99Rogers – Crown Heights – Thursdays @ 8 pm

The Trivia: Four themed rounds of ten questions each. One entirely music round (name the song & artist). The host offers double points on one round of each team’s choice, but you have to choose it before you hear the questions, so it’s a bit of a gamble there. Top-scoring team each round gets shots for the team. If two teams tie for a round, they each have to tell a joke as a tiebreaker; audience decides. The questions were fair, but challenging, with a few headscratchers. Overall, the questions were high quality, and its clear that the host puts a lot of effort into writing a balanced round of trivia. The host shouts the questions through a megaphone and they are… extremely… long. Like entire paragraph questions. Sometimes he throws a few extra hints in there, other times it was just a lot of needless exposition for a relatively simple question. IMHO, trivia night questions should not take much longer than ten seconds to read. If you need to tell a long story to connect it to the theme, then just pick a different question! Even the music questions run for far too long, often giving away the title of the song before the host cuts it off. As a result, the night takes longer, too! I’m an old man, I want to get home before 11! Besides that nitpick, I was very happy with the questions overall, and the host did keep the night moving efficiently and effectively.

$50 bar tab goes to the winner, but there is NO SECOND PLACE. I find this a very bad marketing strategy for the bar, as even a $10 to $25 bar tab pretty much guarantees the team comes back, and you KNOW they’re gonna spend more than that in drinks alone. The highest scoring team each round gets shots.

The Venue: 99Rogers is a dimly lit bar with sports on TV and a surprisingly robust selection of American eats (chicken sandwiches and tacos among them), plenty of beers on draft, and a handful of specialty cocktails (small wine selection, though). They have outdoor seating, but, unfortunately, Trivia must be played indoors. The place gets PACKED, so get there early to secure a booth near the host.