We’re looking at yet another snowy weekend. That means 15 minute stints of kids frolicking in the snow between several hours of them not wanting to leave the house–and us being stuck in the house, anyway, and that’s why you’re seeing so many reviews of games for kids lately. Fortunately, we’re on a hot stint of fun games that make these snowy weekends feel like family time. If you’re looking for a fun game for the entire family, for example, then Spot It! is…er, it. Spot the matching item on a pair of cards and call it out before anyone else does. While the recommended age is 7 to 12, but that just looks to be part of a trend where toy manufacturers try to play it safe. We’ve seen Spot It! be plenty of fun for kids age 5 and up.
This is a great game for parents and grandparents to play with their children and grandchildren. The packaging is travel size so this is a great game to take on a trip. It contains four games where all of the players play at the same time. Spot It improves visual perception skills and sharpens mental processing and cognitive skills–all while playing, you know, a game. Spot It! has 55 round cards, with each one decorated with 8 symbols. With more than 50 symbols used among the cards, including images of snowflakes, hearts and dragons, as well as words such as Stop and OK, there is always one (and just one) matching symbol between any two cards. The words and symbols are easily recognizable and the game can be played with two to eight players. The player who finds the matching symbol on the two cards wins the round. That player then draws 2 new cards, puts them on the table, and the game continues.
If two players tie for first when the game ends, the winner is decided by a duel where each player picks a card and, at the same time, places it face up on the table. The first to find the matching symbol wins. That’s really more simple than it sounds. We just like to get really detailed on the descriptions. And we’re really impressed by how Spot It! also offers five mini-games in the pack, with separate objectives and rules. That makes it a great game for shorter car trips–assuming we can ever get out on the road again.
