I SPY Eagle Eye Find-it Game (review)

University Games also sent us I SPY Eagle Eye Find-it Game for review. I was super excited about this because I'm sort of awesome at searches (word puzzles, image searches, you name it!) and I knew this would be my sort of game.

It's a very simple game to explain, there is no reading required to play, and the instructions suggest numerous ways to play including different ways to score and tournament style playing. Since Bobble and Squiggle are so young (5 and 3), I opted to not keep score at all. I mean, let's be honest: I was going to win, right? I figured that I'd just take a few seconds to remind them of the instructions, and take pictures for the review before I started searching.

The first time we played, I helped them, explaining that everyone gets one board piece (a big, cardboard card), and everyone gets one little card that has images on it. Each tiny card has 8 tiny pictures on it, but it only has one item on your game board. The game boards are 2-sided, so you technically have 8 boards. There is a bell that you place in the middle and when you find the item on your card on your board, you hit the bell. (If you are keeping score, you hit the bell and yell first; simply hitting the bell would imply you should all switch boards because you couldn't find anything.)

Honestly, I figured my 5 year old would be decent, and my 3 year old would get frustrated. This is because my husband played with us the first time and we quickly learned that there are lots of little "almost" images. By this, I mean the same item as on your card, but tilted a different way (for example, instead of a toy pig on its side, it would be standing upright, or a truck that is identical but a different number). It's actually pretty challenging!

The second time we played was about 2 weeks after first introducing them to the game. Squiggle abandoned her building activities to play, leaving the mess behind her (explaining the background in the pictures). I was a bit cocky in thinking I was going to own them at the game, apparently, because Squiggle (who is only 3, mind you) quickly put me in my place! Look at that smug face!

She found the first 3 legitimate items, first try, and very quickly. I thought she was finding near misses, or maybe simply excited to ring the bell. Nope... she was simply ruling the game. I had another image that showed her pointing out what she found on the card and on her board, but I don't want to give anything away, so I opted not to share that one. I will, instead, share an extremely up close image of part of a board to show just how detailed they are.

That being said, the game suggests ages 5 and up. I know these are suggestions, but I didn't expect a 3 year old to actually be good at it. I was going to recommend this for kids that were about kindergarten age, but I am now going to suggest that if your child (or the one you are shopping for) has an eye for detail, get the game regardless of age.

Bobble leaning over to see if Squiggle really did find something again. She did.

Despite only having 8 board images, we have not succeeded in memorizing a single thing. Each board has so much detail and there are so many cards to search off of that we've never played through all of them in one game, and many times we don't even find the items on the card since you get a new card when someone finds an item. It's really set up to keep it challenging for a long time.

You can purchase I SPY: EAGLE EYE for under $20 at Areyougame.com, and at various retail stores. Don't forget to check out Areyougame.com for games to suit all sorts of occasions!

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff is was sent this product in exchange for a review. This did not sway my opinion in any way. All opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own. 

The Very Hungry Caterpillar Spin & Seek ABC Game (game review)

Another character favourite is looking to be a favourite game for your little ones, only this time it's one of Eric Carle's characters! A family favourite recognized almost everywhere: The Very Hungry Caterpillar!! 

The Very Hungry Caterpillar Spin & Seek ABC Game by Briarpatch (University Games) is geared towards the younger game-playing crowd, this game focuses on letter recognition for both uppercase and lowercase letters.

Character piece choices

The set up of the game is pretty easy. The players can choose one of 4 Eric Carle characters to be their playing piece, the cards are spread out on the floor to be visible, and you spin the spinner to determine how far you move.

There are two cards for each letter: 1 uppercase, 1 lowercase. In the example above, you can see that the letters are both the same colours, regardless of case (so both A cards will have a red A, both C cards will have a green C, etc.). This is identical to the representation on the game board to help with identification. To further assist identification, all lowercase letter cards are bordered with a blue line, and all upper case cards have an orange border. The backside of the cards show an example of a word that starts with that letter (same for both cases).

So everyone picks a character, the cards are spread out image side up (i.e. bear -- you know, opposite of what I did above... I'll get to this), and everyone is ready to go, so you spin the spinner!

You can choose to move the number of spaces shown on the spinner (in the above case, 3 spaces), or you can move to the next space with a BIG or little letter as indicated in the outside ring of the spinner (above case would be BIG letter). This is beneficial if someone just landed on the space 3 ahead of you, but 1 ahead of you was a BIG letter not yet snagged!

Bobble moving his piece

Now you may notice that I separated the lower case letters from the upper case letters in the picture above. This is not suggested in the instructions, but since Squiggle doesn't recognize most letters (unless they are in her name), I thought it would help her to have the lower case on one side and the upper case on the other. As she gets better at the letter recognition, I plan to mix them all up. 

You may also notice that, contrary to the instructions I mentioned earlier, I have the letter side up instead of the image side up. This is specifically to benefit Squiggle, as she doesn't know her alphabet, or sounds. Image side up would be more challenging for Bobble because he would see a train before he paid attention to the top of the card that said "little t", and he might think of the sound and associate with a letter that way. Since Squiggle is so new to letters, however, he obliged us in playing the "easy way" to help her learn.

When you move to a space, you have to find the image card that matches that letter, and it must be the proper case. If you land on the BIG B, you cannot select the little b card. If you select a wrong card, the card is put back down the next person gets to go. If you land on an space that someone already got a card from, you can spin and move again. If you land on an space that someone guessed incorrectly on (so they are there, but the card hasn't been taken), you may share a space.

The game ends when all players reach FINISH. The player with the most cards wins (ties result in more than one winner). 

The kids liked it so much, they insisted on playing again before bed! To make it a little more challenging for Bobble, we mixed up the upper and lower case letters.

 
What I love about this game is that you can alter the play to accommodate the skill level of the child(ren) playing. For Squiggle, she needs to just see the letters as she starts learning, but we always flip over the card to show the image and say what it is and what sound it makes. That usually sounds like, "B. Bear. Buh-buh-bear. Bear starts with the letter B!" As her letter recognition improves, the cases will be mixed up

As letter recognition improves, mixing the letters will help her

For someone like Bobble who knows his letters and sounds really well and is just starting to read, the image side is great. It encourages letter recognition coupled with sound recall, and also helps learn to spell/read as they see the word spelled out on the card.

The only thing I don't like about the game isn't actually an issue with this specific game at all, so much as an issue with any game with cardboard pieces that slide into a tiny plastic stand:

With young children, they get ruined quickly. Bent, ripped, you name it. We made it a household rule (...that never seems to be followed, of course) that you always leave the base on the pieces and they will be stored that way to prevent things like the above from happening. Of course, you could also just put a bit of tape around the bottom before putting it on the base. I'm sure that would help too!

The Very Hungry Caterpillar Spin & Seek ABC Game is a great choice for an emerging reader or young preschooler. This game can be purchased for around $15, making it a fun, educational, and budget-friendly gift for any occasion. Be sure to check out Areyougame.com for this game, and many other great games!

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff was sent this product for review. This did not influence my opinion of the game at all. All opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own.

Pete the Cat Groovy Button Game (review)

Still looking for some board game ideas? Check out the Pete the Cat Groovy Buttons Game by Briarpatch (University Games). The game is fairly quick, so if you need a game that takes little time, this is a good choice. Likewise, if your kids prefer to play more than one game in a row, this is a great option to not take up too much time!

Setting the game up is super easy, and it also includes my new favourite feature: an in-board spinner! (Check out my Kids onStage review to read why!) The down side is that you do risk the child(ren) leaning on the board to reach the spinner when they first start playing, and that will knock your pieces over. Once they get used to not pushing or leaning on the board with all their weight, it works quite well!

The buttons all go in a pile to the side of the board, and each player gets a button jar. All the pieces are cardboard (spinner arrow and stand for your game piece aside) and can easily be stored in a single sandwich bag.

To play, you select your game (Pete the Cat character) piece and place it in any of the green circles on the board corners. Movement is clockwise around the board (the number of spaces that your spinner lands on), and youngest player goes first. If you land on a green button, you take the number of buttons shown on that spot from the button pile and put them on your button jar. If you land on a red button, you place that number of buttons from your jar onto Pete the Cat in the center of the board. If you land on a blue space, you can switch your button jar with any other player’s button jar (getting all their buttons). The goal is to have the most buttons when the button pile is gone.

You have the option of going through the center part of the board (towards Pete the Cat) from either direction. If you land directly on Pete the Cat, you get all the buttons that are on him (from people landing on red spaces). This encourages planning ahead since they need to decide if it will be worth going that way due to all the red buttons and how many buttons are sitting on Pete the Cat.

When the button pile is gone, any buttons sitting on Pete the Cat are divided evenly amongst the players. When our first game ended, however, Bobble had only a handful of the 40 buttons, so we just gave all of them to him (he still had the least number of buttons). The person with the most buttons wins!

This game encourages counting skills the most, but it also encourages colour recognition (and having to remember what those colours mean in the game). It also encourages basic strategizing in giving the option of moving towards the center of the board or not.

 

My kids loved this game right off the bat because: Pete the Cat. The game play, as I mentioned, was pretty decently paced, so it wouldn’t be frustrating if the kids want to play more than once.Since it’s just counting, it’s not really boring for the older people playing like some children’s games are. If you’re looking for a fun, decent-paced game for a younger child, Pete the Cat Groovy Buttons Game is a good option!

You can find the Pete the Cat Groovy Buttons Game for around $20. Don't forget to check out AreYouGame.com to find games for all occasions and all ages!

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff was sent this product for review in exchange for my honest opinion. This did not influence my opinion of the product in any way. All opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own.

Kids on Stage (game review)

I previously mentioned the Super Why ABC Game, by Briarpatch (University Games), and how educational and fun it is. I am pleased to be able to review some more of their games, as they have offered me some for review! First up: Kids on Stage! 

I'd like to state, in advance, that my camera could not focus on the card and the action at the same time, so I'm sorry for slightly out-of-focus cards... but they are clear enough to see what the person should be doing!

I was excited to try Kids on Stage before I even opened it because the box said there was no reading required. This meant I had a much better chance to play them successfully with the kids since Bobble can sight read a few things, but Squiggle is still working on her alphabet. I also liked that it was for 2 – 6 players. It’s nice for when the kids have some friends over, or for larger families.

The setup is really easy, and you can start playing pretty much immediately after you put your piece on the board and set up the spinner. The spinner, by the way, is attached to the board. I cannot tell you how nice this is. Aside from not having to worry about it getting left out of the box and then stepped on (and broken), or a kid being angry and throwing it (or hoarding it), it’s always there when you want to play. I love the spinner being part of the board!

As far as actual game play, the rules are very easy to understand. You spin, you move that number, and you draw a card with the colour that matches the space you are on. Red cards are action cards, green cards are object cards, and blue cards are animal cards. Some of the cards can be challenging for things the children haven’t been exposed to. One example would be sewing. My kids weren’t sure what to do for that one. Others were difficult for them to not give away because they know many of the American Sign Language (ASL) signs for animals, objects, or actions on the cards.

You guess until you get it right. If they are having trouble guessing what you are acting out, you can make noises to help give it away. Fake snoring made the red “sleeping” card a bit too obvious, though! There is no counting who got however many cards right, you just play until you all get to the end. Quite simple, and takes away the frustration of not winning for the kids.

I honestly wasn’t sure how well Squiggle, having just turned three, would grasp the concept of acting something out without saying what it was. I was pleasantly surprised that she understood quickly, I just reminded her at every turn to “be/do this without saying it”. The only time this didn’t work was when she was sleepy. Then she just threw herself against the couch, giggling, and saying what she should act out. So, sleepy times aside, it worked really well.

Bobble, who is now 5 ½, really loved it. I was actually surprised at how much better Squiggle was at acting the things out, and how quickly she guessed things correctly compared to Bobble. However, Bobble has always been a bit slower on pretend play. I think this will be really good to encourage him to use his imagination, and that’s a great thing.

 

I liked that the spinner went all the way up to 8, as that could make the game go really quickly (which is sometimes a welcome relief, am I right?!). The one thing I didn’t like was that, should the game be a moderately-paced game, you might go through all the cards for a certain colour and then they would be too easy because the kids remember what did and didn’t work for acting that one out. That also makes it less fun to play twice in a row.

I’d love to see more cards available for this game, or even blank cards that were added with it so you can create your own. I think 10 more cards of each colour could really make a big difference.

I highly recommend this game for anyone looking for a present, or simply for a fun new addition to their game shelf. It encourages creative thinking, requires action, doesn’t require reading (though the word/words are on the card), helps with counting to 8, and colour recognition. 

You can purchase Kids on Stage for around $20, so head on over to Amazon.com or AreYouGame.com to check out this game (and many others)!

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff was given the game in exchange for an honest review. This did not sway my opinion of the product at all. All opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own.

Battleship (game review)

We recently added Battleship to our game library, and I have to admit I was excited. I remembered playing as a kid and loving the game, so I figured it would be a great addition to help change up what we play with Bobble. It said ages 7+ on the box, but I figured Bobble would probably catch on well, so why not try?

The game comes with two separate fold-open boards, 5 ships for each board, and more white and red pegs than seems necessary because the boards are hard to close when you have them divided up and in their respective holding areas.

The one thing that instantly comes up as a negative for this game (aside from all the small pieces and having a toddler) is that you can’t really play this comfortably if you aren’t at a table. This might not be a con for you, but we tend to just pull out games and play on the living room floor. This is hard for me to do with Battleship because I’m tall enough that I would see the other person’s set up, so I have to stretch out across the floor to play. Again, might not seem like a negative, but it’s a lot more uncomfortable after a while (and much harder to get up from) now that I’m in my 30s than it was two decades ago!

If you’ve never played Battleship, the premise is quite simple: set up your ships on the horizontal part of the board however you want (so long as it isn’t diagonal), and try to guess where your opponent has set theirs up. The game board is a grid with letters along the Y axis (top-bottom) and numbers along the X axis (left-right). You use red pegs to symbolize hits on the ships, and the white pegs to show misses. You use the upper part of the game board (the grid that your ships aren’t on) to mark your missed and hit calls against your opponent. You only need to mark hits on your actual ships on the bottom part to show you where your opponent has hit a ship.

To play, you call out a coordinate like B3, and the other player will tell you if it was a miss or a hit. If it’s a hit, they will tell you which ship you hit so you know how many places it should be taking up in the area (the carrier, for example, takes up 5 spaces so has 5 places to hit before you sink it). The first person to sink all of their opponent’s ships wins.

This is a much slower game than some of our other games that we’ve reviewed so far, but that’s due to the vast possibilities to call out if you’re really unlucky and can’t seem to find a ship. Alternatively, it could go pretty quickly if you get lucky with your calls.

The hardest part of this game with Bobble was getting him to remember to mark his hits and misses on his board. He would remember to mark the ships that we hit of his, but he’d just get so excited if he hit a ship that he’d bounce for a minute and then forget to peg. On the other hand, he’d get frustrated if he didn’t hit and complain for a second before the next person went, and still forget to peg.

After the first few times of playing with him, he got really good at “seeing” the board. At first he was just guessing and it was a shot in the dark. If he had a hit at B3, the next call he made might be H8. He wasn’t understanding the game to where he could visualize the hit means there is another spot right near there that would also be part of the boat. To help with this, hubby took a board (after a game ended) and left all the pegs on it. He showed him the hit and then nothing around it, then held up the boat that he hit to his upper board to show him that it would fill spaces immediately around there.

It helped, because now Bobble is really good and wins a lot. I’d be irritated with how good he got so quickly, but I’m too proud to really be legitimately upset.

Squiggle wanting to play... she tried, anyway!

This is a great game for encouraging strategizing and helping to learn a bit of rudimentary geometry skills (coordinates, anyone?). No reading is required for this game (if you can teach the child the rules), but they will need to know numbers, letters, and be able to memorize the name of the ships to tell you which one they sunk. (Admittedly, I never remember what they are called… I tend to say, “You hit the 3-holed one!”) Just make sure you have a bit of time to play, as it can go on quite a bit. If your child is younger, like Bobble, I would recommend playing with another adult (or older child) on their side to make sure they are not moving ships around or missing pegs their first few times they play. Definitely a game worth having in your collection, though!

They also make a travel version, though I honestly cannot see any car ride ever being smooth enough to make those little pegs (or ships) not get lost in or under seats… regardless of the person’s age. Hit a pothole or something and boom. Pegs would likely rain everywhere! (My husband says he never had an issue, but he also used the travel version to take places and then play there, not in the car.) There is also an electronic version, but I was hoping the electronic version would involve a red light showing where you got hit (or got a hit) when you touch the square on the grid, thus eliminating the pegs. The reality of it is that it makes sounds, but you still have pegs. I guess I'll just stick to the original, then!

You can buy Battleship for between $12 and $16 at most retail stores.

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff is responsible for the content of this post. Hasbro did not sponsor this post in any way. The game was received as a gift from a friend.

Hoot Owl Hoot! (game review)

Another great cooperative game is Hoot Owl Hoot! by Peaceable Kingdom. This game involves more strategizing than Count Your Chickens! does, and the way the game is set up encourages the players to work together.

Like Count Your Chickens!, Hoot Owl Hoot! has the instructions printed on the inside of the box lid. Not only does this prevent you from losing them, but it saves trees, too!

 

The game comes with the game board, a pile of cards with different coloured circles or suns on them, a sun token, and 6 owl tokens. 

To set up the game, you shuffle all the cards and deal three to each player. You place your owls on the start spots (number of owls played with vary depending on the difficulty level you want), and the sun token on the sun start spot. The goal of the game is to get all the baby owls back to the nest before sunrise.

While you can hold your cards in your hand, it is suggested to leave them face up for everyone to see so you can work together to plan the best plays to get the owls back in the nest. 

When it is your turn, you pick which colour you want to play from the 3 cards in your hand. If you have a sun card, you have no choice but to play that card and move the sun token one spot over to the right), then draw a new card. If you are playing a colour, you can move any owl of your choice to the next circle with that colour. If you are playing a green card and there is an owl on the next two green spots, you would play on the first available green spot (so you’d skip a lot of spots). If there are no more spots of that colour available, the owl gets to move into the nest. This is the sort of thing that makes this game all the more fun when working as a team, and precisely why everyone being able to see the other players’ cards is beneficial.

A yellow card was played allowing the owl on the Start 4 spot to move a good distance to the next unoccupied yellow circle.

Another yellow card was played and an owl from the Start 2 position was moved 3 yellow circles because the first two were occupied.

When all the owls make it to the nest, you win. If the sun gets all the way to the far right spot (aka: if the sun rises) first, the game is over. The beginner level is only played with owls on the first 3 start spots, the intermediate level is with owls on the first 4 spots, and the challenge level is with all 6 owls in play.

Hoot Owl Hoot! is recommended for ages 4 and up, up to 4 players, and should last about 15 minutes from start to finish. No reading is required for game play (provided someone can read to explain the rules at first). Great game for colour recognition and cooperative strategizing.

You can purchase Hoot Owl Hoot! for approximately $16 at select retail stores like Target (they carry Peaceable Kingdom games), or online at Amazon.com.

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff is responsible for the content of this post. Hoot Owl Hoot! was purchased by me and all opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own.