Mini-Review: Forbidden Island

(Image from Gamewright's site: http://www.gamewright.com/gamewright/index.php?section=games&pa...)

I put this game on my wishlist about a year ago and this Christmas a relative came through and sent it to us as a gift. My daughters did not seem very interested in playing when I showed them the game tin, but I went into the dining room and began reading the instructions and setting up the "board." In this game, you lay out tiles to form the game board. We don't play many board games (though there was a Clue marathon on Christmas day with the visiting cousins) so this was novel enough to get my 11 and 13 year old daughters to sit down to play. As I set out the tiles, the girls read the names aloud.

"Oooh, the Observatory!"

"Twilight Hollows!"

We played three games in a row. The first one was way too easy, but that was my fault for not knowing the rules well enough (we didn't limit our hands to 5 treasure cards, and we didn't know we had to be on the same tile to give cards to other players). The second game also seemed easy, but it was still fun (I was giving players an additional treasure card when they drew a Waters Rise! card). On the third game we got the rules all ironed out and managed to escape the island after almost half of it had sunk into the sea!

The next day we played our fourth game, and this time we got mom to sit down with us.

Now, normally at this point the game would go back on/in/near the game pile and we'd look at it every once in a while, maybe say something like "we should play Forbidden Island again..." and that would be the end of it. And it may still be that way later. But today I came into the living room to find my 13 year old playing the game by herself.

She had a notebook next to her and I peeked over her shoulder.

On the left hand page she had written a list of all of the games locations. On the next page, she had started a short story.

"Chapter 1: Cave of Shadows"

She was playing the game to get ideas for a story she was writing based on the Forbidden Island.

And that's something we noted when we were first setting up the game. I said "This island sounds fascinating!" and the girls agreed.

(Image lifted from the game maker's website)

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Tags: Forbidden, Island, game, review

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Comment by James Floyd Kelly on April 7, 2013 at 7:31pm

Using the layout of the random tiles and locations to create a drawn map is creative. Have you told her about Forbidden Desert yet?

http://www.gamewright.com/gamewright/index.php?section=games&pa...

Comment by Garrett Alley on April 7, 2013 at 2:36pm

I managed to sneak this one:

Apparently she even needed a calculator(!)...

Comment by James Floyd Kelly on March 26, 2013 at 7:00pm

Treasure maps!??? Would she be willing to let you post a few photos?

Comment by Garrett Alley on March 26, 2013 at 2:15pm

Yes! Already done. I'm not sure if she finished that story, but she's moved on to drawing very detailed treasure maps.

Comment by James Floyd Kelly on March 25, 2013 at 3:46pm

Garrett,

Give that girl a leather bound journal!

Seriously... great little story. The creativity shown there will pay off for her later in life, I imagine.

Comment by Garrett Alley on January 17, 2013 at 10:28am

Thanks, Kevin. And you're right about the tin -- room for several islands in there... We haven't filled up our "game shelf"/area yet, so this one gets a pass, for now.

The kids were playing by themselves again this past weekend. This time they were changing the shape of the island. Funny, I think they wanted more of a challenge, but they refused to start with a higher water level.

Comment by Kevin on January 17, 2013 at 12:52am

Nice review. I got this last Christmas and it has been a hit in my house too. Its a perfect to play with kids and people who don't normally play boardgames since it's a co-op game. The only thing I didn't like was the tin it came in, which was ridiculously large considering the contents.

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