Mickey Mouse Undertakes a Magical Quest to Save Pluto

When my cousin Kristen and I were growing up, everyone associated me with Winnie the Pooh and her with Mickey Mouse. In fact, they still do. While I never got my hands on a Winnie the Pooh video game, one of the first games I bought when my brother and I finally purchased a console in the early 1990s – skipping right over the Ataris and Nintendos we’d played at our friends’ houses to the Super Nintendo – was The Magical Quest starring Mickey Mouse. Kristen had moved out of state before that point, but we still got together when we could, and this game was a staple of our sleepovers.

This is a two-player game, but unlike some Disney SNES games, such as Goof Troop, only one can play at a time. Hence, you’re basically racing each other to see who can beat the game first, or at least who can get the furthest before you decide to give it up for the day. Each player is Mickey Mouse, and when that player loses a life, it’s time for the next player to give it a whirl. When the players are greatly mismatched in terms of game-playing skills, this can lead to some frustration. Annoyingly, there’s no way to save game progress either, so it took us a fair number of get-togethers before we were able to get through the earlier levels quickly enough to finish the game in one sitting.

Mickey’s basic form is his typical black, red and gold outfit, and plain old unencumbered Mickey has some advantages in game play but lacks any special powers. However, he has three different costumes that he can change into. Sorcerer Mickey shoots magic, fireman Mickey sprays water and mountain climber Mickey shoots out a grappling hook that allows him to scale cliffs. Each has its charms, but my favorite is probably the fireman, since it’s such fun to see the water extinguish those fires and, in certain situations, create icy outcroppings. The grappling hook is great, too, but I often had trouble making it work properly.

The Magical Quest has six levels, each of which gets progressively more difficult, though after a few times through, the first three are fairly simple to beat. In Treetops, Mickey must ascend a series of twisty vines in a landscape that seems partly inspired by Mickey and the Beanstalk. This level is fun and not super-tricky, with Mickey hitching rides on flying tomatoes (not of the Olympic snowboarding variety) and disturbing snoozing birds to get to where he needs to go. The boss, a giant snake-like dragon with Pete’s head, is easy to beat by throwing projectiles at him, and the Pete-headed spider at the end of Dark Forest is similarly simple to vanquish if you can get the right angle for stomping on his head.

Fire Grotto is more challenging, since fires keep popping up randomly as they do in the Princess Bride’s Fire Swamp. Still, there’s usually enough forewarning that you can get through the level without being burnt to a crisp. The hardest part is keeping up enough fire energy, which can be boosted by finding hidden fire hydrants, much as magic can be boosted by collecting magic lamps.

The hardest levels by far, though, are the last three. Pete’s Peak is incredibly windy, so there’s always danger of simply blowing off a cliff, and the boss, a mother eagle, is incredibly difficult to defeat. Snowy Valley, meanwhile, is slippery, and it’s very hard to keep your footing. The game culminates in Pete’s Castle, where Mickey finally hopes to rescue the missing Pluto. After those last two levels, this one seems almost easy by comparison until you get to Pete; actually beating him is another matter.

The graphics are pretty decent for two decades ago, and the music has a fun adventurous ring to it. Once you’re proficient, beating the game in an afternoon is not too difficult, and my cousin and I managed it several times, though we probably had the most fun while we were still getting the hang of it. While elements of it can be aggravating, this is a classic game holding many happy memories for me.

Different Colors Make the Pooh Playing Card Deck Attractive But Hard to Use

It’s no secret to anyone I know that I am a big fan of Winnie the Pooh. Add that to my fondness for playing cards and it’s little wonder that I have received more than one deck of Winnie the Pooh playing cards over the years. The sturdy deck produced by the United States Playing Card Company comes in an attractive pastel purple box whose front shows a drowsy Pooh Bear happily snoozing in a hammock. A simplified version of this same picture appears on each of the four ace cards.

In terms of image variety, this isn’t the most complex of card decks, since it only uses 13 different pictures, plus pictures of Pooh and Tigger that take up the whole card for the jokers. The ace, jack queen and king each have a thin border with yellow on the left side, pink on the right and either purple or blue on the top and bottom, depending on the suit. Otherwise, the background is white, and that white background is uninterrupted for cards two through ten.

The most unusual thing about this deck of cards is the fact that instead of having black clubs and spades and red hearts and diamonds, it has purple clubs and spades and blue hearts and diamonds. The reason for this is aesthetic, as it goes so nicely with the cheerful color palette used in the pictures themselves, and I do like it from that standpoint. On the other hand, my brain is so used to the established colors that I tend to get a little confused when I play with this deck. It’s not a problem if I’m playing something simple like golf, which allows me to take my time, but if I’m playing a fast-paced game of double solitaire, this is not a deck I prefer to use.

For numbers two through ten, the icons emblematic of that particular suit are featured on the card. For instance, the nine of hearts has nine hearts on it. Hence, there’s not a lot of room for pictures. Out of necessity, only the jack, queen and king can be really large. The hammock picture on the ace doesn’t take up much room because of the large “Disney’s Winnie the Pooh” floating above it. Of Pooh’s jumbo poses, my favorite is probably the one on the queen card, which shows him clutching a bouquet of purple flowers and smiling, eyes closed. However, I also love the jack, on which he stands with his nose tilted upward as a butterfly lands upon it. The king pose is actually identical to the eight aside from the size, which is a bit boring; I would have thought something different could have been done for the final card in the suit.

Among the regular numbers, we have a variety of poses, some more interesting than others. Pooh is alone on seven and eight, whereas he has company on all the other cards, though in the case of three, it seems to be his imagination that Heffalumps and Woozles are peering at him through the mirror. The box for this deck includes an advertisement for The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, the show that really made me an ardent enthusiast of the Silly Old Bear and his friends, and the style of the pictures reflects that. The pictures are very detailed and cheerful. My favorite is probably two, in which Piglet offers a pot of honey to a kingly Pooh as Tigger, a pot atop his head, stands guard. I also love ten, in which the two friends surprise Pooh with a birthday party. However, I was a little disappointed that only Tigger and Piglet appear in the deck. That leaves out Rabbit and Eeyore, who are usually just as prominent as Piglet and Tigger, as well as the more infrequent Kanga, Roo, Owl, Christopher Robin and Gopher, who isn’t in the books but is at the heart of some of the show’s most memorable episodes.

With seven other major characters unrepresented here, there is plenty of reason to introduce other decks into the mix, which the company has done. Still, this is a very nice deck for those who love Pooh, Tigger, Piglet and the simple pleasures depicted on these cards. Each card is sturdy and smooth, making this an easy deck to use with any number of traditional card games. While I would recommend it primarily for slower-paced games, if you are not so easily addled, you should be able to use it for whatever card game you enjoy most. Card-playing, like most activities, is so much friendlier with Pooh!

That Mickey Mouse is Such a Card...

We play a lot of cards in my house, so we have a cardboard box full of card decks, and every once in a while one of us will pick up a new one just to give us some variety in our card options. One of our decks is a set of Disney Mickey Mouse playing cards. I think I actually picked them up with the intention of incorporating them into a birthday project, but I needed two identical decks of cards and there was only one on the shelf. Since I never found a matching box, I went with another deck design for the present but kept the cards for myself.

The blue box in which the cards came has a smiling Mickey on the front, and the box bears his name as well, but the deck features not just Mickey but several of his friends as well. The backs of the cards are purple and feature a group portrait of Mickey, Goofy, Donald, Pluto and Minnie, all smiling widely. The picture is full of vibrant color, and the characters are shaded in such a way as to give them a slightly three-dimensional look. The arrangement of the characters adds to the fun, as each is in a distinct position. Minnie sprawls in the front, her chin resting on her gloved hands, while Goofy, in the back, has one arm on Mickey’s shoulder and the other on Donald’s. Next to them, Pluto pants cheerfully, one ear raised as if to indicate that he has just heard an intriguing noise.

While Mickey is not the only character in this deck, he’s certainly the star. In each suit, numbers 2 through 9 focus on Mickey, and the pose is the same across the suits. For instance, each 5 shows Mickey eagerly pointing at something, while the Mickey on 9 bashfully holds out a bouquet of pink flowers. In all 36 cards, he looks the same, with black arms and legs and dressed in his traditional red shorts with white buttons. The aces are a bit different, as each features Mickey in a different pose and costume engaged in some type of physical activity. For instance, the ace of clubs shows a scowling, green-shirted, yellow-helmeted Mickey doing a difficult skateboarding trick, while the ace of diamonds shows him in jeans and a red shirt kicking a soccer ball.

The face cards are where the real variety comes in, as each character has a number to his or herself, and each character gets four different poses. The 10s feature Pluto, though he only has two to himself as Mickey shares the limelight with him on the other two. Jack Goofy, Queen Minnie and King Donald all get to fly solo for all four of their cards. My favorite suit for the face cards is spades, as Goofy, Minnie and Donald are all dressed in marching band uniforms and each plays a different instrument.

Only three of the cards in the deck – two with Mickey, one with Pluto – feature any less-than-happy facial expression, and it’s not so much that they are unhappy in them, it’s just that they are concentrating hard. It might have been fun to have a little more variety in the expressions; Donald is particularly entertaining when he is angry. However, this choice gives the deck a very cheerful feel.

One thing I appreciate about this deck is the balance between variety and uniformity. For instance, I’m glad that the suit colors are the traditional black and red. I have other Disney decks with blue and purple instead, and while they are pretty, the color difference throws me off, especially when I am playing a fast-paced game like double solitaire. The suits are further differentiated from each other in that each suit has its own background color. Every card has a white border and a white rectangle in the upper left and lower right corner where the number and suit of the card are displayed, but the main picture is contained in a rectangle, with the character in question sometimes spilling out into the border a bit. The clubs have a pink background, the spades green, the hearts blue and the diamonds yellow. What’s more, in the face cards, the corresponding suit design is set in the middle of the card as part of the backdrop. This makes it look as though each character is peeking out from behind a frame with a hole in the shape of a club, spade, heart or diamond.

Along with the 52 regular play cards, there are two identical jokers. Each has a purple background and features a laughing Mickey receiving a slurp from Pluto. Additionally, one card has a list of games and rule books available for purchase, while the other encourages customers to check out www.USPlayingCard.com to learn about other card brands, how certain games came about and how to play hundreds of different games.

I find that playing cards is more fun when I have an interesting deck, and this deck certainly fits the bill. Colorful and featuring beloved characters that just about anyone is bound to recognize, it’s also practical and can be used for any game that calls for regular decks of cards. Golf, double solitaire and rummy are the favorites in my house, but that’s only the tip of the iceberg. Meanwhile, if you are of an artistic nature, you can use the cards to build houses and see how far you can get before the structure collapses. Whatever your pleasure, the Mickey Mouse card deck is a Disney delight.

Midnight Bingo

An organized bingo event can be a surprisingly fun way to bring college students together.

Around Epinions: Explore the Wilds of India With Mowgli in The Jungle Book

I first became aware of video game systems on a visit to my cousin David’s house. He had an Atari, and every time we went there, I looked forward to playing his E. T. game, which, as I recall, mostly consisted of laying trails of Reese’s Pieces. Later, my friends would introduce me to the wonders of Nintendo, and although my wild, jerky movements threatened to knock out a lamp or a clock whenever I was allowed to try my skill at Duck Hunt or one of the Mario games, I thought that nothing could be cooler than having a Nintendo of my very own. Then Super Nintendo came along, and I couldn’t stand it anymore. One year, my brother and I pooled our savings, and we bought ourselves a Super Nintendo, along with several classic games that we played through the ground.

My favorite was one that came along a little later. As I watched the usual parade of Saturday Morning Cartoons, a new commercial captured my attention. A ferocious drill sergeant bellowed out his descriptions of all the rigorous challenges a player would have to face in playing The Jungle Book for Super Nintendo. That classic Disney movie, the last animated film overseen by Walt Disney himself, had long been a favorite of mine, so the premise appealed to me at once, and it looked like a fun game. And my brother and I collapsed into giggles whenever the sergeant concluded the commercial by demanding, in a low and dangerous voice, “Have you ever tried to get to Level Ten in your underwear, boy?”

No, we had not, but yes, we were determined to try. The underwear, of course, refers to the paltry bit of red cloth that passes for Mowgli’s clothing, both in the movie and the game. Mowgli is lanky and limber, even more so in the game; he swings from trees, surfs on giant leaves, ducks and weaves and crouches and leaps his way through all of the trials that await him. Super Nintendo isn’t nearly as graphically advanced as the systems that are out today, but I was always happy with the look of the game, which is modeled after the film. Similarly, the game incorporates music from the movie, most notably The Bare Necessities, a sped-up version of which plays when Mowgli dons a mask giving him brief invincibility.

The masks can be handy, as Mowgli can breeze past enemies without being injured, though I find that, especially with the music on, the mask puts me in a frantic energy mode and, as often as not, I end up accidentally launching myself off a cliff. It’s the steep drops that I generally find most hazardous to my health in this game. For instance, Mowgli must sometimes leap a series of floating leaves, which is tricky to get right. It’s also easy to get carried away when swinging on a vine; that’s one of the most entertaining actions you can do on this game, but it can be tricky to get the timing right. Even when there is no immediate danger below, there is a chance of taking up too much time and ending up losing a life.

Handily, there are halfway points in the levels, so once you’ve mastered the first part of a level, you won’t have to return to it again and again before moving on to the latter portion. The midway point is usually heralded by the young son of elephant colonel Hathi, while Baloo the bear is often on hand to usher Mowgli out of a particular level. Most of the characters from the movie turn up at one point, to help or hinder. My favorite villain, in film and game both, is Kaa the snake. He’s the end-of-the-level boss in the largely vertical tree level, in which Mowgli spends much of his time inside of trees, stumbling into invisible obstacles. The first few times I played, I had one heck of a time putting the hypnotic Kaa out of commission. It’s not quite so tricky anymore, but still, he is one slippery fellow! Other levels require Mowgli to navigate a river, march with Hathi’s troops and make his way through the ruins where King Louie resides. The game finally end when Mowgli beats the tiger Shere Khan and makes his way into the man village to start a new life.

A lot of the game is about ingenuity and agility. Mowgli does a lot of climbing, ducking, jumping and the like, and it’s important to navigate the level with an eye for hidden treasure, since you must collect a certain number of gems in order to advance. Of course, in unearthing hidden treasure, you might also stumble into a threat; my least favorite of these is the beehive, which comes with a very irritating sound effect. There are also prickly pears to watch out for, and mischievous monkeys are always lobbing fruit from overhead. Of course, Mowgli is not unarmed himself. He has an arsenal of bananas, and along with the gems, he also collects various other fruit-based weapons. I generally find the bananas the easiest weapons to use, but it’s worthwhile to pick up as many extras as possible because it is possible to run out of bananas.

The Jungle Book is fairly easy to play but not so easy that it lacks a challenge. I prefer it to the fairly similar Aladdin and The Lion King, though those are fun as well. The only downside, really, is that two people can’t play at once, but I’ve always preferred one-at-a-time games anyway, since you get to make all of the decisions without having to worry about how they affect another player. If you prefer to play simultaneously with a friend, Goof Troop is a cute Disney game that allows this and is probably my favorite of such games that I have tried on the Super Nintendo.

I’ve noticed that lately, a lot of my friends have joined the Facebook group When I Was Your Age, We Had to Blow on the Video Games to Make Them Work. Though we don’t pull out the Super Nintendo too often at my house anymore, it’s still in the living room, and once in a while I get the urge to expend a bit of hot air for the sake of spending a couple of hours with a classic video game, particularly this one. Now that I have gotten to level ten many times over, I can certainly attest that The Jungle Book was a worthwhile investment.

Classic Scrabble Is Streamlined for Computer Play

It’s hard to believe that it’s been a decade since my grandparents were introduced into the wonderful world of computers when my grandma received one for her birthday. She took to it quickly, and before long, we were e-mailing each other and chatting over instant messenger. This year, she even joined Facebook. For the most part, Grandma uses her computer to keep in touch with friends and relatives. But she also likes to play a game now and then, and her favorite is Scrabble.

Scrabble has long been a board game of choice in my family, and scarcely a visit with Grandma and Grandpa seems to go by without at least one instance of us trying to outfox each other on the Scrabble board. When we’re at their house, we still play the traditional way once in a while, since it’s not very easy for three people to crowd around the computer. But mostly, Grandpa sits out and Grandma and I challenge each other, and with the computer keeping score, the game goes by pretty quickly.

The rules are the same as in the traditional board game. Each person gets seven letters to start out with, and as tiles are used, more must be drawn. This can be done automatically or by selecting individual turned-over tiles that hover around the board by clicking on them with the mouse. When Grandma and I play, we decide who goes first, and that person is Player 1. The game keeps track of how much time we’re taking, so it’s easy to tell if one person’s turn is dragging on a little longer than it should. It’s interesting to compare the two players’ times at various points in the game.

Another nice feature of the game is that if you try to play a word that the computer rejects, you still have your turn. Hence, you really don’t have to shrink away from playing something if you’re not sure about it. Revealing your letters to your opponent isn’t even an issue because that’s just something you have to get used to when you’re playing this game. You will see each other’s tiles, unless you turn away from the computer every time it’s the other player’s turn.

When my grandparents play each other, they always point out possible words to one another. I like a bit more competition, so Grandma and I keep our suggestions to a minimum, though we do find that once in a while, we can’t resist speaking up. (Now that she’s on Facebook, I’ve been trying to get her to give Lexulous a whirl so we can conduct a long-distance game, with the added benefit of not being able to see each other’s tiles, but that hasn’t happened quite yet.)

Playing on the computer, you don’t have to worry about tiles slip-sliding away. If you have a deluxe board, that’s not as much of a problem, but it can still be an issue, especially if somebody is clumsy and flings an arm across the board or an overly inquisitive cat decides to tiptoe through the tiles. The tiles on the computer are staying put. And the computer keeps track of the score, so there can be no accusation of false score-keeping, and nobody has to deal with the headache of math in addition to verbal skills.

It’s pretty basic stuff as games go, but Scrabble is one of my favorite computer games, even though I don’t own a copy myself. The graphics are clean and attractive, and there's a fun fireworks effect that comes up if you're lucky enough to use all seven of your tiles in one turn.  I’ve played it many times, and my grandparents have played it many more. Installation was easy, and we’ve never had a problem getting it to come up when we play. There are sound effects that you may choose to disable if you’re more inclined to think of Scrabble as a quiet game, ensuring that the virtual experience will be as much like the old-fashioned one as possible, but more streamlined. It’s hard to improve on a game that’s so great already. But in several small ways, the computer version does. Just try not to be too competitive...

Around Epinions in 80 Days: Farkle Is Fun - and Addictive!

When I was in elementary school, I spent far too many hours playing the insidiously addictive Tetris. In college, my addictive computer game of choice was Snood, to which my similarly afflicted fellow members of the college newspaper staff introduced me. Nowadays, I’ve fallen into the clutches of Farkle, a dice game that is all the rage on Facebook. My cousin got me hooked on it, and for a while, I found myself rolling those virtual dice late into the night. Nowadays, however, I don’t have to settle for pixels on my screen. That’s because I got the real, physical game for Christmas.

I don’t know if Farkle first appeared online or in plastic (though the word “classic“ on the packaging suggests the latter). I do know that I played a game quite similar to it when I was younger; we often broke it out on camping trips or other such occasions. So to me, Farkle was new but familiar, and getting the actual game felt like coming full circle. It comes in a thick plastic cup, mug-like but lacking in a handle and featuring a lid that fits perfectly over the top, making for easy shaking during rolls. On the inside, the material at the bottom is foam, which helps quiet the rattling of the six dice. My cup is blue, but it is also available in other colors. The dice are typical white, six-sided dice.

The game is pretty basic, and the cup comes with a set of instructions tucked inside for easy reference. (Actually, there are two sets: one in English and one in Spanish). All you need is a pad of paper to keep track of your score. The packaging advises that this game is intended for two or more players, but you can play by yourself too and challenge yourself to see, for example, how many turns it takes for you to get to 10,000. There is an element of gambling to this game, as you must at some point decide whether you want to continue with your turn and potentially earn more points or play it safe.

In order for your points to be preserved, you must earn at least 500. There are several different combinations that yield points. Ones are worth 100 points, while fives are worth 50. Three ones are 300; three twos are 200; three threes are 300; three fours are 400; three fives are 500 and three sixes are 600. Four of a kind are 1000; five of a kind are 2000; six of a kind are 3000. A straight of one through six is worth 1500, as are three pairs or four of a kind plus a pair, while two sets of three of a kind are worth 2500. Some of these point values and configurations are different than those found in the Facebook game; you’re free, of course, to use whatever rules you choose, as long as everyone is on the same page.

Each person rolls the dice and continues to roll, setting aside dice with point values, until he rolls a useless jumble or decides to call it quits. I see nothing in the rules to indicate that setting aside all eligible dice is required. I often throw back my fives in hopes of a better chance at a higher-scoring combination. The safest time to continue rolling is when all six dice are spoken for, since the next batch of six is quite likely to contain something usable. This isn’t always the case, however; if you get 3000 in one roll, I’d think very hard before deciding to put those points on the line with another roll.

It isn’t as easy to get to 500 as you might think, so if you play to 10,000 as the game suggests, it can take a while, particularly if you have several people squaring off against each other. My strategy usually involves taking it turtle-slow, and this has served me well, but being willing to push your luck can be very advantageous too. Whatever your style, Farkle is a fun, fast-paced dice game that’s easy to learn and play. Just watch out, because whether it’s on the computer screen or the kitchen table, Farkle is mighty addictive!

Test Your Tolkien Knowledge With Lord of the Rings Trivial Pursuit

When it comes to J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth, I like to think of myself as something of an expert. I first read The Hobbit in first grade, and my dad had already read it to me before that. By the time I was in high school, Sam Gamgee had replaced Bilbo Baggins as my favorite hobbit, though I'll always identify myself more with Bilbo. It was in eighth grade that my English class did a unit on The Hobbit and I was deemed so well-versed in the book that I was given an alternate assignment so I'd have a bit of a challenge. Of course, when Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy hit the theaters, those movies were highlights of my year three years in a row.

It's no surprise that the past decade has included many Lord of the Rings-related gifts, as merchandise inspired by the movies became readily available. One of these presents was Trivial Pursuit: The Lord of the Rings Movie Trilogy Collector's Edition. Shortly after I received this for Christmas, my parents, brother and I sat down for a game in which I expected to emerge the victor. As I recall, I did, but I found the questions more challenging than I had anticipated. I was anxious to give it a go in different company last month when I went to visit my friends Erica and Art. They, too, own the board game, and I'm pretty sure they've both played the game and watched the movies more often than I have. Still, I thought we were fairly evenly matched. Then the game began, and after Erica and I each missed a question, Art managed a flawless run of correct answers that left him the undisputed champion in a mere turn. Clearly, I am not the biggest Tolkien expert out there...

This edition of Trivial Pursuit comes in an attractive brown box featuring the Ring on the cover and ornate designs in the corners. The board, which features a map of Middle-earth in the background, has the Ring in the center, with six straight paths leading out toward the circle. Each path has five regular spaces and an oversized space the connects with the circle; these are the spaces that allow a player to receive a wedge of the corresponding color. On the circle, there are six spaces between each of these mega-spaces. In order to win the game, a player must collect one wedge of each color, for which there are spaces inside the bases of the game pieces. There is no purple wedge, but there are purple spaces; these direct the player to roll again.

Orange spaces have a tree symbol, which represents Things. Green has a leaf, for Good Characters. Blue has a curious brown symbol that represents Evil Characters; I can't figure out what it's supposed to be, but it certainly looks sinister. The red spaces have the Ring, denoting Place & History. Yellow spaces have a dagger for Warfare, and the brown spaces have a movie reel for Making Movies. This last category concentrates on details about the production of the films and might include such queries as "Which actor portrayed Aragorn?" or "In what country were the movies filmed?" If you were a Tolkien fan completely unfamiliar with the films, some of the questions in the other categories would trip you up, but this would be the only one to consistently cause a problem. To even things out, it might have been nice if the folks at Hasbro had lumped Good Characters and Evil Characters into one category and added a category specifically pertaining to the books.

This game is designed for up to four players, with pewter figurines of four of the main characters: Frodo, Gandalf, Aragorn and Galadriel. While Elf queen Galadriel is actually a rather minor character compared to the others, I have no objection to her inclusion, though I would have preferred that everyone in the Fellowship be included as well, giving players plenty of characters from which to choose. But I suppose that would have made the game quite a bit pricier!

Also included in the game are one die and a box full of trivia questions, and that's all you really need to play the game. If you land on one of the mega-spaces, you can decide whether you want to proceed in the circle or up the designated path. On any given turn, you're free to move to the left or the right as you choose. The main objective is to collect those wedges. Once you've done that, all that's left is to get to the Ring, which you must land on by exact count. At this point, you're at the mercy of the other players, and they get to decide which category is your weakest and hope that a question from that category will be enough to thwart you. If not, you'll be declared the winner.

The game can be more complicated than this if you wish. While the rules include suggestions for a shorter game, it's the Expert Fan Rules that require explanation. I'll do my best, though I prefer to play the simpler version. There's a Ring piece and a Ringwraith piece, and taken together, they add another dimension to the game. The One Ring belongs to whoever last correctly answered a question on a mega-space, even if that person already had the wedge for that space. The main purpose of possessing the Ring is to get you out of answering especially tough questions. However, if you elect to use this option, you must answer the new question correctly or you'll lose a wedge, and if you have no wedges to lose, you're out of the game. The Ringwraith moves with a roll of the die each time a player guesses a question incorrectly. Once it is out on the circle, it doesn't move along the spokes. If it lands on a space with a player, that player loses a wedge (or, as above, if he has no wedges, he is out of the game). If there are two or more players on the same space, the player with the most wedges loses a wedge.

Whether or not you incorporate these advanced rules, Trivial Pursuit: The Lord of the Rings Movie Trilogy Collector's Edition is a fun game for Tolkien fanatics - though if at least one of you has an especially extensive knowledge of the trilogy, I would recommend amending the rules so that a turn is over after a player answers a question, whether or not the response is correct. That way, everybody gets equal play time - though it also makes winning more luck-based. However you decide to play, this is a great board game for those who are eager to show off their knowledge of all things Lord of the Rings.

The Office DVD Board Game Is Fairly Fun for Fans

Over the past couple of years, my best friend Libbie had mentioned to me that she got a laugh out of The Office, so this Christmas I decided to get her The Office DVD Board Game, which tests players' knowledge of the show with a variety of challenges. The only trouble was that I'd never seen more than a snippet or two of the show myself, so I wasn't sure how soon I'd be able to play it with her. Imagine my surprise when my brother got the first four seasons of The Office on DVD for Christmas. Perfect timing!

I know of at least one other board game relating to The Office. This one, which comes with cardboard stand-up figures of all the major characters, includes only tidbits from the show's first three seasons. The first time I played it, there were still several episodes of the third season that I hadn't seen, so I was at a mild disadvantage, but there's a pretty good mix of questions from different points in the series.

While the questions are divided into several different categories, identifiable by the icon (Stapler, Beet, Sheriff's Badge, Dwight Bobblehead, Pepper Spray, Mug, Dice) on the screen that corresponds to the one on the game board, most categories lead to some type of trivia question regarding the show. For instance, you may be asked to finish a particular quote or identify the character who said it. Other questions are only very tangentially related to the show, like asking for the director of a movie mentioned by one of the characters.

The most oddball category requires contestants to work together to accomplish a physical task such as making paper dolls. This could be fun, but it's also time-consuming, especially since we don't know ahead of time what materials are needed. When Libbie and I land on this category, we generally choose another category to play instead. Additionally, there's some confusion about how the betting works in the one category that requires it. You're allowed to put down more than one Schrute Buck, but there doesn't seem to be any incentive to do so, since as far as I can tell you're only supposed to get whatever the other person laid down. Nothing in the rules seems to clarify this issue.

The board itself, and especially the currency, reflect the season three finale in which Dwight Schrute has reason to believe that he is now the manager of the Scranton branch of Dunder-Mifflin. As an incentive program, he institutes Schrute Bucks, which feature his face in the middle. In the game, answering questions correctly yields these bills, and collecting enough of them will ensure that when you land at Michael's desk, you'll win instead of being booted back to another area of the game. Because it takes a while to accumulate a winning number of Schrute Bucks, it usually makes more sense to take the long way around the board, but if you want to take the short cut, you'll have to deal with Dwight, whose desk serves as a roadblock for every player taking that route. Given its unique position in the game, I would think the Dwight icon would yield an especially challenging question, but these queries tend to be about as basic as the others.

Seasoned fans of The Office should enjoy the chance to test out their trivia knowledge, but it's not what I'd call an intensive game. Most of the questions aren't terribly tricky, and while the world-weary narration by H. R. man Toby Flenderson (Paul Lieberstein) is amusing and helpful as you're learning to play the game, it gets a bit old when he says the same things over and over. Same goes for the small rotation of clips that often are not directly related to the questions being asked. I'm sure Libbie and I will play this game again, but it's not the type of game that can be played for hours on end. It's fun, but it definitely could have been better.

Show Off Your Lyrical Prowess With Encore

When we visit my aunt and uncle over Christmas break, we often break out the karaoke machine, mostly to listen to them sing, though once in a while the McCarty crew will join in. This year, none of us made use of any of that fancy equipment. Instead, we sat around playing Encore, which forced all of us to exercise our vocal chords as well as our brains.

Encore is one of those fun party games, though it's probably best with a smaller group of people. Unlike games such as Taboo in which more players just mean more mayhem and more points, Encore is set up in such a way that an especially large group of people, particularly with different musical backgrounds, could keep the game going all name.

The game comes with a board and a die with you roll. You land on a square and do your thing, and if you emerge triumphant from your turn, you get to go again. If not, the opponent rolls. Sounds pretty simple, and it is, but those turns can take quite a long time.

There are several different play options depending on the color square you land on. The most common seems to be group against group, either word or category. If you get stuck with a category, watch out; chances are, you're in it for the long haul, since there are so many songs that could fit in most categories. All you need is six or more words of the song and you're golden. It's trickier when it's only one word, but even that can take forever to stump someone. When we played, we spend such a long time on "rain" and "God" that in the end, we gave up and went with a new card.

Other colors entail a person against person match-up or person against team. The deck is stacked against the individual in that instance, but that doesn't necessarily mean that the single person has no shot at winning that round. In fact, it seems like it's sometimes easier for the individual, since there's no confusion over which person is going to sing. As long as there are plenty of songs left to go around...

I'm not sure if the timers we played with were officially included with the game or had just wound up in the box, but there only seemed to be half a minute on the clock. I suppose it could have been a minute, but it sure seemed shorter when we were searching our brains fruitlessly for songs with "kind" and "name" in it.

There were nine of us playing, and the game lasted well over an hour, and would have lasted longer if we hadn't called a draw on several of the category questions when we were still going strong after ten minutes. You don't have to be a good singer to get a kick out of Encore, though it might help those you're playing with enjoy it more. All you need is a lifetime of tunes rattling around in your head, the more eclectic the better. Sing your heart out with Encore!

The Joy of Scrabble

I have already reviewed Scrabble, but when I was invited to participate in this write-off celebrating our favorite games, I knew that Scrabble had to be my choice. So I will be reviewing the deluxe edition of Scrabble, which is much more luxurious and practical than the original version. But first, a word or two about the game...

I have always loved Scrabble. My love of words has a lot to do with it, and there is also the thrill of arranging the tiles into a jackpot of points. Scrabble is one of the games we pull out most often, and we even have a notebook where we record our scores, along with the date of the game played. We haven't always kept that kind of a record; that came about a few years ago when I was in a Scrabble-obsessed phase and we played just about every day. Suffice it to say, Scrabble is my friend.

But I hadn't played it all that much recently until a friend of mine reawakened my interest in the game. We had just returned defeated from the college his sister and I attend. The group of us - the three of us and three friends - had planned to play Midnight Bingo, but we arrived to discover that the date had been misadvertised. As we sat at their house pondering what to do, he came up with the idea of playing Midnight Scrabble instead. So it was that we swung by my house to pick up my board and found ourselves starting up a game of Scrabble at midnight.

It was a revamped, revitalized version of Scrabble which reminded me a bit of the Disney commercial with the little girl who changes the rules to the game and ends up spelling
"supercalifragilisticexpialidocious." (Fun fact: That word was in the title of my first review of Scrabble, which was written long before I saw this commercial.) At any rate, the whole point was just to have fun and to prove that board games don't have to be "bored" games. We didn't even bother to keep score, and we created a completely different set of house rules. It was grand.

So I've been on a Scrabble kick lately. And although most of my games at home with my parents have occurred a little earlier in the day and have followed the more traditional rules, I can't forget the impetus for my renewed love of the game. Scrabble: Teenagers (and college folks) think it's cool, too!

Um... That was more than a word. But that's okay. Here's the gist: For anyone unfortunate enough not to know already, Scrabble is a game consisting of a board and a bag full of lettered tiles. In the deluxe version, the tiles are reddish-brown with white lettering. The board is plastic, and each square is set off in a groove. This is a very helpful in preventing the board from being wiped out by a clutzy movement. Also extremely useful is the turnstile underneath the board, which allows players to turn the board towards them on their turn. These special features make it the ideal board to own.

Although any number of house rules can be implemented, as I noted earlier, the basic rules are that each player has seven tiles on a given turn. That player must make a word by building off of a letter already on the board, except for the first word of the game, which must cover the star in the center of the board. The words can go horizontally or vertically, and special spaces on the board add extra points. There is a 50 point bonus for using all seven tiles. Proper nouns and foreign phrases are not officially allowed, though we dispensed with that rule quickly during Midnight Scrabble. When the bag is empty, the first person to use all of his or her remaining tiles collects the points remaining on the other players' trays. Whoever finishes with the most points wins.

However you play it, S-c-r-a-b-b-l-e spells fun, and it?s my pick for favorite game.

Ohhhh Noooo!!! The Next Generation of Tetris Lures in Unsuspecting College Student...

I first became acquainted with Snood last year, when I discovered that most of the members of the school's newspaper staff were addicted to this odd-looking game. Whenever an editor was late to a meeting, a fellow editor would announce, "Oh, they're probably playing Snood." Sometimes the game would even find its way into the meeting via someone's laptop.

I viewed this phenomenon with some bemusement, not entirely understanding the obsession but still itching ever so slightly to try it myself. Imagine my surprise when I returned home from my overseas travels to find that my brother had installed it on my computer in my absence.

"Wow," I thought. "This is that game that everyone at school is so obsessed with. I ought to give it a shot."

And so I did. I just started playing and figured it out as I went along. When I was younger, I used to spend hours playing Tetris. Now I found myself doing the same thing. Snood is quite a bit different from Tetris, but it still operates under the basic premise that keeping the board as clear as you can is a good thing.

In Tetris, you must navigate oddly shaped blocks into recesses of the same shape. When you complete a solid line, that line disappears. The goal is not to let the blocks touch the top. As an added frustration, you have a limited amount of time in which to rotate and maneuver each block.

In Snood, each object you are working with is a single unit whose shape and face depends upon its color. The blue Snood is a small circle that looks like Mr. Bill. The red one is roughly the same size and has a less definite shape. It resembles some sort of demon. The orange Snood is a large sun-like circle, green is a large square, purple is a triangle, and light blue is a square-like shape surrounded with fringes. Time is not an issue. You can take as long as you want to launch that Snood. Try to line it up with another of the same color, or start a new color group. In order to latch on to harder-to-reach Snoods, try ricocheting off of the side. You'll have less control over where it goes, but it might just lead you to eliminate a whole string of Snoods.

This is a game of strategy. You have to line Snoods up in groups of three. Sometimes a group much larger than that will be there when the level begins, and all you need to do in order to disperse it is attach a Snood to the whole lot. The bigger the group the better, and the more Snoods are supported by it the better. You get the highest points by dispersing large clusters of Snoods with several random Snoods attached to them with nothing left to cling to.

Snood comes in five basic levels: Child, Easy, Medium, Hard, and Evil. I started out always playing Journey, which takes you through the levels until you are unable to clear one, but now I stick to Evil, which is very populous, moves down towards the bottom of the screen very quickly, and includes many skulls, which are dead Snoods that can only be removed by shooting down the Snood clusters that support them. An additional option is Puzzle, in which Snoods are not laid out in rows but are arranged in a strange pattern. I've only played this a couple times. It's pretty tough.

Snood involves only the motion of waving around a mouse and clicking it. It can become monotonous, and if you've been staring at the screen for a couple hours playing it your arm will probably start to hurt and your eyes will start to water. The problem is that this game is so darn addictive! You get on your computer to do your homework and say "Oh, I'll just play a quick game of Snood before I write my paper." There is no such thing as a quick game of Snood. One leads to another, which leads to another, which leads to another... Don't let it happen. Be warned, Snood will grab hold of you and will not let you go willingly. Be prepared to fight back. If you try Snood, just know what you're getting yourself into...

"Is it a boy or a girl?"

Guess Who? is a fun game to play with someone who has a short attention span. The game moves very quickly, and the child will enjoy whipping the disqualified pictures down. Each player has a game board which consists of several picture cards with either blue or red backs. The game begins with all of these card standing upright. As a player poses questions about the picture which is on the card in the other player's hand, he or she is able to eliminate several possible pictures. When they are out of the running, they are placed face down.

This game is very easy to play, appropriate for children of preschool age and older. The downside of this game is that there are only so many questions that can be asked. Gender, hair color, eye color, glasses, hat, facial hair, bald...these are the most commonly asked questions, and although there are other possibilities, they grow more and more subjective. "Does he have a big nose?" "Is she smiling?" That sort of thing. It generally takes an average of half a dozen questions to determine the opponent's picture. If the person is a woman, that's automatically narrowed down to five. This is a favorite first question, so if one player has a man and the other has a woman, the one with the woman usually loses.

Guess Who? is an entertaining game, but usually you won't find yourself sending more than twenty minutes or so playing. There just aren't enough possibilities to keep the game going for more than a few minutes, and it usually gets boring after a few consecutive games. Tip: The pictures are movable, so rearrange them on your board to add variety. At least then you won't memorize everyone's position!

"The First CD Game"

I first encountered Play it by Ear in my middle school music class. For the purposes of the class, we broke up into teams and selected a spokesperson for each question. It was one of our favorite pastimes in the class, and when our music teacher couldn't come one day, it was the ideal activity to be supervised by a substitute. In this case the substitute happened to be our principal, who had been the kindergarten teacher when my class was in kindergarten. We were having a great time when the selected card instructed the CD controller to go to track 66 for a series of really short stories. It would soon turn into a moment that would live in infamy when the man in the first story began to demonstrate his knowledge of certain vulgar terms. We all loved our principal, but it was pretty comical to see her jaw drop like that. We were very careful to avoid that track thereafter.

A couple years later, we managed to snag it from a WQLN auction. I can't remember exactly what we paid for it, but I think it was around nine dollars. Now when we play it at home, we generally don't keep score. We just take turns asking and answering questions. That way we don't have to be so bummed out by how little we know!

The CD features 99 tracks, each of which is broken up into three separate sections (A, B, and C). Each track has several cards interspersed throughout the deck, each asking a different set of questions. Each card is double-sided, with a different track's questions on either side. There are many different categories to choose from, including TV, Movies, Sports, News and History: 1969 and before, News and History: 1970 and after, Animals, Musical Instruments, Pop Music, Classical Music, Tongue Twisters, Folk Songs, Marches, and Anthems, Short-term Memory, and Really Short Stories. I may have missed a category or two in there, but I think I covered them all.

The Sports and News and History tracks mostly feature news broadcasts or isolated quotes by famous sports figures or politicians. TV and Movies require that you be able to identify a television show or movie by a portion of its soundtrack. The Music categories feature clips of songs. Musical Instruments provides a series of three different instruments or rhythms, while Animals provides three different animal sounds. Tongue Twisters is pretty self-explanatory, as is Really Short Stories. Short-term Memory tracks give lists of items.

Many of the questions are quite tricky. You may here a song clip and be asked to identify the name of a song that group performed with a particular singer. Or you may hear a quote and be asked what political position this person held prior to making that statement. Expect to be stumped a lot.

Some of the tracks are just a lot of fun. For instance, if you were asked to identify a robin among gaily whistling birdsong, low grunting, or "Merry Chistmas," could you do it? Hmmm... And you will no doubt come to love certain recurring characters in the Really Short Stories, such as all those talking machines (an elevator and a pop machine, to name two) and the val gal / surfer dude airheads Cheryl Ann and Leo (the one responsible for the dreaded track 66).

This is a game your family will enjoy playing again and again. I highly recommend it for all -- just watch out for Leo's mouth if you're playing with kids!

The Classic

Do card games get any better than Uno? Such a simple game, but few games have achieved success like it has. It has spawned numerous special editions, including Sesame Street, Star Trek, and Toy Story, but the instantly recognizable original is what can be found in nearly every home in America.

It can be played with as many or as few people as you wish (though it would be pretty boring with one!). Just sit at a table or on the floor, hand seven cards out to each person, and leave the rest of the deck in the middle. Match numbers or colors, and foil your friends with Reverse, Skip, Draw Two, and Draw Four.

Easy to learn and fun to play, Uno is a definite plus for a camping trip or even a long car ride. Anyone can play, and if you can't win at any other game, maybe you'll have a chance with this one!

Just be sure to remember to call Uno when you have one card left!

Don't Sample the Cuisine!

I grew up on Hungry Hungry Hippos, frantically controlling my hippo as marbles flew across the feeding ground, trying desperately to get more marbles than my cousins and brother. Sometimes it seemed that the harder I tried the fewer marbles gained successful entry into my hippo's mouth...but it was a lot of fun anyway. Very noisy, very chaotic, but definitely a blast.

Why hippos and marbles? Well, marbles are the easiest objects to maneuver, and hippos are so big and hungry, they'll eat anything. (Though I would be quite surprised to find a live hippo happily gobbling up marbles in his native habitat.) And they're just so darn cute!

This game is great fun for young children, preferably four of them. Five minutes is an unusually long duration for this game, which works quite well since children this age tend to have such short attention spans. It's the ideal game to be found in a kindergarten classroom or at a picnic with young children. But the children shouldn't be too young -- probably no younger than three or four. A baby or toddler could decide the hippos ought to share their dinner with him, and you could end up with a choking child on your hands. For five- and six-year-olds, though, this game can't be beat!

Oops!

Do you remember the $100,000 Pyramid? I recall watching it years ago and itching to be able to get into that seat and get the other person to guess my word without saying something I wasn't supposed to. I thought, "That looks so easy! How can they not figure out what to say for that?" Of course, it always looks easier when you're not the one playing.

Taboo follows along the same lines as that lightning round of the $100,000 Pyramid. Each card has a word at the top and four words which you're not allowed to use in your clues. If you say one of the words accidentally, you get buzzed by a delighted delegate from the other team and must forfeit that point to them. The idea is to go through as many words in one turn as possible. I think the hourglass is two minutes. Four or five cards in one turn in considered great, but I've seen someone go through nine cards in a single turn!

The trick is to look for connections that the game makers might not have seen. Depending on how well you know your teammates, you may be able to judge what kinds of connections they'll make. You can even relate to something only they would know about. You can make fill-in-the-blanks. You can take it in an entirely different direction. For instance, I once had the word "cruise" and the taboo words were "boat," "vacation," "water," amd "carnival," or something to that effect. I said "actor, Tom..." and received the right answer in two seconds flat.

This is a game for fast thinkers. If you drive everyone crazy by free associating to the point where you're compared with Robin Williams, you will excel at this game. As long as the other players have some idea what you're talking about. This is a great game for parties and get-togethers, and it's sure to produce some laughs. And if younger children want to participate but find it too complicated, bestow upon them the honor of blaring the buzzer. You may wish you hadn't, but they'll have a blast.

Butterfingers?

I am an avid card player, but every time I play anything from double solitaire to Uno I find myself having to ask one of the other players to shuffle for me. My most valiant attempts always seem to turn the game into 52-card pick-up. When it happens that I am in a group of people which does not include a natural-born card dealer, then we're all in trouble.

That's not a problem, however, when I go to my grandma's house. Because of this magical little machine she has, all I have to do is put half the deck on one platform, half on the other, push the button...and presto, my cards are shuffled in a nice neat pile. I doubt if I'll ever get the hang of shuffling -- I've had perhaps fifteen years' practice and haven't gotten it right yet -- but if I can get my hands on one of these then I'll be all set.

Of course, if you're one of those people who likes to show off your ability as a casino-worthy card shark, this sort of device is extraneous, maybe even insulting. But if you're all thumbs like me, it'll make every card game a little bit less intimidating.

"You Roll Your Dice, You Move Your Mice. Nobody Gets Hurt."

Bob the Tomato was right on when he made this dry remark in Veggie Tales' "The Toy Who Saved Christmas". While "Mouse Trap" is as zany and crazy as it gets, it is also completely safe (unless someone swallows one of the mice). Younger kids enjoy just playing with all of the neat gadgets without bothering to try to put it all together. Just be sure not to leave a toddler alone with it as there are a very few game pieces small enough to be swallowed.

On the other hand, for the future engineer or inventor in your family, the elaborate setting up of the game is so intriguing that they may insist on setting the whole thing up before the game begins. The elaborate chain reaction which eventually leads to the capture of the unfortunate mouse/mice is simply ingenious, and the young participants may feel inspired to set up a fancy machine of their own.

Bright colorful plastic pieces and whimsical gameboard illustrations come together to create a five-year-old's cross between miniature golf and a role-playing game. One of the most creative games ever invented, no children's game closet is complete without it.

Pop! Goes the Dice

A simple dice game, Trouble has become a favorite in my house. Up to four people can play at a time. The more the merrier, because a more crowded board means more opportunities to jump your opponent. While this game is mostly luck, there is some strategy involved in trying to decide which pieces to move when. One thing to learn very quickly: never land on an opponent's starting point if you can help it. He may have been stuck there for twelve turns, but nine times out of ten he'll roll a 1 or a 6 on his next turn and send you back to where you started from.

This game usually doesn't take more than half an hour to play. It's simple enough that most kindergartners can grasp it, but it is entertaining for parents and grandparents too. This is a great game to bring along on a car ride or camping trip, and the POP! is so much fun that you'll be eagerly awaiting your next turn just so you can push that plastic dome.