Product Tips

A Strategy for Fun

Volume 4 / Issue 2 / Winter 2004

Board games are back! For tons of fun this holiday season, I recommend three strategy games that stimulate critical thinking and provide hours of enjoyment for the whole family. All are suitable for gifted children.

Gobblet! by Blue Orange Games, is as easy to learn as tic-tac-toe, but it requires much more strategic planning. Designed for two players, the game consists of a wooden board with 16 squares and two colored sets of “nesting pegs.” Each player receives a set of 12 pegs, in four sizes. The object is to be the first to line up four pegs horizontally, vertically, or diagonally, placing the larger pegs first. To block an opponent or to gain advantage, a player may “gobble up” an opponent by placing a larger peg already on the board on top of the opponent’s smaller one.

To win at Gobblet! requires planning ahead, considering the sizes and combinations of pegs on the board, and determining any of the opponent’s pegs that may be underneath. Recommended for ages 7 to adult, Gobblet! has won national and international recognition from such prestigious organizations as Parents’ Choice, Oppenheim Toy Portfolio, National Parenting Publications, Dr. Toy, and the Canadian Toy Testing Council. Gobblet! Junior, a simplified version, is available for children as young as 5.

Another award winner is Blokus, by Educational Insights. Selected Europe’s 2002 Game of the Year, the Cannes Game Festival Winner, and a Mensa Select National Competition Winner, Blokus also requires considerable strategic planning. The game consists of a square, raised grid of 400 smaller squares and four colored sets of 21 tile pieces. Each piece is a different shape comprising one to five squares. The object is to get as many of your pieces onto the board as you can before the usable board space is taken up. Taking turns, the players begin in a corner and work toward the middle, placing one piece per turn. Pieces of the same color may touch only at the corners; pieces of different colors may touch sides. The player with the fewest pieces left when no more moves are possible wins.

Blokus instructions provide variations for one to four players, ages 5 to adult. Each variation requires critical analysis of space and geometric positioning, and the differently shaped pieces allow for numerous defensive and offensive maneuvers. To see a demo of Blokus in action, go to www.blokus.com.

Another Mensa Select National Competition Winner is Fire and Ice, by Out of the Box Publishing. The game board consists of seven triangular islands arranged into a larger triangle connected in threes by lines and a circle. Each individual island has the same symmetric configuration of seven peg holes as the game board. The object is to control three of the islands along one of the straight lines or situated around the circle by controlling the pegs on the individual islands within the same configuration.

Players moves one of their pegs within the same island or to the corresponding position on another island, placing an opponent’s unplayed peg in the spot just vacated. Play continues until one player controls three islands by placing the pegs in identical configurations on each island and within the seven-island configuration. The mathematical pattern—seven points connected in triplets in seven ways—forms a finite plane and, according to the instructions, produces a winner every time.
—Sarah Boone, MA

Sarah Boone holds a master’s in teaching and certification in gifted education. She teaches at Meredith College.