Zeus on the Loose

Zeus on the Loose is quite solidly based on everything that makes the kids' card game 99 fun to play. And, quite like the Major FUN-awarded game Straw, it makes a good game, better.

Zeus on the Loose adds new cards, with new powers, a lot more interaction, and a Zeus statue.

Let me summarize the root game, as it were, according to Pagat, who classifies 99 as an "adding game": "These are...games, in which the values of the cards are added together as they played in a single pile, the object being to avoid taking the total above the target score (98, 99, 100 respecively)."

So, you see, if your card has the power of, for example, reversing the digits (one of my favorites), you can make the card total, which is currently at, for example, 93, become 39, don't you see.

Interesting. Fun, even. But it's the "lot more interaction" that earned Zeus on the Loose it's Major FUN for Kids award. It would have to be. Because the added functionality and the significantly silly images of male and female Greek gods, and even the cool little Zeus statue cannot be compared in fun value to the Stealing Zeus rules.

You see, to win, you must be the Holder of the Zeus. To be the Holder of the Zeus, you must steal it from a player who is currently Zeus-Holder. O, you steal quite openly, there is no deception involved. Merely the experience of complete, if temporary, vindication. And then it gets stolen from you. And you can't win without it. And then you do a "Same Number Sneak" (see the rules), and steal it back. And, well, it's like a whole nother game, as it were. Like 99, sure. And Straw. But a whole new level of fun.

GiftTRAP - a kinder kind of party game

GiftTRAP is a party game about giving each other gifts. The better you are at giving people the things they really want, the better you do at the game.

How do you like that for a party game premise? giving each other presents.

Well, we loved it!

What fun to think about what other people might want for a present! What a fun thing to think about for a change! What a fun way to play with other people - giving presents to the very people you're trying to beat, winning because you're good at guessing what other people might want!

OK, so they're not, like, real presents. They're only photos. But in the world of GiftTRAP, they're real enough. So real enough that you actually get excited when people give you the gifts you really want. Really excited. Even though they get more points than you do. And you're just as excited when you give people the gifts they most really wanted. Because they get excited. And, just maybe because you get more points than they do.

GiftTRAP is masterfully packaged. The board, for example, is folded into a U-shape that fits everso well into the GiftTRAP box (well, cube, actually). Since each player has to use a lot of different pieces (2 scoring markers, 9 gift tokens, and 4 choice tokens), all of the player's chosen color; the pieces come in their own individual, appropriately colored organza drawstring bags. Then there are the many decks of cards - 640 of them. Just so you never run out of something new to give each other.

But it's the game itself that deserves the most attention, and praise. Praise, because it's probably the first and only party game in which empathy is a strategically valuable commodity, empathy and intuition, sensitivity and appreciation, even.

GiftTRAP is a new kind of party game. A kinder kind. A Major FUN kind.

A Basket Full of Squishies

You remember me writing you about Office Playground? It was in that article on Toy Therapy for Business Meetings, in case you forgot.

I went to them for an update on their current meeting-appropriate toy offerings, and wound up with what I'd like to think of as "a basket full of squishies." Like to think, because I only got four, and the basket's too big, anyhow. Anyhow, as I was saying, think of these as a representative four, a mere sample of the varieties of "squish" (or whatever you call that really stretchable, baby-poweder-covered stuff they're made of and their meanings.

Let us begin therefore with the Spaghetti Ball, because it was my favorite and took me most by surprise. It's a bunch of squishy strings attached in the middle, is what it is. Long squishy strings, attached in the middle, and when you throw it, darn if it doesn't kind of ball up, and when you spin it darn if it doesn't flatten out, and darn if it doesn't hang by any one of it's strings and darn if you can't spin the whole thing pretty darn fast, if you want, in a pre-launching manner.

This pre-launching spinning of a mass of connected squishy strings activity is remarkably similar to that performed by the user of that which is commonly refered to as the Stretchin' Squid Yo Yo.

My wife, when she first saw the Stretchin' Squid Yo Yo - with its convenient finger-ring-ended highly stretchable, well, tentacle, with which, should you so desire, you can perform yo-yo-like activities - proceded to demonstrate the verisimilitude, showing me how she could Rock the Cradle, Shoot the Moon, Walk the Dog, and make me writhe with laughter.

Then there's this squishy frisbee-thing, the Stretch Flyer, which does in deed flatten and fly frisbee-like into the beyond, and also fits over your head. Thus, should a great deal of shared spunkiness be manifest, it can easily serve as an invitation to a game of frisbee catch, or golf, or basketball, or dodgeball, for that matter - a dodgeball that doesn't hurt. Or, as previously noted, you can put it over your head, which, at times, is exactly what you need to be able to do.

Finally, we have Stretchy String, also made of the basic squishy material, but thicker, and hence, stretchier, and further hence, can be snapped at things and people as well as whirled menacingly and at extensive distance. Of course, it doesn't really hurt when it hits you, but it sure looks like it will. As it does when someone snaps it at you.

Note, if you will, how each of these lends itself to a range of play, from sensual and contemplative, to downright hostile and aggressive. Note, further, how, though each is in deed a tension reliever, some seem to lend themselves more to relieving social tension than personal.

Trapture

Trapture is played on a hexagonal board with sets of 12 "Squiggles" - strips of 3 to 6 rectangles, joined at 60-degree angles. There are apparently many ways strips of 3-6 rectangles can be joined at 60-degree angles. Each of the 2 sets has 11 of them.

At the beginning of the game, the board is seeded with 13 purple pegs, each in its assigned position. Players take turns connecting their Squiggles in the grooves between the hexagonal spaces on the board, attempting to surround pegs. Because the Squiggles are so different, anticipating what territory one particular Squiggle will surround can be a sometimes profound challenge, conceptually and perceptually.

In fact, the challenge is often so profound that sometimes the best thing to do is not think about it at all, take any piece, and get on with it. Which is what makes the game often as much a game of luck as logic. Hence the sometimes Majorness of the FUN.

The transparent squiggles are gratifyingly hefty and colorful. You can play the game without even removing it from its cardboard box, which is a good thing, because when the game is over, closing the lid leaves all the pieces set up securely in position.

Flip-Tac-Toe

Flip-Tac-Toe is a 3-in-a-row game on a 4x4 board for 2-4 players. And that's not all. It's a Tic-Tac-Toe game that breaks almost every convention of Tic-Tac-Toe, and yet, when all is said and done, is still definitely Tic-Tac-Toe.

You get 12 big bright foam chips apiece. You put one of your pieces anywhere on the board. Or you move a piece anywhere on the board. Yes, that's right, I said move "a" piece, as in any piece, as in one of yours or one of anyone else's. Anywhere. Even on top of another piece (unless there are already 4 pieces on it). And if there are stacks of pieces, you can also turn a stack over, on your turn, so to speak.

A stacking strategy, they explain, is to try to get your color on top and on bottom of a stack, like a sandwich - so that it always stays the same color even when flipped. Very interesting. And very different when you play with 3 or 4 people, stack-sandwich-making-strategy-wise.

Easy to learn, because it's tic-tac-toe. Takes a while to master, because it's so much more.

Spectrangle

Spectrangle is a lovely, and happily intense game of luck and srategy - with just enough complexity to present a challenge, and just enough chance to keep the playing field level, as it were, so to speak, even if adults are playing too.

Speaking of playing fields, the game is played on one of a very few, if not the only, triangular game board. A very nice, molded triangular game board, by the way, that has a molded triangular lid that snaps down to store all the pieces. And the pieces themselves are colorful and of appreciable heft. And you know how much we love heft.

Players draw 4 numbered triangular tiles ("trangs") from a bag, and then take turns placing tiles on the board so that adjacent colors match. Certain spaces on the board score twice or three-times the value of the tile that occupies them. This significantly adds to the strategic interest of the game - weighing the value of holding on to a high-scoring tile, avoiding giving the opponent access to the high-score positions on the board, and, since score is determined by multiplying the number on a trang by the number of matching sides, times the value of the space it is on, looking for the highest scoring play becomes a truly challenging task.