curtis baseman

In 1998 the first Cranium party game was introduced — a combination of elements that had appeared in other party games including art, trivia, language, and performance. The game took off and made its creators a mint, and also turbocharged the career of artist Curtis Baseman (who created the characters that appear on the box). Several other spinoff games were added to the market before Cranium and all that had to do with it was sold to Hasbro Games in 2008. Now Cranium is about to turn 25 (yikes) so Hasbro is introducing new versions of four Cranium games: the original that started it all, Big Brain, Hullabaloo and Hoopla. This revamped line will start appearing in stores this June (see above pic for what they’ll look like). Our one complaint: where is Baseman? The same characters appear on the box of the 25th Anniversary Edition, but they’re clearly drawn by someone else. Was Baseman not available? Did he get snubbed? Where has he been all these years anyway? Below