This past
Sunday was the monthly meeting of our gaming group, 3rd Sunday
Gamers. Several of the members teach at my
son’s school. One of them brought a new
game, Numero, and we played 10 Days in the USA. I realized that I missed a few great games
that really need to be mentioned when talking about educational games.
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| Photo by Tony Archer |
Numero was very interesting and very
good. Essentially, players are
attempting to lay down numbered cards into multiple piles from their hand to make
matches. Once a match is made, the
matching player takes that pile and set it before them, sort of like taking a
trick. Rather than create a new pile,
players can change the value of the pile by adding numbers to it. There are also “wild” cards that allow you to
perform other arithmetic operations to a pile.
In this way, the value of the pile can be matched and taken. Not only were there the basic operations
(adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing), but with percentages and a
cube root thrown in, this game was a math refresher in a box, yet actually was
a lot of fun. It could be tuned to
younger players by taking out some or all of the wild cards. I had never seen it before, but it definitely
bridges the “educational” vs. “fun” divide.
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| Photo by Nathan Morse |
To start
things off, though, we played 10 Days in
the USA, which is part of a larger series of games that I should probably
write about. I actually gave this game
to my wife for Christmas a few years ago because it reinforces United States
geography, so I really had no excuse for missing it. In this game, you are attempting to create a
trip throughout the states by walking, driving or flying. Walking and driving requires you to know
which states touch or are close together.
A map board is provided. This
game not only bridges the gap, but builds a autobahn between “educational” and “fun”!
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| Photo by Z-Man Games |
We closed
the night with Pandemic, which
thinking about it, also has a map board as part of play. It shows the major cities around the world,
and therefore would also be educational to some extent. I miss that because this game is so much fun!! Honestly, this is one of my favorite
games. It is also a big hit in our
group, with roughly 20 plays in the group.
Beyond geography, it really teaches teamwork. I won’t go into it more; I will put a link to
my previous review.
We also
played 7 Wonders. While thematically based on history, game play
really doesn’t teach history. There
might be some background on the 7 Wonders of the Ancient World somewhere in the
box, but then I missed it. It was a very
good game; everyone liked it. I had
prepared much more than the last time I tried to teach it, which was a disaster
due to lack of preparation. We managed
to get in two plays, a learning game and a real play. I will review it in the future.
Playing four
games, and one of them twice, made for a great day. Any of these games would be great in a family
or casual setting. I’d love to be able
to tell you who won what, but we really don’t care that much. Hey, we have enough trouble keeping track of
who’s turn it is! But now,
It’s
Your Move!
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