Paper tycoons vie for Monopoly championship

Link : http://uk.news.yahoo.com/041008/80/f45vm.html


TOKYO (Reuters) - On weekdays, Yutaka Okada is a mild-mannered economist crunching numbers for a big bank.


But at night and on weekends he transforms into a ruthless property magnate, wheeling and dealing to amass vast real estate empires, all the while trying to keep out of jail.


Okada is the world Monopoly champion.


On Friday, he faced 38 other cutthroat contenders in a bid to defend his title at the Monopoly World Championship in Tokyo, bringing together devotees of the classic board game.


"My mainstay is negotiation," said Okada, 37, wearing a navy-blue Monopoly Championship blazer and a green tie patterned with tiny teddy bears.


"I try to go for the 'high risk, high return' property groups, and then buy the unpopular properties, the cheap ones," he added.


"But mainly I try not to be too rigid, to move with the flow of the game."


Those traits held him in good stead in 2000, when he survived a three-hour final round, besting champions from 38 nations to claim the crown and $15,140 (8,500 pounds) -- which also happens to be the total amount of play money in a standard Monopoly set.


"Since I became champion, I'm often asked if I've made a lot of money in property," said Okada, who is an economist with Mizuho Research Institute, affiliated with Japan's biggest bank.


"But really, I've just bought and sold a few stocks. Just like your average person," he said.


Invented in the Depression era by unemployed salesman Charles Darrow, Monopoly, now owned by U.S. toymaker Hasbro, remains one of the most popular board games in the world.


The championships are held every four years.


The rules are simple: players try to bankrupt each other by buying land and forcing the others to pay exorbitant rents.


LESSONS IN LIFE


The game exists in 26 languages and more than 200 editions, among them a Japanese version in which the most expensive property is "Ginza", an upscale Tokyo shopping area.


The two-day event pits national champions aged 15 to 51 against each other in rounds to select five finalists. They use the "standard" Atlantic City version.


As one round began on Friday, players hunched over their boards and a tense silence, broken only by the rattle of dice, filled the room on the 40th floor of an office and shopping complex.


Soon voices began to rise as deals were proposed and rejected, some players tapping their feet nervously.


"It's good, just tiring," said Leon Hechtman, 21, from Australia, who went bankrupt in one of two rounds he played.


"All the dealings, the conversation, tires you out."


Okada played Monopoly occasionally as a child, but did not take it up in earnest until he was 30, after a TV show gave him the impression Monopoly "would open up the world".


For three years, he played 20 to 30 games a month and, in 2000, won the Japanese national championship and the world crown.


Worried about his employer's reaction, he took vacation time and quietly went off to the world championship in Toronto.


Even in the era of video games, Okada said, Monopoly has valuable lessons to teach.


"It's a game of communication skills, and these can be applied to work. I'm much better at listening and at expressing my own opinion that I was before," he said.


"It's also useful when I meet with my bosses. I can play up the value of my work or make excuses when it hasn't gone well."