[GuB-42]

The worst part is that while Monopoly has its flaws, a good part of what makes it so "unfun" is house rules.

Played by the rules (or using the official "short game" rules), it is not that bad. There has been a lot of progress made in board game design in the last few decades and there are way better options today, but if you are stuck with Monopoly, just read the damn rulebook, it will improve your experience a lot.

A game should take less than an hour, involve a lot of negotiation, and be pretty aggressive (gameplay-wise!).

[paulddraper]

Disagree.

Monopoly without rule modifications is nearly unplayable.

Specifically, the monopoly dynamic.

[GuB-42]

Curious to know what are your rules modifications.

By terrible house rules I mean things like collecting money on "free parking", limiting trade or not auctioning unbought property.

I have yet to see commonly practiced house rules that improve the game. I am sure there are, but most people who know enough about game design to actually improve on the game typically don't play Monopoly.

[paulddraper]

Removing the monopoly requirement for building.

[ipaddr]

The free parking win all money on the board gives everyone a comeback chance

[GuB-42]

The big problem with that rule, and it is a common theme in most house rules, and in many games other than Monopoly is that it puts back into play money that should have been destroyed.

Games have a fine tuned balance between resource sinks and sources, if you break the balance, for example by removing a sink, as it is the case here, you break the game. Here it tends to result in much longer and boring games.

Plus, it is a poor comeback mechanism. If you don't have property, cash alone is not enough to get you back into the game. Monopoly already has a limited but better designed comeback mechanism with "repair" cards.