
was quite popular among Magyars (and can still be found today in the closets and basements of grandparents across Hungary), but predictably, the regime change here in 1989 meant that free-market playthings like Monopoly were suddenly in high demand here.
In 1992, Hungary became the first nation of the former Soviet bloc to have an official Monopoly version published in the native language and customized to feature domestic streets and squares on the board’s spaces, as opposed to the Atlantic City locations still used in the game’s original version – and to this day, Monopoly endures as a favored amusement for avaricious Magyars.
Considering that the British version of Monopoly focuses on purchasing London locales, it would seem that Budapest would serve as the financial playground for the game’s Hungarian equivalent. However, the designers apparently decided to give cities across the country a chance to be bought up by little metal cars, dogs, top hats, thimbles, and wheelbarrows – while the names of many board spaces don’t always seem precisely based on actual squares and streets, the different color-coded property categories are named after locations traditionally associated with various towns like Pécs, Debrecen, Szeged, Eger, and Sopron.
Nonetheless, two prominent Budapest sites occupy the top-rent spots most commonly associated with Atlantic City’s Park Place and Boardwalk – Vörösmarty Square is the second-most-expensive property, while anyone who lands on Dunakorzó (the Danube Promenade, a rather fitting counterpart to Boardwalk) should be prepared to pay major Monopoly money for rent if they don’t hold the deed. Also, the railways are appropriately named Keleti, Nyugati, and Déli – although it's impossible to climb aboard a train at the nonexistent Északi Station referred to on this board.
In addition to the classic-style game, a Hungarian-language Monopoly Magyarország version is also available nowadays, with the board featuring dapper old Mr. Monopoly holding the national red, white, and green flag before a backdrop of major Magyar landmarks; instead of individual streets, players can buy entire towns or Budapest attractions like the Royal Palace or Margaret Island. Hungary’s communist-era leaders certainly wouldn’t have condoned such plundering of the country’s community chest, but at least in the Monopoly version of Budapest real-estate speculation, nobody will actually go to jail!
