The game I want most:

…I apparently I can’t get it until spring.  I saw this item in the last 10 minutes of the show and fell in love.  The game’s inventor, David Hoyt, was signing cards with me at the Top Trumps booth earlier in the day and he showed me this product in the 30 seconds he had before meeting Mike Gray from Hasbro to play games for the evening.  It’s called Word Winder andi n this game you use Boggle-like rules to mark letters that form a word in hopes of creating a path from one side of the playing area to the other.  The board is made up of lots of 4×4 letter squares so you can organize them and reorganize them any way you’d like. I cannot wait to get my hands on this one!

Word Winder Stats:

not for sale yet (I hear Mid-March)

Some other games I liked (in no particular order):

Faux•Cabulary by Out of the Box

This is an odd, but fun word-creation party game.  One player draws a card with a definition like “The Synthetic Fur Used to Make Cold Weather Garments” and the other players select 3 dice at random.  The card is read and players roll their dice once and use the face-up word bits to create a word that best fits the definition.  You get results like “AfroPuffFuzz” and “SuperFunkGrub” and the card reader gets to select the winner.  As a quick side note, I played this game with some Mennonites at New York Toy Fair and we had a blast.

Faux•Cabulary Stats:

~$25, Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble, Fat Brain Toys, mom & pop stores

3-7 players

20-30 minutes

Ages 13 and Up

Sutakku by Smirk & Dagger Games

Curt Covert, inventor of Sutakku, stopped me at the fair because he knows I have an affinity for push-your-luck dice games and he was dying to show me Sutakku.  It’s exactly that, a quick-playing, push-your-luck dice game and the goal of each turn is to create a high scoring stack for the highest point total after 5 rounds.   The general rule is to you roll 3 dice and select 2 of them to start or add to your stack.  You always have to stack numbers that are equal or higher than the number on the top of your stack.  There are bonus points for stacking on a 5 of 6 because you’re really pushing your luck and you score by multiplying the number on the top of the stack by the number of dice in the stack.  The one interesting catch is that the dice don’t have regular numbers on them, but instead symbols which I haven’t decided if I love or hate yet.  You don’t get the quick – OH YEA! after you have a good roll, but if your opponent has had one too many beers they might think they busted when they didn’t.  So the jury is still out on the art – but I like the big dice, they feel good to roll (dice game lovers will understand that comment).

Sutakku Stats:

~$25 Amazon.com, mom & pop stores for a location near you: CHECK HERE

1 or more players

15 minutes

Ages 14 and Up

Blindside by Talicor ~$30

Aparently this game sold out on Saturday and while I’m not a huge fan of abstract strategy, I get the appeal of this game.  It’s like checkers mixed with chess on crack.  The board is made up of a bunch of hexagons and each player (max 2) has 7 hexagon movers that have little arrow inserts which dictate how far and which direction it can move.  The goal is to attack your opponent by jumping or landing on them and then removing their arrow(s) which depleates their mobility.  When one player gets all of the arrows, they win.  The board can also change shape so I see the hours of fun this could provide for someone who really digs abstract strategy games.

Blindside Stats:

~$30, Specialty Retailers and Amazon.com

2 players

25-30 minutes (so I’m told)

Ages 10 and Up

Oversight by Griddly Games

I saw this game last ChiTag when it was still in prototype form (another reason ChiTag is so cool!) and this year it was for sale!  This is another abstract strategy but it’s definitely “lite” abstract strategy.  You have a board with 49 tiles (7 rows by 7 columns) and each player has colored coins and their goal is to get 4 in a row.  On their turn, players may either place one of their coins on any tile (the tile colors don’t matter – they’re just to distract you) or shift one of the rows of tiles that has an arrow next to it.  You shift a row by pushing one tile in either end and this shifts all of the tiles and any tokens that are on those tiles.  It’s definitely easier to learn than it is to explain in an article and has a similar feel to Gobblet or X-Ceter-O where it takes some thinking to win. (pic includes Reisa Schwartzman, Oversight inventor)

Oversight  Stats:

~$16-25 Specialty Retailers and Amazon.com (now) and Marbles Stores (next year)

2-4 players

5-20 minutes (depending on how many players and how good they are)

Ages 7 and Up

Doggy Doo by Goliath

It’s a game about a dog that poops a compound (think Play-Doh) and it makes funny noises as the poop is working its way through the dog.  That’s it, that’s all you need to know.  But if you want to know more, kids get to feed the dog a “treat” (the compound) and then they roll a die to see how many times they get to pump the leash (which moves the compound through the dog).  If the dog poops on your turn, you get to clean it up.  The first player to get 3 pieces of poop on their shovel wins.  Wow.

As a side note, this game came from Chicago invention firm Lund and Company (of TMX Elmo fame) and it was invented 15 years ago but didn’t find a home until Goliath picked it up in 2009.  To read more about the game’s history, click HERE.

Doggie Doo  Stats:

~$20 Toys ‘R Us, Walmart, Target, Amazon, AreYouGame.com and more

2-4 players

~10-15 minutes

Ages 4 and Up

Pick Me by Tree Toys, not for sale yet

Plastic Barbie-like arms in a cup?  Yea – I didn’t care what this game was about, it already had me laughing!  You use little guitars to flick picks into the cup of arms and if you get one to stick you win!

I should also mention that this game was so popular with people walking by that most of the parts for the sample that was out were stolen.  While that must mean they like it, shame on fair goers for depriving other gamers from testing this one out!

Pick Me Stats:

not for sale yet

Some other notable games I feel I must mention:

GameChanger by Identity Games

This game has been all over the news and they had a huge, popular booth – which was probably also the best-looking one at the fair!  If you haven’t heard about GameChanger, it’s a game board that you use with your iPad (yep, you plug it into the board).  So now your board game has sound, video and is interactive.  Right now it retails for $80 which is pricey, but the game board is like an extension of your ipad and it recognizes were your mover is on the board.  The starter kit has 2 games and I hear there are going to be more game “skins” in the future so hopefully you’ll get a lot of mileage out of the $80 starter kit. (Pic taken by GameChanger — mine was blurry!)

Pajaggle by Pajaggle Inc.

I heard that the Pajaggle people had a great show and their product will soon have a much greater distribution.  Congrats to them!  Pajaggle is like a far more complex version of Perfection, just without the popping mechanism and annoying ticking timer.  The pieces are extremely intricate which makes it a little harder to find their home space and some pieces even nest inside of others.  The game play is pretty straightforward, race another person or race against yourself – it does come with a timer.  There are some other little games but sadly a bunch of them require two sets or more to play and at $30 a pop it can get really expensive so fingers crossed that their greater distribution will bring the price down.  UPDATE: Additional piece packs will be available soon for $12.99.

First, thanks to all of you who voted for me – it just wasn’t my year.  I will say, I’m okay losing to Susan McKinley Ross; she’s a great inventor and her game Qwirkle won the Spiel des Jahres, so it only seems fitting that she took home the trophy!  Congratulations Susan!

Despite my loss, the evening was quite a success!  Again it was held at Chicago’s Museum of Science and Industry and this year the museum is hosting a Dr. Seuss exhibit which was quite cool!  Dinner even had a Seuss theme to it – Roast Beast and Thing 1, Thing 2 desserts!  I got pretty lucky and sat with fellow nominee Rory O’Conner who was nominated for the Rising Star award for his invention Rory’s Story Cubes.  We also sat with some new inventors and the always-funny Jason Schneider from Gamewright.  Even more impressive (sorry Rory & Jason!) during the ceremony I sat by Alan Hassenfeld, retired chairman of Hasbro and grandson of Harry Hassenfeld, who began Hasbro with his brother Helal.  Actually it started as “Hassenfeld Brothers” which got shortened to Hasbro in the 1960s – but seriously, could you imagine what it would be like to grow up in such a prominent toy family?!  I’d love to pick his brain for an hour!

Onto the ceremony, Tim Walsh was an AMAZING host (again)!  Tim’s the inventor of Blurt! and co-inventor of TriBond and did a little film called TOYLAND but I really think his calling is hosting awards shows!  The keynote of the evening was given by Richard Levy (at left), who has been an inventor in the toy and game industry for more than 35 years and is the co-developer of Furby and the game he’s probably best known for is Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus.  He also co-wrote “The Toy and Game Inventor’s Handbook” (which I have on my bookshelf) with Ron Weingartner, who I saw during cocktail hour.  Seriously, with ~400 guests this year it really was a HUGE industry event packed with some amazing people!  During the keynote Richard shared stories from his life as an inventor and talked about the earlier days in the industry.  He had a long list of advice for the newbie inventors – and as I’m writing this now, I wish I would have been taking notes but truthfully I was too nervous to think about it.

After Richard’s legnthy keynote, the awards began and the winners are as follows:

Excellence in Toy Design • Marty Abrams & Joel Rosenzweig, Fyr Flyz

Excellence in Game Design • Susan McKinley Ross, Qwirkle

Rising Star Inventor • Blake English, The Air Swimmers

Excellence in Character Creation • Theodor Seuss Geisel (see a theme here?)

Young Inventor of the Year • Greyson MacLean, BrickStix (and if you didn’t see him on Conan, you must watch! HERE)

Excellence in Electronic Adaptation of an Existing Toy or Game • Tom Liddell, Top Trumps

Hassenfeld Family Initiatives Humanitarian Award • Sir Torquil Norman (who was knighted by Queen Elizabeth in 2007 and is best known for Polly Pocket)

In Memoriam Recognitions:

Elliot Handler (founder of Mattel)

James Becker (developer of Gumby & Pokey, Barrel of Monkeys, and Othello)

Lifetime Achievement Award • Burt Meyer

Burt started his career at Marvin Glass and Associates in the mid 1950s and retired after founding Meyer/Glass Design (where I started my career).  He is responsible for some pretty classic inventions: Lite Brite, Mouse Trap, Toss Across, Rock’Em Sock’Em and many others.  Great story about Lite Brite is that it was licensed to Merrill Hassenfeld (the president of Hasbro at the time and Alan Hassenfeld’s father) the day it was shown.  Burt demonstrated the prototype to Merrill; he tried it and said “That’s my Item!”  Marvin Glass and Merrill got the deal done the same day.

Amazing!  — which also pretty much sums up the whole evening!

For those of you who have been to ChiTAG in the past, you know that it’s a mix of mass-market games from larger manufacturers and mass-appeal specialty games from medium to very small manufacturers.  Overall, I’d say that the majority games appeal to casual gamers and families and here’s a small taste of what you’re going to see:

Educational Insights  

I’m so excited that they have a booth this year because they have so many fun games in beautiful packaging!  First there’s Buck Buck Moose by Mary Jo Reutter, who was last year’s TAGIE winner for Excellence in Game Design!  Buck Buck Moose is a speed game for kids 4+ and you lay out 4 stacks of colored Moose cards, which have the most adorable drawings.  Then players take turns pulling long skinny cards out of a cardboard holder – which will either be Buck, the ranger, or a Moose!  When a Moose card is pulled, players race to slap the matching colored Moose and they get to keep that card.  Player with the most cards wins!

They also have The Sneaky, Snacky Squirrel Game! (invented by their very own Riley Wilkinson) and I raved about this game’s adorable packaging right after New York Toy Fair. (see HERE)  Thankfully, it’s not just a cute box – it’s also a fun game for kids 3+!  Players use squirrel-shaped tweezers to grab and steal acorns to complete their stash.  There are just so many cute things about this game that I’d like to post a bunch of pictures, but instead I’m just going to say “go to their booth!”  After seeing it I’m sure you’ll FIND a 3-4 year old to buy it for!

I should mention that Educational Insights doesn’t do just children’s games – they also have games like KaBAM!, a word-building card game for players 7+. Flip over 2 cards and use this 2-letter combo to create a word.  So if the cards are A and C if I yell “ACROSS” before my opponent yells “PACK” then I would win the pair of cards.  There’s also a KaBAM! round that adds some variety to the game, but I want to give the folks at their booth something to talk about.

Buck Buck Moose Stats:
~$12 ChiTag, EducationalInsights.com, Amazon.com
3-6 players
~10 minutes
Ages 4-7

The Sneaky Snacky Squirrel Game Stats:
~$20 ChiTag, EducationalInsights.com, Amazon.com
2-4 players
~10 minutes
Ages 3-5

KaBAM! Stats:
~$13 ChiTag, EducationalInsights.com, Amazon.com
2-4 players (although I recommend at least 4)
~15-20 minutes (you decide how many rounds you want to play!)
Ages 7 and Up

MindWare

A new exhibitor this year, MindWare is a catalog company that creates “brainy toys for kids of all ages” and works with inventors like Peggy Brown and Susan McKinley Ross to create fun, puzzle-like games.  Susan, who is up against me for the TAGIE for Excellence in Game Design, invented MindWare’s best selling game Qwirkle.  Qwirkle is a family game where players create lines of tiles with matching colors or shapes similar to the crossword-style play of Scrabble.

My favorite MindWare game was invented by Peggy Brown, and it’s called Q-bitz (reviewed HERE).  Q-bitz is a game where you use patterned dice to solve visual challenges and there’s going to be an oversized version of the game at ChiTAG with cubes that are 1 foot by 1 foot!  This is definitely a booth to stop by!

Qwirkle Stats:
~$25 ChiTag, MindWare.com, Amazon.com
2-4 players
~30-45 minutes
Ages 6 and Up

North Star Games 

I’ve reviewed their Wits & Wagers and Wits & Wagers Family games (see HERE and HERE) but they’ve come out with an interesting new game called Crappy Birthday.  I’ll admit I haven’t played this one yet, but I know it’s going to give at least a couple good laughs because the game is about giving and receiving bad gifts — and who hasn’t gotten a bad gift they laugh about years later?!

Crappy Birthday Stats:
~$15 ChiTag, Amazon.com
2-4 players
~30 minutes (or so the box says…)
Ages 8 and Up

ThinkFun

I’m a big fan of their single-player challenge game Solitaire Chess (reviewed HERE) – especially the iPhone app.  ThinkFun also has a bunch of great games like Zingo (see HERE) and Smart Mouth, but personally I’m looking forward to trying out their new word-search, single-player challenge game, PathWords, in which you use see-through Tetris-like pieces to mark words by covering the letters on a grid.  Does that make sense?  Well one look at the picture and you get what I’m trying to say.  Worth a peek I’m sure!

PathWords Stats:
~$20 ChiTag, Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble and anywhere that sells ThinkFun products
1 players
Play as long as you’d like
Ages 12 and Up

Spin Master

Yes, they’re in the game business!  And I believe they’ll be showing games like Quelf, which is like Cranium on Red Bull, and it’s counterpart Quelf Junior which is a game of wacky stunts for kids which is funny for a little while but didn’t have as much variety as Quelf.  Spin Master is also the one manufacturing Greg Zima’s game Stomple, which I talked about last year and reviewed this spring (see HERE).  Greg is another inventor who is nominated for the TAGIE for Excellence in Game Design.  I hear that there might be an oversized Stomple game at ChiTag, which would be really cool!

Quelf Stats:
~$25 ChiTag, Amazon.com, Target, Toys R Us, Barnes & Noble
3-8 players
~30 minutes
Ages 12 and Up

and the best for last…..Top Trumps

If I had to give ONE reason to go this year, what’s going on at the Top Trumps booth is it.  Yes, they have the World Record challenge happening with the Girl Scouts – but that’s not it.  They’ve giving away FOR FREE the Toy & Game Guru Top Trumps decks – and they’ve scheduled almost all of the inventors in the deck to be at their booth (#603) signing their cards!!  Yes, I’m lucky enough to be in the deck, so PLEASE stop by sometime between 12pm-12:45 on Saturday to say hi and pick up your free deck!!   I can tell you right now that I’m REALLY exciting about getting my deck signed by some famous inventors that I will most definitely geek-out about meeting!

Top Trumps Toy & Game Guru Stats:
*FREE* at ChiTag — and it is ONLY available at Chitag
2-4 players
~10 minutes to play — hours of fun reading all the inventor bios!
Ages 6 and Up

Some other companies you’ll see at the fair (and I’ve gone nuts linking each to a review of one of their games): Endless Games, Bananagrams, Find-It Games, Fun Q Games, Out of the Box, Buffalo Games, Rio Grande Games, also Mayfair Games, Talicor, Zobmondo, Moosetache Games, Smirk and Dagger, HL Games, Griddly Games…and I’m sorry to anyone I might have missed!

This year there out of the 12 finalists: Dollhouse, Dungeons & Dragons, Hot Wheels, Jenga, Pogo Stick, Puppets, R/C vehicles, Rubik’s Cube, Simon, Star Wars action figures, Transformers, and Twister, 2 were selected and one was ADDED?!  And the winners are….

Dollhouse, Hot Wheels and Blanket!  Yep, not a good year for games but definitely items I spent a chunk of my childhood playing with (yes, I was a girl who loved my Hot Wheels).  Still, I have to wonder how BLANKET ended up in the final list if it wasn’t a nominee (and I double checked this).  But I also am perplexed how so many non-toy/game items end up in the Hall of Fame.  Kids are naturally creative so really anything in their world can be a toy — and that’s great! — but I don’t know if I think they diserve a spot in the hall of fame.  I’d much rather see generic classics like Chess and Puppets make it into the Hall of Fame than things like box, stick and blanket.  Why?  Because chess and puppets were created as an amusement and they were successful whereas box, stick and blanket were created for different things and were “just happened upon” playthings.  To me, there’s a huge difference there and I wish the Hall of Fame would distinguish between those two types of playthings — of course, I’m an inventor so of course I put more stock in the intentional plaything versus the “happened upon” plaything.

In my neighborhood in Chicago, there are THREE small local toy and game stores that are joining together to celebrate.  *Play is a children’s toy, book and gift store run by my pal Ann Kienzle in Logan Square, Cat & Mouse is my local game shop in Bucktown and Building Blocks Toy Store is a little further away from me but it’s a classic toy and game store in Wicker Park and they’ve come up with a deal where if you visit all three stores on November 12th you get $30 — one $10 gift certificate to each store.  How cool is that?!

Other stores are doing product giveaways, raffles and charitable contributions or they’re providing special entertainment like bands, face painting, arts and crafts, scavenger hunts, game tournaments, yo-yo demonstrations, Hexbug races, and much, much more.

You can find out what’s going on in YOUR neighborhood by visiting the Neighborhood Toy Store Day website (click HERE) or look up your favorite local store on Facebook or Twitter and see what they’re up to!

“I really valued hearing people in the business talk honestly about their experiences. Because there are speakers from every aspect of the business, you get a 360 view of the industry. I especially love hearing about other inventor’s successes and sadly, but not uncommon in this business—failures. Mary Jo Reuters honest and funny account of how she kept track of her rejection submission demonstrated the persistence it takes to succeed while also demonstrating a good inventor’s necessary optimism for trying lots of new ideas.I also thought it was interesting to hear a large mass market brand say that often times game play isn’t looked at all that closely. The ability to communicate the game or toy in a 30 second commercial spot was far more important as high volume sales right off the bat was their driving factor.”

Gina Manola, Inventor of Notable Novelists
www.calico-kids.com

“I went through my notes from the conference and realized there is something I learned that I always keep in the back of my mind when I’m preparing a presentation.  ‘When you present a concept, make sure you clearly and effectively get your idea across.  You should be prepared to supply all important and relevant information so that when your concept is pitched internally it can speak for it self without you being there.’”

Andrew Mercer, Inventions in progress…stay tuned!
www.CautionLowSign.com

“I attended my first T&GCon after I’d already self-produced the game I invented.  What I learned is that I should have attended the conference much earlier in the game – before I hired anyone to work on my product – It would have saved me tens of thousands of dollars.   The panel speakers are both knowledgeable and approachable.  The organizers have set up the conference and all the networking events in such a way that make it super informative, yet casual and fun – a career catalyst for anyone looking to get into the toy industry, and a great way to make important face-to-face connections you won’t find anywhere else.”

Mary Kay Russell, Inventor of Ultimate Party Block by Fundex, (will be out this Christmas!)
www.kubit2me.com

“Because our industry is spread all over the world, we inventors can feel a bit isolated from our friends and colleagues in the biz . Email, trade shows and the occasional phone conference or road trip help, but they don’t compare to the information-sharing/connecting opportunities the T&GCon provides. Last year during the conference, I got to preview and discuss the box design for my new game Story Speller with Matt Nuccio, when it magically appeared on his iPad during a lunch break, fresh out of the mind and computer of one of his talented graphic artists at Design Edge in New York City! It was a classic T&G Con moment.”

Colleen McCarthy-Evans, Inventor of  Story Speller by  Think-a-lot Toys and  In A Pickle by Gamewright
www.imgamedesign.com

“Having been a professional inventor for years, I’d learned much of the informational content shared at T&GCon the old-fashioned way – through trial and error, blood, sweat, and tears. I’ve often said if this conference had existed 20 years ago, it would have saved me 10 years’ worth of shoe leather. Still, each year I learn something, but the most valuable jewels I’ve taken with me are the connections I’ve made with other industry professionals who have quickly become my colleagues and business partners.”

Peggy Brown, Inventor of Q-bitz by Mindware and It’s a Dog’s LIFE by Winning Moves
www.PeggyBrown.net

“T&GCon teaches me the value of networking and allows me to connect with and learn from both fellow inventors and industry experts.  The Navy Pier venue and the dedicated, hard work of Mary Couzin and her team, creates a fun and exciting experience for me that I look forward to year after year!”

Joyce Johnson, Inventor of Cartoon-It by ThinkFun
www.joycejohnsondesigns.com

“TAGIE is a MUST for anyone in, or wanting in, the game and toy business! The 2011 TAGIE EXPO will be my fourth and hardly my last. I can’t stop going. Each and every year, TAGIE has gotten bigger, better and more informative. The game and toy industry icons as well as big box companies are all there and there for YOU. I have been in the board game design business for 8 years now and nowhere have I found a more up close and personal experience. When I say personal I mean, at lunch, passing the salt to the makers of Apples to Apples. The expo gives invaluable, how-to’s, new ideas, friends, and industry contacts. And for anyone wanting the absolute truth about their idea or product look no further than the one-on-one presentations with the pros. And to top it all off is the TAGIE awards dinner, which is a fun night that is hard to put a price tag on. I really don’t know how Mary Couzin pulls it altogether but I know the inventors and the toy and game industry is really glad she does.”

Keith Gardner, Lots of new games coming next year…but right now they’re a secret!
www.talicor.com

If you’re interested in attending T&GCon, click HERE for more info and to get $100 off attendance and sign up NOW!

I was hoping that after my 1-day whirlwind trip to GenCon in Indianapolis I would have this amazing recap article to write, but I have to say after spending an hour and forty-three minutes in the Will Call line to pick up my ticket, I was pretty miffed.  Given that my ONE-day pass set me back $50.88 (a 4-day pass costs $78.00 + fees, just FYI) standing in line for that long really soured the start of the event for me.  (The pic at right only shows a small portion of the long, LONG line.) Granted, later in the day I talked to people who were in line 3 hours and longer – so I really shouldn’t complain, but it was pretty well annoying.  There, I’ve vented…I will move on.

Some of you may wonder why I went to GenCon in the first place since I focus on mass market/mass-appeal products and steer clear of the German-style and roll-play games, which is really the GenCon target market.  It’s because I’d heard that in the past couple years the family gaming section got larger.  And it was nice.  They had a whole section dedicated to the more casual gamer off to one side of the main hall, but you did have to walk through hoards of costumed men and half-naked women to get there (how I managed to capture such a preppy bunch of people above is beyond me).  But once I made it over to that section, I got to visit with the lovely folks at Winning Moves, Out of the Box, Buffalo Games, Spin Master, Telestrations and a handful of others.  Just like at ChiTag you can play games at every booth and buy your favorites to take home.  A special added bonus for me – they were showing my NEW game High-Low RACK-O at the Winning Moves booth and the people playing looked like they were really enjoying it so that was nice. (they’re playing it in the pic below at right)

Overall I’d have to say that it was nice but not worth the money unless you’re into RPG and German-style games.  GenCon has pages and pages of events listed in their program and for the ticket price to be worth it, you really need to take advantage of those, which often come at an additional cost.  (and trust me – it looks like a TON of people do!)  For the casual gamer, I think that ChiTag has more booths, more events centered around mass-appeal games, the show sales are just as good and the tickets are WAY cheaper (like a quarter the price!)  Still, if you live near Indy it might be worth it to go on Sunday and get a “Family Fun” badge which will get 4 family members in for $28 or you can splurge and get the “Family Fun Pass” for $40 that also gets you 8 “generic event” tickets.  To find out more about the Sunday Family Fun events you can click HERE.  GenCon runs through Sunday, August 7.

To see more GenCon pictures, please visit The Game Aisle’s Facebook Page: www.facebook.com/TheGameAisle 

Unfortunately I didn’t get to go to ASTRA this year, but my inventor friend Mary Jo Reutter (read about her games HERE) did and she was nice enough to share what’s great about the ASTRA show from an inventor’s perspective.  Quick background for anyone who doesn’t know ASTRA stands for American Specialty Toy Retailing Association and they’re the ones behind Neighborhood Toy Store Day which is Nov. 12th this year.  The ASTRA show is held in June every year, but unlike Toy Fair the location of the show bounces around the country.  So without anymore boring chatter from me, I’ll let Mary Jo take over…

As an inventor, I appreciate companies that do something extra to promote my games. And I am more than happy to help!  It’s a win-win-win situation.  Win #1 — The exhibitor (publisher) wins because they have something special to draw people into their booth, giving added value to the attendee’s experience.  Win #2 — The store owner / buyer wins because they can get an understanding of the game, enabling them to better explain, or better yet demonstrate it to their customer. I’ve been told this always contributes to more sales.  Plus they now have an interesting story to tell to their customers; “I met the inventor of this game.” Win #3 — the inventor wins because a few more units may be sold. We can be certain that the game is being described correctly. That means it’s less likely to die on the vine.  It takes a village to get a product to market!

I’m really happy to see several companies recognizing the value of including the inventor in the marketing process. At the Educational Insights booth, besides myself playing Buck Buck Moose (with some very competitive buyers),  Dan Acuff showed his clever word game KaBAM, and Riley Wilkenson showed Sneaky Snacky Squirrel (a runnaway hit).  At the ThinkFun booth,  Joyce Johnson was demonstrating her new game Cartoon-It.  At Shains was Colleen McCarthy Evans showing her new game What She Said.  There were probably others as well,  and I certainly don’t mean to leave them out.  Most of all, the hard working self-published inventors, who are the champions of their games, understand the value of a good hands-on demo.

Perhaps the best part of the show is how nice everyone is! The store owners, the reps, the people manning the booths, it’s just a good vibe all around. So, from this inventor’s perspective it was worth the time to come out to demo a new game.  And I admit, I still giggle and blush when I’m asked to autograph the box!

Now for my wish. I wish ASTRA would find a way to extend Game Night. I had the fortune to demo the Fancy Nancy Fabulous Fashionista Game, which is being published by Briarpatch.  It was an exciting evening (even though I spent most of the evening placing little cardboard dresses in a cardboard armoire), there were some great games and great game companies there, but I know not everyone was able to get in. As in everyday life, it sure would be nice for everyone to play — playing a game makes every day better!

You can find out more about Mary Jo Reutter at her website: YouBetchaInteractive.com

You can find out more about ASTRA at their website: ASTRA.org

I’ll admit it, I was the geek in the back last night taking feverish notes during Mike Hirtle’s lecture entitled  “What Makes A Good Game.”  Now, before the sassy comments come streaming in, it wasn’t because I don’t know what makes a game good – it’s more I that I wanted to be able to share his thoughts with you.

What I found interesting is that he referred to George Parker’s criteria for a good game.  For those of you who don’t know George Parker (at left) was THE original Parker brother and of course now Parker Brothers is apart of the Hasbro family.  George Parker was an interesting and savvy man and I highly recommend you read Phil Orbanes’ book about him entitled “The Game Makers: The Story of Parker Brothers from Tiddledy Winks to Trivial Pursuit.” You can find it for sale HERE.

So here are the criteria, and I’ve expounded upon them based on what Mike said…

1. Is it fun to play?

Yea,  we all believe this is an obvious one but when designing a game it is essential to remember that people will be choosing to play your game and sometimes after a long day at work.  Therefore, it needs to be fun!

 

2. Is there a reward?

What’s the point of the game?  Why are you playing it?  What experience are you getting out of it?  A game needs to be more than just a way to kill time.

3. Is it challenging?

Do you have to think and plan ahead?  Games can’t be based all on chance, a person’s choice needs to have an impact on the end result of the game.  And difficult choices are great!

4. Is the game non-frustrating?

A game can’t feel unfair, too easy — or conversely too hard.  Games that are too difficult to the point that they are unbeatable, or unfinishable are frustrating.  Mike cited the common house rule where you get money when you land on Free Parking in Monopoly.  This adds to the length of the game so instead of the game being (relatively) quick and drags on to the point of frustration.

5. Does the game have repeat play value?

This is just as important today as it was in George Parker’s time.  People have to want to play a game over and over and over for it to be a good game.  If it’s a one and done what’s the point?

6. Is there “magic” to the game?

George had a crazy list of things that might bring magic to a game including puffs of air and light beams, but a game that has in interesting or magical centerpiece is intriguing and creates a “wondrous” experience.

Here are some of the continuing trends I saw during Toy Fair 2011:

Tile-Placement games

In the last two years we’ve seen a bunch of Blokus-like games such as Callisto by University Games, Cir*Kis by Winning Moves/Hasbro and Blockers by Briarpatch.  New additions this year – both of which I think look pretty fun — include City Square Off by Gamewright and PathWords by ThinkFun.  In City Square Off each player has their own board on which to put their pieces and a card is flipped to direct them which piece to add until they run out of space.  Whoever is the last-person able to add a piece wins.  PathWords is a brainteaser and uses Tetris-like pieces to cover letters on the board.  Different, yes – but still tile placement.

Letter Tile, Dice and Card Games

I think almost everyone has a game centered around letter tiles, cubes or cards by now.  Think about it: Scrabble, Boggle, Bananagrams, UpWords and Scrabble Slam are the big ones.  Some more obscure ones: Lexigo, Amuse Amaze, Scrabble Me, Word Pirates, Zip-It, Tripoley Word, Pick Two, Anagrams, Appletters, My Word, Snatch-It, Stir ’em Up!, Word Shout, Take a Letter, A BEE C Match Game, Spill and Spell, Up For Grabs and so many others.  And now following the trend is Letter Go by Think Fun, the reintroduction of Big Boggle by Winning Moves (can’t wait!), Kabam! by Educational Insights and Spell it! by Blue Orange.  I’m guessing (and hoping) these games are pretty strong since they’ll be going up against a lot of other skus.

Cool Packaging

YAY, I LOVE cool packaging!!  Although we’ve seen it before: the Banagrams fabric banana, the Scrabble Apple fabric apple, the Slamwich lunchbox, Jenga in a tube, tins, tins and more tins – packaging definitely isn’t just a box anymore!  This year I saw more cute fabric zip-up pouches especially at University Games where they have a fabric pigeon for their Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus game and a fabric caterpillar, Very Hungry Caterpillar Match and Munch game.  ThinkFun did a nice long pencil-box looking package with two drawers that open at the same time for their Letter Go game – very satisfying!  Educational Insights also gets a shout out and gold star for their super-cute Sneaky Snacky Squirrel packaging which is in the shape of a tree with some AMAZING art!  I asked Riley Wilkinson from Educational Insights about the packaging and he said:

“I hired Lucia Gaggiotti from Italy to design my package. I bought boxes of butter cookies in Starbucks that she had illustrated and knew she’d be the perfect choice to make my tree-shaped box adorable!  She was so fun to work with and as I designed the game and package, she and I talked about the famous artist Charley Harper—a big influence on her style and in the history of illustration. I wanted the game to feel like some of the storybooks my mom used to read to me in the 1970s.”

LOVE IT!

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