Game time

[attach]421[/attach]Fashion personality Jeanne Beker says it’s strip tease of the mind.

It’s a game with no board, no dice and no playing characters, just a whole lot of questions printed on cards.

If you’re thinking questions on cards don’t sound all that cerebral or sophisticated, don’t let Gravitas fool you.

Developed by midtown entrepreneur Alan Gratias, the game is far from sombre and not at all simple. Its name Gravitas, which means substance or depth of personality in Latin, should indicate as much.

Dubbed the “the little box of big questions” Gravitas consists of a pint-sized box filled with 143 cards with questions players must answer. The questions range from profound (“Why the evil in man’s heart?”) to personal (“What is it you wish your mother understood about you?”) to fun (“What are you going to do with the mangos?”).

“We’re lacking in human connection,” Gratias said from his Summerhill home, adding the questions are designed to both promote self-awareness and reveal who you are.

Players can choose to answer the questions in a profound way or just off-the-cuff, he says. Whatever is deemed the best answer is the winner.

“Very often the fun, flippant answer can be the winner,” he says. “The point is to have fun.”

The game was first conceived at millennium party Gratias hosted where guests brought three personal items to go into a time capsule and then shared the stories behind them. The explanations generated such insights and conversation that he started developing the concept of a game that would reveal who we are.

Initially intending the game for baby boomers, Gratias says it turns out a diverse range of ages like playing it, including grandmas and tweenies. Not surprisingly, the majority of buyers are women.

Available online at [url]www.gravitasthegame.com[/url] Gravitas also sells in the new McNally Robinson bookstore at the Shops at Don Mills.

The most popular midtown seller is the Spotted Zebra on Yonge St., he says.

To sample a Gravitas question you can visit the website and submit your answer for a chance to win the game. The question changes weekly.

When he isn’t restoring old homes and growing lavender and chardonnay grapes in his Prince Edward County retreat, Gratias is busy devising a new batch of questions for the fourth version of the game. He carries a notepad around and composes some 20–30 questions a day — though not all make the cut, he says.

One of the questions he’s mulling around: “Why try to be different when normal is crazy enough?”

Maybe the answer to some questions is all in the asking.