42 Trivia

We first discovered 42 Trivia and its owner/host Pat Keenan at The Trestle in Cornwall way back in early 2015 before POW! Trivia was a thought in anyone’s mind, least of all the minds of its two founders.  After playing up the street at 2 Alices for a few weeks with no success to speak of, we thought we could use a change of scenery and decided to check out trivia night at The Trestle.  Inexplicably, The Trestle’s trivia was the same night at 2 Alices, which begs the question of how exactly a hole-in-the-wall town like Cornwall can support two of the more robustly attended trivia nights in the area occurring simultaneously.  But I suppose it goes back to that old adage, if you host trivia night, they will come.

42 Trivia consists of five rounds and a final question.  The second and fourth rounds are visual, with some kind of theme attached, while the first and the third are usually general knowledge.  The fifth round is referred two as the “Connections” round, because there are five general knowledge questions whose answers all have something in common, and identifying that common element is the answer to the round’s sixth and final question.  One time it was “alternate names for prison”, another it was “things that have hooks”.  Names of airlines and models of cars have also been used.  As a general rule, you either get the connection by the time you answer the second question or you don’t get it at all- sounds crazy, but seriously, this rule has never not held.

The final question always has the same format- you’re given four items and need to arrange them in an order (usually chronologically by date of occurrence, or by age if it’s a list of names).  You can bet anywhere from 0 to 20 points, but if you get it wrong you lose the points you bet.  Typically I’m not a fan of final questions in any form but I find this kind of final question a lot less offensive: for one thing, you can decide how many points you want to risk after you’ve seen the question, which makes the whole thing a lot more fair, and the structure of the question means it’s not a “you know it or you don’t” type deal like most one-answer final questions.  Even if you’re not 100% familiar with the subject at hand, you should be able to hypothesize your way to a reasonable guess.

42 Trivia was one of the POW! Trivia staples before there even was a POW! Trivia, so it will always hold something of a special place in our hearts.  And who knows, maybe one of these days we’ll be able to correctly guess the Connection Round answer after question 4 or 5, instead of needing to know it by the end of question 2 if we’re going to get it at all.  Not holding my breath on that one, though.

Overall: 7/10

Questions: 7/10– Generally well written, the only complaint is that they can sometimes be on the easy side.  This varies quite a bit from week to week, though.  We had a perfect game one week, and the next time we returned we really struggled.

Structure: 7/10– The connections round is unique and the final question doesn’t suck.  Would be nice if the general knowledge rounds were longer than just 6 questions, though.

Host: 8/10– Pat Keenan is great: he writes his own questions, knows is audience and his trivia regulars, and moves the proceedings along efficiently so you’re usually done within 2 hours of walking in the door.

Venues: 21 Burgers (Mondays), Irish Eyes(Tuesdays), The Trestle (Thursdays)