Our Family Games Night with Dementia UK and Ideal Games
AD – Items featured gifted for review
Autumn has now most definitely arrived and with the change of the seasons we have longer nights, colder weather and the prospect of even more time at home with the family. After 6 months at home already, with our family having experienced isolating class bubbles in just the first few weeks back of the Autumn term, the prospect of a long hard winter is more than a little daunting.
In order to break up the monotony, boredom and screen time, this October we’re talking part in Dementia UK’s Raise Your Game campaign; an initiative to raise awareness and funding for all the work their dementia specialist Admiral Nurses do to help families across the country. Whether it’s linking up with friends and family virtually on Zoom, or with your own family in the home, the aim is to bring back the joy of a traditional family game night, playing games that bring all generations together for some fun, laughter and much needed conversation.
By challenging yourself to put down the tech and bring out the board games for a family board game marathon not only can you switch off from some of the stresses of breaking news updates and social media scaremongering, you can also raise some much needed funds for a fantastic charity too.
Thanks to Ideal Games by John Adams, we’ve been sent a great selection of family games to put through their paces. Here are some of our favourites!
Our Fave for Younger Children
Grabolo
This game is super easy to understand and play, fast paced and fun and one that the whole family can enjoy together, even our youngest daughter who is just 4 years old. To win at Grabolo you need to have super quick responses, being the first player to grab the correct piece.
The clues in the name here. Simply roll the two dice and be the first person to GRAB the appropriate character e.g. green tree, yellow car to beat your opponents. My daughter LOVES this game and the excitement and anticipation of the competition that comes with it.
Grabolo can be played with up to 6 players and takes just around 10 minutes to complete. Grabolo retails at £9.99.
For the Family Battle
Rummikub is another favourite from my own childhood so one that bought a whole load of nostalgia when we started playing again. I love how competitive Mike gets with this one (he now considers himself to be a bit of a pro!)
Rummikub comes with 106 tiles numbered 1-13 in four different colours. The aim of the game is to be the first person to clear all their tiles and should RUMMIKUB! To play, you must lay down sets of groups (three or four tiles of the same number but different colour) or runs (3 or more consecutive numbers of the same colour).
On each turn you can then either rearrange of add to existing runs, create new ones and clear your rack, using a joker to create any number.
The game is really quick and easy to learn, and involves strategy, sets and logic – requiring tactical thinking and planning ahead, whilst at the same time observing other players moves to ensure you don’t miss any opportunity to place a tile.
Despite Mikes initial reservations on this one he is well and truly hooked! Erin in particular has enjoyed the challenge of trying to beat her Dad!
Educational but bags of fun…
If you aren’t familiar with the concept, Triominos was first released in 1965 and is suitable for 2-4 players aged 6 and above. A triangular version of the classic game dominos, with triangular shaped pieces with sides all worth different amounts of points. To win you must try and score the highest number of points by matching your tiles, and be the first person to place all your pieces.
Triominos is the combination of luck and skill, using maths, logic and strategy to place the pieces in the best location, as well as collecting bonus points for linking tiles to create bridges, hexagons or double hexagons.
The instructions are super easy to follow, and unlike some board games, age does not a competitive advantage which means that Erin quite regularly beats me (and is pretty proud of the fact too!)
A fun way to encourage children to practice their addition by volunteering to keep a tally of the scores, Triominos also comes in a handy little canvas bag that zips all the pieces tidily away after play.
For the Ultimate Duel
Tetris Duel
Based on the computer game Tetris (oh how i miss my youthful Game Boy days!) Tetris Duel is a fast paced table top head to head challenge with your opponent. Race against the timer to create rows using your shaped Tetrimino pieces and score the most points to win. An LCD screen displays the piece you need to play next, and you score points for placing your piece by another of your own colour, or by completing a row. Avoid creating gaps in the rows or points will be deducted!
The electronic grid keeps a track of time and score, lighting up to mark each players’ turn.
This one does require some initial assembly and my daughter took a little longer to fully grasp the scoring system as it isn’t automatic) but this light up twist on a retro classic has soon become a firm favourite.
ORTHELLO
Orthello is a simple to play strategy game for two players that is really quick to learn but much more challenging to master!
Game play is really simple – players share out the double sided black and white discs and choose which colour they want to play with. The aim is to ‘trap’ the discs of your opposing player between two of your own colour. Once captured, you can turn their disc over to your colour.
Starting with just four discs on the board, the winner is the person who can achieve the most pieces of their colour on the board – a fast paced game, the player in the lead can change quite literally from one move to the next!
Possibly one for slightly older players (7+) in order to fully benefit from the strategy elements and is suitable for 2 players (but is also fun to watch!)
For Solo or Team Play
Rubiks Revolution is a great twist on the traditional Rubik’s cube that we all know and love and features 6 different electronic games that can either be played alone or against your friends and family, with lights, actions and sound.
Erin’s personal favourite was LIGHT SPEED mode which can be played as single or multiplayer. In Light Speed mode you have to find and turn off the lit up square on the cube, spinning the cube in your hands to find the one that is illuminated. As play progresses you get less and less time to find the illuminated square, and the aim is to achieve the highest score possible. This normally results in lots of manic twisting of the cube and is high energy fun for the whole family.
I also really enjoyed Pattern Panic mode where you have to remember a set sequence of colours (which are said in spoken mode e.g. Blue, White, White, Yellow) and extend by a new colour for every level.
Team work makes the dream work
BANK ATTACK
In this high energy game, the family has to work together a team to try and crack the vault and release the gold that has been hidden inside!
Each player chooses their role in the mission (from Hacker to Money Maker, Lookout or Explosives Expert) and then you pick the level of difficulty (from 1-5).
Follow the instructions from the boss quickly and efficiently (passing the correct tools at the right time to your team members) and avoid making a mistake or the alarm will ring and your mission will fail!
The harder levels for this are frantic and we loved the scrambling around trying to find the right pieces at the right time!
This one is recommended for ages 7 and above, and for the harder levels in particular I think this would be more like 8/9+.
Get Involved and Raise Your Game
So there you have my round up of family games – which ones would you like to play with your brood?
If you want to get involved and take part in Dementia UK’s Raise Your Game – you can sign up for a fundraising pack HERE
By taking part with your family and friends, you could help fund dementia specialist nurses to support more families across the UK.
A big thanks to Ideal Games for sharing their selection of best selling games, all of which are available to buy now at Amazon and all good toy stores.
