Even though there have been holiday decorations up in stores across the country for more than a month, I personally can’t believe it’s already November and the holidays are right around the corner!  Now, for many of you in the game world you know that before we can dig in to our Thanksgiving turkey, we have to meet in Chicago for ChiTag!  And the game I’m going to review this week, Befuzzled, will be the star of the Fun Q Games booth.

I’ve had Befuzzled on my desk for a little while but waited to write my review for a couple reasons.  First, I think this is a great family party game for the holidays – especially for a crowd of slightly over-served adults, teens and kids.  Second, if you are stopping by ChiTag I wanted to remind you to stop by the Fun Q Games booth #219 – not only are they nice people, but they have 2 games worth checking out (Befuzzled and Triplica) and you’ll be able to buy it there!

So what is this game I speak so highly of?  Befuzzled is a speed/action game with quick rounds; which is a nice combination for a family-friendly party game.  There are 3 types of cards in the box: Action cards, Flip cards and Shape cards.   Action cards list actions (duh!) like “Bark like a Dog” and “Snap Your Fingers.”  You lay 8 of these cards face-up on the table in 2 rows of 4.  Then you take the Shape card deck and lay one card on top of each Action card so you can still see the title of the action.  Next you pick a player to start the round and give them the deck of Flip cards. This person is the “judge” and they turn over the top Flip card so everyone can see what symbol it is.  Whoever does the action under the matching shape first, wins the round and gets to keep the Flip card.  The Flip deck gets passed to the next player and they’re the judge for the next round.  Play continues until there are no cards left in the Flip deck and then you can choose to count up cards and keep score, or just claim a winner for the game.

The instructions are pretty specific as to how many cards should be in the draw deck (5 x the number of players) but us beer-drinking adults skipped over that rule.  We did find that this game played really well with a larger group and while the instructions say 3-8 players, I’m not sure the game would be quite as much fun with only 3 players.  What I do like about this game is that it comes in a nice small box so it’s easy to pop in a bag and bring it to a friend’s or relative’s holiday party – or heck, you could even give it as a hostess gift!  (Man, am I filled with great ideas today!)

Befuzzled Stats:
~$14 ChiTag, Specialty Retailers and Amazon.com
3-8 players (although I recommend at least 4)
~10-30 minutes (you decide how many rounds you want to play!)
Ages 7 and Up

**For $2 admission to ChiTag, visit HERE

I’ve always believed that every board game is in some way, shape or form educational.  One of the biggest things I think EVERYONE can learn from playing games is how to be a good winner or how to accept defeat gracefully.  And now there is this new category of games cropping up in which players either win or lose together as a group.  There’s no one winner nor is there one loser – and players compete TOGETHER against the game itself.  So maybe these games won’t teach you to be a good winner or good loser but they will teach you teamwork and group strategy – and that’s not a bad deal.

Any of you who have met me in person know that I love competition…I thrive on competition – especially when it comes to Boggle. (Which I won last night, oh yea!) So how do I feel about these “cooperative” games?  I actually like them.   One in particular I fell in love with initally because of the game’s look is called Hoot Owl Hoot and after playing it, I think it’s a great game for kids.

The object of the game is to get the owls to the nest before the sun rises.  There is a a little sun token that starts by the moon at the top of the board and if it reaches the sun before all of the owls are in the nest, the game wins.  The sun moves forward one space everytime a player discards a sun card.  To start the game off, you decide how many owls you’d like to attempt.  For younger kids, you start with 3 owls and then work your way up to using all 6 owls for the hardest game.  Players each are dealt 3 cards and on their turn if they have a sun, they must play it and move the sun token forward one space.  If they don’t have a sun they can play any color card in their hand.  Then they move any owl forward to the next available space of that color.  The strategy is to get owls jumping over each other because the nearest space of that color is occupied.  If all of the owls make it to the nest before the sun rises, the players win!

Hoot Owl Hoot is for kids ages 4 and up – but just to make sure it was actually fun for adults AND there was a real chance that the game would win, I played with my husband.  Just the two of us tackled the hardest version with all six owls on the board I’m happy to say that we won only 3 out of 4 and the one we lost, we lost BAD.  Why does that make me happy?  Because I want to know this game is decent competition…and it turns out it is.  The odds are in the favor of the players, but if you lost all the time would you ever play?  Probably not.  Which brings me to another important point: parents make sure you have time to play 2 games in case the sun wins the first one.

Couple other things to note: the rules are in the box top – and it’s a NICE box so you probably won’t smash or mangle it for many years.  Also the game is “Green” meaning it’s made of earth-friendly materials including soy-based inks.  Even the pieces come in a paper envelope instead of lots of little plastic baggies.  I have to say the design, artwork and planet-friendly parts make me smile.

Hoot Owl Hoot Stats:

• $15 at Amazon.com, some Barnes & Noble stores and some Learning Express stores
• 2-4 players (must omit challenge cards with 2 players so 3-8 is better)
• ~10-20 min.
• Ages 4 and up

I had never played it or even heard about it before I saw this picture – I bought it 100% based this photo…okay 90%, 10% was price point.  It was only a little over $12 so if it stunk, it wasn’t too much of my game budget out the window.  (Yes, I have a game budget otherwise I’d be very poor.)

Other than being visually cool with a Peter Max trippy look Aquarius is a pretty good game.  The goal is to get a chain of 7 panels of your particular pattern connected together. (In the pic at left, the fire has 4 in a row)  At the beginning of the game each player is given a goal card with their pattern on it but it’s good to keep in mind that goals may changed as the game progresses.  The game is all about building off a random “start card” and then you can build off any card in the mass by placing cards with matching panels next to each other.  As you can see, there can be multiple panels per card but you only have to match one – but if you match more than one you get a bonus.  There are also cards that allow you to move cards, remove cards, reshuffle everyone’s hands and trade or rotate goals, which keeps the game interesting.

Another thing I really liked about Aquarius is that it has amazingly written rules (click the image at right to see a larger image of page 1 of the instructions or you can download a full set HERE).  Not only do they GET TO THE POINT QUICKLY, there are color diagrams, they have visual cues for easy navigation and they keep the FAQs and alternative play stuff for the back page.  If you’re an inventor and need an example of well-written rules, spend the $12 and get yourself a copy.  I mean it…nothing irks me more than horrible directions.  They put me in a bad mood.

Aquarius Stats:

~$13 at Amazon, ToysRUs.com, AreYouGame.com, mom & pop retailers
2 to 4 players
~10-15 minutes
Ages 6 and Up

Earlier this week I posted an interview with Mary Jo Reutter who won the TAGIE award for Excellence in Game Design in November of 2010 and you can see that article HERE.  But now it’s time to take a peek at some of her games and Mary Jo has AGAIN been nice enough to share some tidbits about how the games changed from her initial prototype – which is something I always find interesting!

First up, Laundry Jumble by Educational Insights.  While this game has roots in the 1967 game Feeley Meeley I think that the updated theme is adorable.  During the game players select a card with an image of an article of clothing on it.  They reach into the “dryer” and try to feel around to find the correct fabric item.  If they do, the player gets to keep the card.  If you pull the “Skunk’s Undies” you need to return a card you’ve already collected.  (ugh!)  Regardless, of whether you pull the correct item or not, it goes right back into the dryer so there’s always tons of stuff in there.

Mary Jo:

“When I pitched Laundry Jumble I called it “Tumble Jumble” (and I think some of the older cards even still say Tumble Bumble).  We loved the name Tumble Jumble, but it was taken, so Educational Insights had to make a change to “The Laundry Jumble Game”. The prototype had a spinning mechanism and also folded flat.  Originally the child was to roll a die to see how many times they’d turn the dryer before reaching in to find the item. Unfortunately this didn’t cost out low enough so we had to lose that feature. Fortunately the play was not compromised.  I’m very pleased that Educational Insights was able to keep the fabric for the construction of the dryer — one of the sweet subtleties of the fabric construction is that the dryer begins getting warm as your hand reaches around searching for the right piece of clothing.  And I’m also very pleased that they were able to get the small details in all of the clothing items. The Skunk’s Undies are a favorite!” (See Mary Jo’s prototype at left – wow that looks just about the same!)

Second is her mini-line of Flip-A-Longs with Fat Brain Toys.  There’s a train version called “Long Long Locomotive” and a medieval version called “Knights of the Long Table” but both play exactly the same.  It’s a matching game but instead of matching the same thing, players must match two halves of the same scene.  In the locomotive version each player starts with an engine and each time they get a match they add this new car to their train.  Obviously, the player with the longest train wins.

Mary Jo:

“The Flip-A-Long theme that was originally pitched was “Lenny’s Limo” — a long stretch limo with different sets of interesting passengers inside.  We changed that theme out for Knights of the Long Table, and Long Long Locomotive.  This game is much like a standard match game in that you can have a lot of different themes, and the twist of using your winning pieces to create a long scene.  The kids are much better at the memory and matching than most of the adults who play!  I like it when kids can genuinely beat their parents at a game.” (see Mary Jo’s prototype at left – it’s super cute!)

Even though the previous two have classic game play roots, I really enjoyed them both.  I thought that Mary Jo really improved upon Feeley Meeley (especially cute fabric instead of weird plastic tchotchkes, click HERE to find out more about Feeley Meeley if you have no idea what I’m talking about.) and making memory/matching play FAR more interesting and visually appealing.

The last game I’m going to review was probably my least favorite out of the three I’m reviewing here, but it definitely gets BIG points for cute!   (But note, that I’m not entirely sold on games action games like Rock’em Sock’em that are essentially toys with rules that are designed for kids — I’m sure skews my rankings.)  Sumo Ham Slam is a game about Sumo hamsters, which in itself is hilarious.  Players battle their hamsters using a wand that goes underneath the plastic board and magnetically attaches to their hamster.  It’s a battle of the bulge with each hamster trying to push the other out of the ring.  Along the way you earn food which are little white discs that adds to your hamster’s bulk when you shove it down their gullet.  The funny theme mixed with the cute characters really makes it a great birthday party gift for any kid 6-9.

Mary Jo:

“Sumo Ham Slam was originally called Masu Masu (which means More! More! in Japanese). The brilliant addition of the hamsters goes to Jason Schneider at Gamewright!  The game play and mechanisms stayed the same, and the hamsters and fantastic name just take it over the top in wacky.” (see her prototype at left, click to enlarge)

Thanks again to Mary Jo for all of her help and the great prototype pics she was awesome enough to send along!

Laundry Jumble Stats:

~$25 at Amazon, Target.com,  QVC, EducationalInsights.com, mom & pop retailers
2 to 4 players
~5-10 minutes
Ages 6 and Up

Flip-A-Longs Stats:

~$13 at Fat Brain Toys ONLY
2 to 4 players
~5-10 minutes
Ages 4 and Up

Sumo Ham Slam Stats:

~$20-25 at Amazon, Fun Again Games, mom & pop retailers
2 to 6 players
~10-15 minutes
Ages 6 and Up

Every holiday season at some point I end up raiding the game shelves at my father’s house looking for something to play.  I’ll admit that over the years, I’ve “liberated” many of my favorites and they now reside in one of my game cabinets, but there are some that I’ve left for sentimental reasons (and there are others that haven’t made the cross-town journey simply because I’m afraid of the wrath if he noticed they were gone). The games at my father’s house are classics from my childhood and earlier.  If something happened to them, some may be impossible to replace but others you can still find on store shelves, because good games are like that, they don’t die – they get reincarnated.

Most of the time games are resurrected using the same name to give consumers that warm-fuzzy nostalgia feeling; great examples out now are Bed Bugs, Hedbanz, Shark Attack, Mall Madness and Rock’Em Sock‘Em Robots.  All except Rock’Em Sock’Em (it’s a bit before my time) were out when I was a kid, disappeared for a while and came back.  Bed Bugs even reused the artwork from the 1985 box when Patch Products rereleased it this year, so it looks just like it did when I was putting it on my wish list for Santa.  On the other hand, Spin Master had some really dated box art for Hedbanz and opted to give the game a facelift, which resulted in a far more appealing package.  But either way if the reincarnated game was notable enough, the product should evoke memories of playing with friends, wishing for it to appear under the Christmas tree or even fuzzy recollections of the game’s commercial.

This “reincarnation” phenomenon isn’t exclusive to the game industry.  Toy brands, shoe brands, car brands, beverage brands, video game brands all go through cycles like this too, but what makes it interesting in the board game arena is that products don’t always stay with their initial manufacturer.  In fact, neither Hedbanz nor Bed Bugs is with the company that originally released it.  Hedbanz has been published here in the US by IRWIN Games, Pressman Toy, Western Publishing and many international manufacturers.  Bed Bugs doesn’t have quite as lengthy of a history, having only been published by Milton Bradley before being picked up by Patch Products.  So why all the jumping around?  Sometimes this is due to a “trickledown” effect.  Hasbro now owns Milton Bradley and they may not have thought that Bed Bugs could sell the volume of games needed for them to spend money to promote the product or maybe they’re focused on building their core brands and didn’t have room for it, either way it ends up with a smaller company who has the time to nurture and rebuild the brand.  Other times it’s in the hands of the inventor to find their game a new manufacturer “home.”  Regardless, it’s obvious that well-loved games have multiple lives and don’t disappear forever – which is good, because there are a couple I’m hoping to see again!

Part 2 – The Reviews

Instead of explaining Bed Bugs I think you can just take a peek at the “vintage” commercial:

Remember that?  And obviously, with New York’s little bed bug problem this year, the rerelease of this game is extremely timely.

Now, I couldn’t find a commercial for Hedbanz, but I’ll explain it for those of you who don’t recall how to play.  Everyone wears a band on their head with a card clipped in it.  Cards have a picture and say “I am a [image word].”   Players don’t know what picture is on their card, but obviously they can see the cards of the other players.  Everyone takes turns asking questions in a “20-questions like fashion” until they can guess what’s on their card.  The quicker you can guess what you are, the more likely it is that you’ll win.  Overall, everyone looks a little silly — but it just adds to the laughs!

Bed Bugs Stats:

~$15 at Amazon, Meijer, Are You Game, Wal-Mart
2 to 4 players
~5-10 minutes
Ages 6 and Up

Hedbanz Stats:

~$15 at Amazon, Target, Toys’RUs (which also has the exclusive Hedbanz for Adults for $17)
2 to 6 players
~20-30 minutes (depending on the number of players)
Ages 7 and Up

ChiTag was over more than a week ago, and I’ve yet to do a recap but it’s because I have to PLAY the games I found there before I review them to make sure I actually like them.  (duh)  This year there were TONS of games to play and buy at the open-to-the-public fair on Chicago’s Navy Pier and I covered a bunch of them in the preview article and I’ve also written articles about many of the games like Word on the Street, Triviathon, Blurt and Backseat Drawing.  But there were two new games that stood out when I made my rounds.

The first game embodies WHY to go to the fair.  The game is Eleminis and it’s the first game from a company called Smileypop.  The inventor, his family and friends were working the booth teaching people how to play the easy-to-learn card game and selling it to anyone interested in taking a copy home.  This kind of product is definitely going to be hard to find in stores and I often don’t review games with distribution as small as theirs because it’s too hard for you, my wonderful readers, to find and buy.  And it’s just mean for me to say “it’s awesome, but good luck finding one!”

In Eleminis the goal is to collect 5 different Elimini (Plant, Air, Water, Rock and Fire). Every player can have up to 5 cards in front of them at a time and on your turn you draw a card and place an Elemini in a blank space in front of you, or you can replace one of your own or one of your opponent’s Eleminis.   Each Elemini card can replace 2 other Eleminis and these icons are shown in the corner of the card.  This allows you to replace one of your own eleminis if you have a duplicate or you can make trouble for your opponents and create duplicates in their set of cards by replacing one of their eleminis.  In the deck there are also cards that allow you to move a card from one player to another, discard Eleminis and swap Eleminis which keeps things interesting.  Then there are there are Stars which are wild Eleminis and the black sheep of the family, the Trash which you need to remove from your hand before you win.  The game takes less than a minute to learn and plays well with 3-5 players (although I didn’t have a chance to test it with more than 5, I can say it wasn’t my fave with just 2 players.)

The other game I played A LOT at the fair is a game from a large manufacturer you may have heard of, Spin Master.  They got back into the world of games after buying some of Imagination Entertainment’s products and adding some new stuff to their portfolio including this new game called Stomple.  It’s very easy abstract strategy and the goal is to be the last player to have their Stomper on the board.  The board is a 7×7 grid of marbles and players use Stompers to push these different colored marbles through the holes the marbles sit in.  On your turn you push down or “stomp” a marble adjacent to your Stomper’s position on the board.  If there is a marble of the same color adjacent to the one you just stomped you must do that one too until there are no marbles of the same color next your stomper.  At anytime you may move to another part of the board by jumping to and stomping a marble that matches the color of your Stomper.  This is particularly useful when you find your Stomper with no marbles nearby since you MUST stomp a marble on each turn.  If you can’t stomp a marble on your turn you must remove you Stomper from the board and you’re done for the round.  But if your Stomper is the last one on the board you get 1 point for each marble left and 3 points for special red cat’s eye marbles.  You can play by counting rounds won or play to a certain total, either way it’s quick and very satisfying to stomp stuff!

Both of these games are quick to learn and play which makes them fun to play both at game fairs and at home.  And a quick thanks to Greg Zima, inventor of Stomple and Matt Laird, inventor of Eleminis for showing me their games at the fair!

Eleminis Stats:
~$11 at Amazon
2-8 Players (not great with 2 players)
~5-10 minutes per round
Ages 7 and Up

Stomple Stats:
~$30 at Amazon now and Barnes & Noble soon
2-4 Players
~5 minutes per round
Ages 8 and Up

Tic Tac Toe – I don’t think there isn’t a person out there who didn’t spend quality childhood time trying to dominate an adversary but instead ended up with a very unsatisfactory “cats” game.  As I recall, tic-tac-toe wasn’t very fun.  So why then do I feel like there is a sudden deluge of new tic-tac-toe inspired games?

Sure, I will freely admit that there are a few classic tic-tac-toe games that are quite enjoyable.  Actually, the only one that really comes to mind is right now is Toss Across, introduced in 1969 by the Ideal Toy Company and invented by Marvin Glass and Associates.  Today Mattel manufactures it, and it’s still a great mix of tic-tac-toe and classic beanbags making it more of a skill game than a dull no-brainer.

But in the last decade we’ve seen tons of new tic-tac-toe themed games. Card games, board games, outdoor games – heck, there’s even a “Tic Tac Toe Toast Bread Stamper” for sale on Amazon so you can play peanut butter versus jelly if you’d like!    Just to name a few that you’ll find in the game section:

• Gobblet, Blue Orange
• Ticks Tacks Toes, Learning Resources
• X-Ceter-O, Endless Games
• Roll-It Tic Tac Toe, Patch Products
• Tic-Attack-Toe, PB & J Toys
• Flip-Tac-Toe, Educational Insights
• Chaos, Mindware
• Monster 4, Lego
• Cubiko, Cubiko Games Limited
• Top Spot, Fundex
• Tic Tac Doh!, Looney Labs
• Electronic Toss Across, Mattel

And a couple a little older:

• Tic Tac Twice, Talicor
• Generic 3D Tic Tac Toe - also called Score Four and Qubic, various
• Shift Tic Tac Toe, Pressman
• Tic Tac Tony, Fisher-Price
• Super 3, Milton Bradley
• Tic Tac Turn, Ohio Art

And then are the “in a row” games which are really one step away from tic-tac-toe like Toot and Otto by ThinkFun and Coverup by Out of the Box and many, MANY others.

So have any of them successfully improved upon the paper and pencil time-waster?  Sure, I really like Gobblet (see my review of Gobblet Gobblers HERE) and X-Ceter-O is probably your best bet for something as close to the classic game as possible.  Thankfully it removes any chance of a cat’s game by limiting each player to 3 Xs (or Os) and forces them to move them in the same order until someone gets three in a row.  Classic tic-tac-toe essence minus the dreaded DRAW.

Gobblet and X-Ceter-O are my pics, but I will toss the question out to my readers too.  Do you have any favorite tic-tac-toe inspired games? (old or new) Please comment below.

Gobblet Stats:
go to the review HERE

X-Ceter-O Stats:
~$10-$12 Amazon, Toys ‘R Us, Kmart, AreYouGame.com
2 players
5 minutes per game
Ages 7 and up

Earlier this summer Brian Turtle of Endless Games emailed me after I posted my backgammon review (see here) and wanted to know if I had ever played their kid’s game Quackgammon.  I’ll admit, I’d walked passed it at Toy Fair but I didn’t stop to play.  Maybe it was because their booth was so busy or because my pal Mary Couzin’s booth was right down the way and I heard a rumor that she was bringing wine or maybe it was because I love backgammon and I wasn’t really sure anyone could improve upon it.  Don’t really know, but I’m definitely glad Brian sent a sample my way.

Quackgammon is a great way to teach a kid how to play backgammon, partly because you don’t play with dull disc-shaped movers, but instead each player gets three super-cute mini rubber ducks!  While it’s not exactly backgammon with duckies, it definitely provides a kid-friendly stepping-stone to real backgammon.

The goal of the game is to get your ducks around the board from home to finish and then off the board before your opponent does.  And just like in backgammon, you’re both going different directions on the board.  On a turn, you roll your die and you can move any of your ducks toward finish.  Your duck can only land on a vacant space or a space occupied by your opponent’s duck, provided there aren’t two of their ducks in a row.  Two ducks in a row is like having two backgammon checkers on the same space, they’re safe from your opponent.  BUT if there is a lonesome duck hanging out by itself, you can move your duck onto that space and “bump” your opponent’s duck back to start.  (Think of it like sending your opponent to “the bar” in backgammon).   Ducks that are sent back to start must be moved onto the board before any other duck can be moved which makes “bumping” a duck very advantageous.

When your ducks gets close to the finish, you’ll need to get them off the board with an exact roll.  First player to get all three ducks off the board first wins.

If you’re a backgammon junkie like me, I’m sure you’ll see lots of similarities between the two games.  And if you’re not, it doesn’t really matter because Quackgammon still stands on it’s own and is lots of fun even if you know NOTHING of backgammon…..but you might want to learn after you play Quackgammon a zillion times with your kids.

**As a quick note, the image above is pulled directly from the Endless Games catalog which are handed out during Toy Fair.  The Endless guys are known for doing something crazy for their catalogs every year and in this picture is Kevin McNulty their VP of Sales.  You can see some of their other catalog covers at their website: http://www.endlessgames.com/ns-Catalogs.html 2009 is my personal fave …pervy ping pong.  Hilarious!

Quackgammon Stats:
~$12-15 at Amazon, Barnes & Noble and some specialty/local game retailers
2 players
~10 minutes
Ages 6 and up

Sometimes I think people are willing to cut games a little slack when they look really great but don’t play as well as they should.  Whereas I’m more likely to enjoy a game that is unattractive but that plays really well.  (What does that say about me?)   So when there is a good looking game that’s really fun to play I get downright excited!   (See my article on Pentago…I was drooling while playing that game!)  Anyway, Dweebies is just that kind of game.  I saw it at Gamewright’s booth at Toy Fair in February and have been dying to have a copy ever since.  The metal packaging is adorable but it’s the super cute Dweebies illustrations that I enjoy.  There are doctor Dweebies, yoga Dweebies, super Dweebies, foam-finger Dweebies and so on, and each one of them has been carefully illustrated for maximum cuteness!  (And yes, we name them as we play them!)

There are 54 Dweebies cards in the deck (27 different illustrations) and the goal is to collect as many of them as you can.  (And why wouldn’t you want to – they’re so CUTE!)  Players each starts with 5 cards in their hand and  replenishes as they play.  One by one players place Dweebies in a grid pattern in the center of the table by adding a Dweebie above, below or next to any other Dweebie.  To capture Dweebies you must create “bookends” of two of the same Dweebies and you collect all of the Dweebies in the middle.  Look at the the grainy illustration below  to get a better idea of what I mean by “bookends.”  Essentially, the two matching Dweebies must be on the ends.  Once you do this, you collect the two bookend Dweebies and any Dweebies in between them.

The other rule of the game is that apparently Dweebies don’t like to be lonely so if someone picks up a line of Dweebies and it creates some loner Dweebies or a couple of unconnected packs of Dweebies players must play cards to connect the Dweebies before adding cards elsewhere on the mass.  (Just FYI, the grainy image shows 2 game scenarios…I know that because someone couldn’t place a second bookend Dweebie until the two groups had been connected.)

It’s an easy overall concept for younger players to grasp, but there is another layer to this card game that makes it appealing to us older players as well.  Each Dweebie has a dot in the corner of the card.  This tells you how many of this particular Dweebie are in the deck.  The dots range from 1 to 4 and you’ll find that there is a strategy to playing the 1-dot “blocking” Dweebies and 4-dot Dweebies.   Obviously it’s very advantageous to count the cards, and it’s a great way to teach the younger crowd why card counting can be important in games.  Yep, that last sentence really solidifies it…. I’m a game geek.  But is that really wrong?

Dweebies Stats:
~$10 at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, internet retailers and mom & pop game shops
2 to 6 (Never tested it with 5 or 6…sorry)
10 Minutes or less
Ages 8 and up

Not far from my house there is a dive bar, with scary red lighting that hosts bingo on Monday nights.  It’s really not all that exciting; you win a brown paper lunch bag filled with random odd items.  I was lucky enough to win the first round Monday night and my winnings included some Cheez-It snacks, baby food, a bunny sucker and Chicklets.  By the end of the night our table had a skull candle, a bible card game and three colors of “fun dough.”  But before the bingo festivities began, we played quite a few rounds of the classic, but somehow not super well known, game Shut The Box.

Surprising to me, no one at my table had ever played Shut The Box before but by the end of the night everyone was addicted.  There are lots of variations of this game but traditionally it’s a box with tiles numbered 1-9 that you can flip forward and backward, which allows players to “check them off” as they use them.  The game is simple; you roll two standard dice and total them up.  Then you flip forward any available tile combination that equals the number you rolled.  So if you roll an 11 and it’s your first turn, you can flip forward a 9 and a 2 or a 1, 4 and 6.  It’s totally up to you, but once you flip forward a number you can’t use it again.  Your turn ends when you roll and you don’t have the right combination of tiles to equal your dice total.   You get your score for the round by totaling up the unused tiles.

There are a couple ways to score.  We played that whoever had the lowest number each round got one point.  You can then play until someone reaches a certain number of wins or until you run out of time.  Keeping a running tally of each player’s actual score is another way to play, just make sure you have a pencil and paper handy.  Play a certain number of rounds or until one player reaches a set number, and then the player with the lowest score is the winner.

Other versions of the game include boxes with tiles numbered 1-10 or 1-12.  There are also 2-player versions and 4-player versions.  Blue Orange games also has a game called Double Shutter that has two levels of tiles numbered 1-9 so you can flip two 5s if you roll a 10.  I also own a dice game named The Game of Chips by Jax that is essentially Shut The Box, with no box.  It uses poker chips numbered 1-10 and you flip them over as you use them.  This is a great low-priced travel alternative; it comes in a nice fabric pouch and can be purchased for ~$5.

Fun bit of trivia for you too, there was a TV show back in the mid-1970s called High Roller that was based on the game Shut The Box.  It was hosted by Alex Trebek and players answered “toss up” questions to gain control of the dice and the option of rolling or passing to their opponent.  It was on for a couple years and then again in the late 80s with Wink Martindale, but the new show wasn’t as successful.

Shut The Box stats:
$15 – $65+ at Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble, Toys R Us,  some mass market retailers, specialty retailers
Shown at top: Melissa & Doug Shut The Box retails for ~$19-$25
Article preview: Front Porch Classics Shut the Box Signature Edition retails for ~$45-$53
1 or more players
Any amount of time
Ages 6 and up

Double Shutter stats:
~$19 at Amazon.com, Toys ‘R Us, Target, specialty retailers
1 or more players
Any amount of time
Ages 8 and up (it’s a bit more complex)

The Game of Chips stats:
~$5 Amazon.com, online game retailers, some specialty stores
1 or more players
Any amount of time, ~15 if you play by their rules
Ages 6 and up