Reviewed by Another Gamer -- Board Game Reviews by Josh: Abalone Review

This past winter I mentioned that Abalone was played on a Scout outing. I didn't give it a full review, but overall I think it's a good 2-player game. It is very easy to learn and play, even for kids down to about seven years old.

Josh Edwards is a well respected reviewer on the web, here is his review:

Board Game Reviews by Josh: Abalone Review

It's Your Move!

The Gambit – Is Chess Good for Schools?

Okay, if you have been reading my blog, or even just read the title block, you know where I am going to come down on this.  I teach chess in my son’s grade school.  Nonetheless, there are issues with teaching chess in schools:  promoting an elitist attitude, scaring kids off, and finding adults to help!  At the same time, there are alternative games that encourage some of the same thought processes. 

First of all, chess can be elitist.  There will be kids who join to prove they are smarter than everyone else.  Worse, there are parents who push their children into chess to prove to the world that their kid (and by extension, the parent) is smarter than everyone else.  I have been to conferences for gifted children where chess clubs were promoted specifically for gifted children, and I have mixed emotions about it.  Chess is a great way to provide more challenge to gifted child.  It doesn’t focus too much on one academic area, and doesn’t feel like “school work”.  Lastly, because chess is “the game of kings”, there are behavioral expectations that go with the game, including playing quietly and with self-control and good sportsmanship.  I worry about gifted children growing up to be “egg-heads” and lacking the softer, interpersonal skills that are so necessary for success at work and in relationships.*  I don’t want to see chess become the exclusive territory of the gifted, however.  “Normal” kids need fun mental challenges that help nurture the thinking processes and teach personal skills too.

Yet, so often (and maybe because of those gifted programs) those “normal” kids are scared by chess, feeling if they are not “smart enough” to play the game.  I frequently hear adults say this very thing; we should expect their kids to feel the same way.  This just isn’t the case.  Anyone can learn the game.  The child, or adult for that matter, may never be the next Bobby Fischer or Judit Polgár, but can love the game and get something out of it nonetheless.  I am a great example of this; I love chess and yet, with a rating in the low 1400’s, I am only a class C player.  I read chess books when I have the time, but honestly I don’t expect to even break into the B class at 1600.  Having fun is far more important than winning or even being a great player.  (Otherwise I wouldn’t game at all!)

Lastly, finding the adults who want to participate is difficult.  In the public school system for Columbus, OH, there has been an employee specifically hired by the district to provide those schools with a chess program.  That is by far the exception to the rule, and that completely leaves out private schools and small districts.  It’s sometimes tough to find adults to teach the gifted kids.  Finding someone to deal with the rest of the school population can be nearly impossible.

Nine Men's Morris - Promo image at Amazon

If chess proves to be too much of a problem, what can be done?  Don’t give up; start a gaming club instead.  There are plenty of classic, quick and relatively inexpensive games that are suited to teaching problem solving skills and sportsmanship.  A short list of abstract games would include Reversi (Othello), Mancala, Backgammon and Nine Men’s Morris.  These games do not need a teacher/coach who is familiar with the game.  The rules are more simple and straightforward and the strategy not as deep as chess.  

There actually are some advantages over a chess club with this approach.  First of all, younger kids can be included with games like checkers.  There are a lot of games that are variants on checkers, both more and less difficult.  As the kids get older, they could be introduced to pool checkers, which someday I would like to learn.  Furthermore, the list isn’t limited to just abstracts.  My wife has had great success playing 20 Questions for Kids as a team game with the after school program.  There are teachers running gaming clubs at schools who are playing some of the other types of games I discuss in this blog.

Games are so important to intellectual and social development that I think all kids should learn to play them.  If your school doesn’t have a chess program, consider a gaming program.  If there isn’t someone to start it, why not you?  If none of that is available, at least play at home.  If you keep playing and reading, I promise to keep writing!

It’s Your Move!

Related Posts:

Gaming Resources – BoardGameGeek: the Doorway to my Demise

Related Links:

Othello – Board Game Geek entry

Mancala – Board Game Geek entry

Nine Men’s Morris – Board Game Geek entry

Backgammon – Board Game Geek entry

20 Questions for Kids – Board Game Geek entry

Judit Polgár – Wikipedia entry

Bobby Fischer – Wikipedia entry

* A few years ago, it was suggested to my wife and me that our son might be gifted.  I am not sure how that actually is measured, but I do know that he is a straight-A student.  Our concern isn’t that he is provided an advanced curriculum to further advance his intellect, though that would be nice.  Our main concern is that he learns empathy, compassion, teamwork and leadership, growing up to be a productive citizen and a faith-filled man.  That’s our job as a parent.  In my engineering career, I have met lots of incredibly smart people who couldn’t lead hungry Boy Scouts to lunch, and can never see when someone is hurting.  That’s not who we are raising Daniel to be.

Mass Market Mêlée – Risk: Revised Edition

Most of my friends and acquaintances have two games they consistently know, and one of them is Risk.  This is the Epic Game for most of them; the game that produced most of the fond (or not!) memories.  I have to admit that I really like Risk, and I am glad to have played it.  Past tense.

Photo by Leo Zappa

A few years ago, Hasbro floated a small print run game to the gaming community:  Risk: Black Ops.  It was a very hot item, and it is said it was really a marketing study for the revised rules they were considering for a revision to Risk itself.  Regardless, the rules from Black Ops were incorporated into the rules for the 2008 edition of Risk.  This has taken a game I have always enjoyed but was too long for most evenings to a new level: a new game I will play anytime! The new rules introduced cities and capitals.  The overwhelming power of the cards was reduced.  Lastly, objectives were introduced, which now define the game end and winning condition.   I am going to take the liberty of assuming you know how the original game worked.

Cities and capitals change the count for armies at the beginning of the turn.  Cities are placed on the board randomly at the beginning of the game, and each player places his or her capital in a territory they control at the beginning of the game.  Rather than just count countries at the beginning of their turn, players count countries and cities, then divide by three to get newly recruited armies.  Another army is added if the player still controls their own capital.  Armies are still gained for controlling continents.

Cities and capitals go on the board at the start; some of the bonuses from objective go on too. (Photo by Liang Roo Wang)

Gone are the massive armies generated by turning in cards.  Cards have one or two stars on them, and the number of stars turned in determines the number of armies received.  Any number of cards can be turned in, totaling a maximum of ten stars.  However, you won’t want to hold onto your cards that long!

Objectives are the biggest change by far.  They give the cities and capitals even more importance, as they shape the endgame and victory conditions.  At the beginning of the game, eight objectives are placed on the map.  These objectives may include taking over an opponent’s capital, controlling a certain number of cities, conquering an entire continent in one turn, or some other goal.  This is the biggest change to the game, because the first person to achieve three objectives wins!  Forget about wiping people off the board!

The combination of these changes results in a game that is very familiar yet far more fun.  The combat dice rolling is still there, as well as most of the major elements.  However, this game now plays in 90 minutes, and after many plays I have never seen a player eliminated!  Never again will people be sitting around for hours to find out the winner of the game they were eliminated from hours ago!

Strategically, there are important differences.  First of all, there is “turtling” in Australia or South America: building up a massive horde to OVERRUN THE WORLD IN STEEL AND BLOOD!  Mwahaha! – er, um, yeah.  No, if you are building up a massive army, you are losing time to those who are skirmishing and raiding to take those objectives (some of which give a combat bonus).  You will lose.  The name of this game is opportunism.  It is probably a little less strategic and a little more tactical than the original, but it is much more fun!

For the family gamer, the new Risk  is excellent for age eight and above.  The only issue with children is the emotional one; some kids are just not ready for Mommy or Daddy to grind them down and seize their cities and capitals.  Tears may be the result.  However, children approaching 9 or 10 could easily grasp the rules.  Given that most people could be given a three minutes explanation of the rule changes, and would know the rest, I believe this game is a must have for the casual gamer.  It will easily bring back those epic games of the past.

One additional note:  This is the same game as Risk: Onyx Edition.  However, the line between Iceland and Greenland is missing in the Onyx version.  This is a misprint: the line is supposed to be there.

Vital Statistics:

Risk (Revised)

                Ages:                    10 and up

                Time:                     90 minutes

                Players:                 3-5

It’s Your Move!

Never Underestimate the Awesomeness Factor

I learned something this weekend about the need for Awesomeness; it is still incredibly important to my 13 year old boy.  It may very well be the difference between giving a game a chance or not.

 Battle Cry and it's great visual appeal - Awesomeness! (Photo by Joe Keller)

We have been playing Battle Cry, a game with a modular board that lets players set up various battles from the American Civil War.  The game has various miniature plastic pieces which represent infantry, cavalry, artillery and leaders. The play is very quick and very fun, but a little light (at least as far as wargames go).  Daniel loves it when we play, and I thought another Civil War game with a little more depth and complexity might work well. I asked, and he looked over the titles of my other Civil War games and picked one.

Friday night I was in front of the TV with the family punching out the little cardboard squares that represent units, leaders, political influence and game markers and bagging them as I do.

For the People has more interesting game play, but isn't as cool (Nick Avtges)

My son says, "Dad, are those the pieces to the game?"

"Yes Daniel, though it's not just the units.  This game also incorporates the events and politics of the war, so there are markers for those, too."

"Oh.  Dad, it looks kind of, well, boring."

"Is that because it doesn't have miniatures?"

 "Um, yeah.  I am more interested in a game that has something that at least stands up and looks like the soldiers."

Oh well, I guess I will see if I can trade my copy of Combat Commander: Europe for Memoir '44 , which is in the same game series as Battle Cry.  That way WWII is still a possibility...

It's Your Move!

I am asking too much...

I have been listening to the Ludology Podcast to and from work.  There are several podcasts that I listen to regularly; this particular one is more of a once-in-a-while type of thing.  The topic was family games, and it ventured into a discussion on the developmental stages of children and what games work well at those stages.  I came to realize something in this podcast -- I am asking too much from my chess club kids.  Simply put, chess offers too many decisions with too many options that impact too many moves down the road for these kids, particularly the younger ones, to grasp.  I thought starting at 4th grade would allow for more cognitive ability, but I was wrong.  Some of the junior high kids should start to get it, but the younger ones, no.

I guess that really means I am a chess teacher, and not a chess coach.

It's Your Move!

Zooloretto Mini-Expansions

I purchased min-expansions shortly after I received the game as a gift.  Since I finally played the base game this weekend, I thought I would punch out those expansions.  Some of them look interesting and shouldn't really add much in the way of rules.  This is a good thing for a lighter game used to introduce games to new people (a "gateway" game).  It keeps the game fresh for those who have played it a lot without complicating the game for new folks.

I also discovered we missed a rule in Zooloretto this weekend that would have put more money in the gameplay.  We will have to play again.

It's Your Move!

A Game for the Whole Herd - Zooloretto

This weekend our gaming group met, and we featured the Spiel des Jahres winning games I own.  I have owned Zooloretto for several years, but had never managed to get it to the table.  Our group has recently (and suddenly!) grown to over ten players, some of whom are not familiar with hobby games.  I had heard Zooloretto worked well as an introductory game, so it was time to give it a try.  The game is thematically fun, has good components and has simple and elegant gameplay.

Image by tiggerix

In Zooloretto, each player is attempting to build the most complete zoo; the zoo that would attract the most visitors.  (No visitors were harmed in the playing of this game.)  Players are rewarded for filling their animal pens, building vending stalls, and expanding their zoo for more.  However, having too many animals and vending stalls is costly; they are stored in the barn and reduce your chance at winning. 

This game has solid, quality components.  Coins are wooden disks painted gray.  The animals, stalls and random coins are represented by tiles.  Coins on tiles are worth the same as the disks.  Each player has their own board to play on, which represents their zoo.  These are not the full thickness of a normal game board, but they are certainly sufficient.  There are wooden tile racks, referred to as “delivery trucks”, which are also included.  Each rack holds three tiles.  There is no real “awesomeness factor”, but the art is certainly of good quality.  If there was one drawback, it was that some of the players had trouble telling which animals were which on opposing zoo boards.  While the instructions discuss setting out three draw piles for the tiles, a draw bag is included so that is handled.

The game is played over a series of rounds.  The end is determined by how long the tiles last, which is impacted by how many players are in the game, and how full the trucks are upon delivery.  On their turn, each player chooses to perform one (not all) of three actions:

·         Draws a tile from the bag, reveals it to be an animal, coin or vending stall, and places it on a delivery truck;

·         Picks up a delivery truck, which may or may not be full.

·         Performs one of several money actions, which are primarily about expanding your zoo and moving animals around.

The catch is that once you have taken a truck, you get no more turns this round!  That’s where the biggest decision point is:  do I wait to receive a full truck, or do I take a truck with tiles I want early to make sure I get those tiles.  (Hmmm, or do I take the truck early to make sure you don’t get the tiles you want!)

Image by Chris Norwood

After everyone has taken a truck, everyone simultaneously places their tiles: animals in their pens, vending stalls on vending sites, and coins in with the money they already have.  If you have a male and a female, they immediately produce a baby – a free animal!  If you don’t have space for any animals or stalls they go in the barn.  Of course, you can only have one animal type in each pen, which is what drives the truck decision I mentioned above.  Now the next round begins.

After the game is over, points are scored.  Points are given for how well you have filled your pens and built vending stalls.  Points are taken away for animals and vending stalls stuck in your barn. 

As you can see from the theme and the overview of the rules, this is a game well suited for children and those who dislike direct confrontation.  As a result, it makes a good casual game, but it makes a superb family game.  I completely understand why this game won the Spiel des Jahres.  It is definitely a game that I will be pulling out for certain friends of ours for whom building a zoo would make a fun game. 

There are expansions, quite a few of which I own but haven’t played.  When I get a chance I will review them.

Vital Statistics:

Zooloretto

                Ages:                     8 and up (little ones will want in; they may need Mom or Dad)

                Time:                     45 minutes

                Players:                 3-5

It’s Your Move!

Good Camping Game ≠ Good Scout Game

I spent the first half of this week at Boy Scout Summer Camp with our troop.  It was a great experience, despite the rain.  There is no better way to see how the future of our society will react to adversity than watching patient, yet determined young men (or women, your mileage may vary) work through mud, wet gear and soaked wood to build a fire in the pouring rain.  It makes me proud to think maybe I have some slight influence for good there.

Yet, all is not perfect.  One of the things I learned in the course of this week is that games that are good for camping, which I have discussed before, are not necessarily good for Scouts.  I had a deck of cards and several games with me at camp, three of which came out: Hive, Bandits, and one of my travel chess sets.  All were put to good use; putting them away was the issue.

Image by David Detwiler

Looking around the table, it was easy to see that playing cards were not given much respect.  In fact, the deck of playing cards that I brought had a few bent cards after just an hour.  I don’t particularly care about that; standard playing cards are cheap and easy to replace.  However, Bandits is a card game that uses its own cards, not standard cards, and would not be as easy to replace.  The game never really caught on in the gaming world, since it is a little simplistic and without a whole lot of choices.  Those facts make it great for young Scouts with little gaming experience; however, it also makes it a game that didn’t stay in print.  If I want it for future events, I need to keep it safe.  It went to bed when I did.

A took a bit more of a chance with my chess set.  Some of the boys were still up when I retired, and chess, unlike Bandits, is a well known game.  One of the new boys was playing, but with an older Scout, so I figured it would probably be okay.  I was wrong.  One knight was lost in the mud.  Since the pieces are less than a half inch tall, and the knight was maroon in color, it was never found.  The new Scout felt pretty badly, but disappointingly the older Scout was pretty cavalier about it.  I knew it was a risk, and I chose to take it, so I am not horribly upset.  I guess for each of those determined and patient Scout there is one who still needs work.  Well, they are boys after all.

Hive is always a huge hit! (Image by Richard van Vugt)

With Hive, I am taking an even bigger risk.  I left it at camp to be returned to me at next week’s troop meeting.  This game was once again a huge hit, and several more boys were introduced to it and loved it.  I left it with a new Scout, and left an older Scout to follow behind him.  The pieces are big and few in number, so I am confident I will get it all back.  Honestly, it was too good an opportunity to teach responsibility to one and leadership to another, so I couldn’t pass it up.  The senior Scout loves games, so I think he will place a little more value on the game coming back whole.

What makes a good Scout game?  First of all, it really needs to be fairly durable (or disposable), just as any other camping game.  Secondly, it really needs to have fairly simple rules.  Some of these boys find Egyptian Ratscrew, a variant of Slapjack, to be a good game, and that (along with Pokemon cards) may be the limit of their gaming experience.  A game like Pandemic may be asking too much, even if it is a good teamwork game.

I will be keeping a separate game bag for my Scout games.  What about you?  After all,

It’s Your Move!

P.S. - Yes, I know that right now Brandubh is also showing as a game I played recently.  I played it with one of the camp councilors.  Afterward I gave it to him, since they can never have too many games and they may need something to do on a rainy evening too.  It's an ancient game that can be made from a board printed on cardstock and aquarium stones.  Let me know if you are interested, and I can shoot you a copy.

Invest your most precious commodity - Time

For the first part of this week I am at Scout Camp.   In my absence, I have asked follow game blogger Trent Howell to post his thoughts as a guest.  A little about Trent...


Trent Howell and family believe that every family should spend more time together playing games. Like most families, Trent and his wife try to find balance among all the activities pulling family members in different directions. By making it a priority to sit down and play games together, they’re able to reconnect with one another in a fun way that strengthens everyone involved. And to encourage other families around the world to enjoy the benefits of spending more face-to-face time with their families, they created The Board Game Family.

Through The Board Game Family, the 6 members of the Howell family share their love of games by publishing video reviews of fun family board games and card games as well as writing articles related to the benefits of family game time. But unlike other reviewers, The Board Game Family reviews come mostly from the children. It’s the kids that describe in the video reviews why they like to play the game.

Trent hopes that by sharing their enjoyment of games with others, more families will be encouraged to strengthen their own family relationships - and will have fun along the way. So check out www.TheBoardGameFamily.com to see what games might be good for your family’s game table.

If you were asked about any recent investments you’ve made, your mind might immediately turn to stocks, bonds, businesses, real estate, precious metals or some other large monetary purchase. Most likely no one would be surprised by that type of answer because that’s what we’re conditioned to think of.

Yet when asked at the end of one’s life what they wished they had done more of, most people don’t typically say money. What they wish is that they had spent more time with their family members.

But is it really "spending" time at all?
When we think about money, "spend" typically means we’ve passed our money on to someone else - we no longer have it. But when we "spend" time with those we love, we aren’t losing it at all. Instead we seem to be filled even more.

And that sounds a lot more like "investing" than "spending".

Time = Money?
You may have heard the phrase "time is money." However one of the biggest differences between money and time is that we can find ways to get more money. But no matter how talented we are, we just can’t find ways to increase the amount of time we have each day.

In a very real sense, our time is much more valuable than money. Yet we frequently hear stories of parents who buy things for their kids to make up for the lack of time they spend with them. They spend money because it’s easier than spending time.

But what if we can find a way to make the most of both our money and time?

Board games = great investment of Money and Time
Board games are a great way to invest both your money and your time. First, they don’t cost a lot of money. You can find a ton of great board games or card games for less than $30. Second, they don’t take a lot of time. But most important of all, they provide a fantastic return that keeps giving more and more every time you use it.

Sure we can spend $50-60 taking our family to the latest blockbuster movie. And we can have a great time and enjoy the experience together. But after those couple hours of staring at a screen are over, they’re over. But with a board game - we get to spend the time together over and over again. And in the process we’re talking to each other, seeing each other smile, and teaching values along the way.

Board games can provide a truly rich environment for investing time with your family.

Our time really is our most precious commodity.
The great thing about investing time in our family relationships is that our time spent with family can also generate our most precious memories.

Thanks to Trent for filling in for me.  Next time I (Frank), will be back, but until then

It's Your Move!

Kids Games – Yes!; Movies – No!

It would make perfect sense to think a blog on casual and family gaming would include children’s games.  So, why haven’t I reviewed any?  Simply put, my son who is going on 14 years old has outgrown them, so I am really unfamiliar with any of the current crop of kid’s (under 10 years old) games.  I have reviewed Hey! That’s My Fish, but primarily because it works so well as an adult game too.  I may eventually do others, but it probably will never be a prominent feature.  My apologies.

It's a simple logo, but has lots of good info.

There are places to find out about this stuff, though.  The guys over at FatherGeek frequently cover children’s games on their blog.  However, if you are looking for a review site, rather than a blog, I would recommend KidGameRatings.  Here you can find games by age group, by name or search in various ways.  Like BoardGameGeek (BGG), it relies on user ratings, so these are real parents rating them.

Right on the front page is a short list of games that are appropriate for 2-3 year-olds, 4-5 year-olds, 6-7 year-olds, 8-9 year-olds, and kids aged 10 or more or 12 or more.  Just these lists of seven games in each age bracket make a quick birthday or Christmas list.  The last three lists are great games that really aren’t “kids” games, but also for adults.  (This is somewhat true of the 6-7 year-old list too.)  In fact, I own quite a few of them and trot them out for my game group. 

Clicking on “more” at the bottom of any of those lists brings up the search page.  In each case, it shows the same thing: all games sorted by minimum player age.  However, that’s also where it gets fun.  On this page, the viewer can put in a minimum age, a minimum rating, and a minimum number of ratings and get a more customized report.  There are headers that can be clicked for sorting, and a link is provided to each game’s BGG page. 

The actual “Search” page allows you to search for a specific game name or publisher name.  This is handy for finding out if you really want to give your child that copy of the Finding Nemo game, or if you will regret it.  Unfortunately, the database is not all-inclusive.  You won’t find Lucky Ducks, or the hint that the game goes off incessantly in the box and will drive everyone insane!

Nonetheless, the site is a wealth of information.  As fast as kids grow older (supposedly it’s at the same rate as parents, but I’m not sure I believe that!), the games they will be interested in will change quickly.  Soon it will be time to start the indoctrination  introduction to our adult gaming world.  They can play the “kid’s” games with their younger siblings or friends.

I only have one word of caution.  It was almost enough to keep me from writing about this site, but in the end, it’s not really about gaming, so I am okay with it.  This site also recommends the movie My Neighbor Totoro, which is AWFUL!  We rented it years ago, and it became a standing joke.  Really.  It ranks at the bottom with Cloverfield, which I saw last week and is easily the worst movie I have seen in the past ten years.

So read KidGameRatings.com for the game reviews, but NOT the movies.

It’s Your Move!

Kinderspiel and Kennerspiel des Jahres

Recently I wrote about the Spiel des Jahres, which is the German game of the year award for family games.  This annual award focuses on the types of game I write about in this blog, but is not the only award handed out.  The group that hands out the Spiel des Jahres also awards the Kinderspiel des Jahres and the Kennerspiel des Jahres.

The Kinderspiel des Jahres is the children’s game of the year, and spotlights those games with the 4- to 6-year old child in mind.  Many of the games under consideration never make it “across the pond”, so we in the States never see them.  I would like to see more of them available; I am pretty certain there are a few that bridge the gap between children’s and family games.

The Kennerspiel des Jahres will be far more interesting.  I am not sure how the term directly translates to English, but the purpose of the award is to spotlight games of interest to hobby gamers.  This year is the first year for this award, which was created (at least as I understand it) to avoid giving away “special” awards year after year, which has been happening of late.  These games will be available in the US, though only through specialty stores.  This year’s games include 7 Wonders, Lancaster and Strasbourg.  Many people thought 7 Wonders would be a Spiel des Jahres nominee, since it is very much a family game.  From reading the rules, it does look like the first game would be tough; there are a lot of icons on the cards.  That fact may have pushed it up to the next category.

I only have 7 Wonders, and it hasn’t made it to the gaming table yet.  (Almost, but not quite!)  Of the games either nominated for this year’s awards or recommended (those not quite good enough to get a nomination), I have three:  7 Wonders, Qwirkle (which I reviewed) and Blockers.  I will ask someone to bring Forbidden Island, rounding the month’s game session to plays of four different games.  At that point, I can review 7 Wonders properly and let you know what I think.

My monthly game session will occur about the time the awards are announced, and I will post the winners.  Until then…

It’s Your Move

Qwirkle - Matt's Opinion

Fellow blogger Matt Stevenson wrote another, more in depth review of Qwirkle.  You can find it at:

http://boardgamebackroom.blogspot.com/2011/06/fresh-baked-qwirkle-by-susan-mckinley.html

It's Your Move!

Mass Market Marvel – Qwirkle

What in the world is a Qwirkle?  You know the old saying: “He’s a psycho, you’re eccentric and I just have a little Qwirkle!”  No, can’t say I’ve heard it either…

Promotional image from Mindware

Qwirkle is a game for two to four players that has been described as Scrabble with shapes and colors.  Not exactly how I would phrase it, but nonetheless it gives a mental picture of what each player is doing.  It has been available at Target for quite some time, and has made its way to K-mart in my area, which is fantastic.  Why?  Because it is a great game that won the 2007 Mensa Select award and is now up for the 2011 Spiel des Jahres.  It is fun, accessible for all ages, and develops pattern recognition skills.  However, do not mistake this for an “educational game”; this game is quite a bit of fun!  What follows is a look at the pieces, an overview of game play, and a bit on accessibility.

The components to Qwirkle consist of black blocks with six shapes painted in six colors on the “face” side.  The combination of color and shape gives thirty six individual blocks, each of which is repeated three times for a total of 108 pieces.  There is no board; the only other component is the draw bag.  The heft of all of these blocks means this game is a great game to play outdoors.  Nothing will blow away in the wind.  I probably wouldn’t take it camping (and certainly not backpacking!) due to the size and weight of the game, but my wife and I have played at the football field during our son’s practice with just a little folding game table and some chairs.  Playing this on the porch on a cool summer evening would be great!

Game play is equally simple.  On a players turn, they choose from one or more tiles in their “hand” and play them together to the table.  The goal is to create lines of one color with all six shapes, or lines of one shape with all six colors in a crossword style pattern.  One point is awarded for each tile (including already placed tiles) in the newly enlarged line.  If two tiles are added to a line of two existing tiles, the player will receive four points.  If they manage to add to more than one line, points are awarded for all of them.  If the play completes a line so that all six colors or shapes are present (called a Qwirkle!) the player receives an additional six points.  Then, tiles a drawn from the draw bag to replenish the “hand”.  The player with the highest score when blocks run out is the winner.  It’s easy to see where the comparisons to Scrabble come to mind.

Promotional image from Mindware

The game box says that children down to six years old can play, and that sounds about right.  Getting a typical 6-year-old to sit for 45 minutes at one game might be a trick though.  Nonetheless, Qwirkle is a game that we have taught lots of people to play, some of whom had never played games even as kids.  Occasionally, there will be a misplay by a new player, but I still sometimes make an illegal move by mistake, so I can’t complain there.  Those moves are normally caught by someone, before it becomes an issue.

This is a great game that I highly recommend.  It is priced very reasonably; great for a game on a budget. Particularly for family play, this game is fantastic.  

Vital Statistics:

Qwirkle

                Ages:                     6 and up

                Time:                     45 minutes

                Players:                 2-4 (but we have pushed this to six players!)

It’s Your Move!