Average Customer Review: ( 11 customer reviews )
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16 of 16 found the following review helpful:
 Best Game EVER!!!!! Jan 05, 2010
By Devilmomma
So many GREAT things about this game.. First- As soon as a child can talk they can play this game. Second- As a parent, you are NOT bored to tears when you play. All ages can play and you aren't simply going around and around a board. Third- the artwork is nice and the pieces are durable. Fourth- (the most important to me) my youngest is in speech therapy and shies away from speaking. In this game if you WIN you "get to" tell a story. So it is REALLY encouraging her to speak instead of being afraid to talk.
I LOVE THIS GAME!!! It was the best present we got this Christmas.
7 of 7 found the following review helpful:
A Quality Game for Imaginative Kids Dec 14, 2009
By S. Entin
My 5 year old daughter received this game as a gift and it's been one of the best toys this holiday season. It's simple, goes quickly, and the thick cardboard punch-outs are high-quality. Spin the spinner to find out what character or item you will select for your storyboard. The first one to collect one of each item (Hero, Rival, Treasure, Transportation, etc) wins the game and tells a story based on their board. We love this game!
11 of 13 found the following review helpful:
 Cute concept - absolutely dreadful design. Dec 28, 2010
By Martha A. Barton
"modgrrrl"
I bought this game sight unseen with great confidence that it would be a winner based on the glowing reviews here and the fact that it had a sticker on it claiming it had won an award for Best Toy. That was a mistake.
SUMMARY:
As a TOY - it's a cute concept and it does have some interesting possible applications for storytelling, but as a GAME? Arrrrgh. No. It is just insanely aggravating. If you play it as it is designed to be played it's possibly the most tedious "GAME" ever made.
PROS:
1. Cute looking pieces that will stimulate kids to come up with some entertaining and inventive stories. I would not say that they are HIGH quality as others have suggested, but rather a medium-quality cardboard. They are not as good a quality as you'll find in say a Ravensburger, Rio Grande, or one of those Reiner Knizia games, but they are miles better than the flimsy cardstock stuff you'll find in most kids games.
CONS:
1. Poorly constructed, useless spinner. The arrow part is made of a transparent flimsy plastic, and straight out of the box, ours was warped downwards and simply did not SPIN, it drags across the cardboard backing and barely moves -- you have to just nudge it around with your finger, you can't spin it at all -- very frustrating for kindergarten aged kids to try to manipulate. Also, since the arrow is made of clear plastic, it's also hard to see at a glance where it points.
2. TRULY TEDIOUS AWFUL GAMEPLAY. There is no actual game here at all. NONE. You spin endlessly until you get the parts you need, and you can't even begin collecting the parts until you have a "place" piece, so it's insanely frustrating for kids in its target age (5 years and up) to actually play.
GAMEPLAY :
The youngest player spins and play proceeds clockwise.
You must spin a "place" piece first before you can begin to collect the other components of a story. If you get anything other than a "place" piece you cannot keep it and must just pass your turn to the next player.
Once you have a "place" piece, you take turns spinning trying to collect the remaining 6 story elements, Hero, Rival, Transportation, Treasure, Magical Helper and Magical Object.
If you land on "Lose a Turn" you lose a turn. If you spin a duplicate piece, you pass your turn to the next player.
The first player to get all 7 story elements wins and gets to tell the story.
MY EXPERIENCE WITH IT:
Our maiden voyage with this "game" we spent eight minutes (fourteen rounds) just passing the spinner around and around taking turns, with everyone getting progressively crabbier and no one getting a "place" piece, before I made an executive decision to ignore that rule and decided that EVERYONE would just pick a "place"piece starting with the youngest player, so we could get things started.
Why did that happen? Well it's poorly designed.
There are 8 possible outcomes on the spinner, so the odds of spinning a "place" piece are only 1 in 8. However until you have a place piece, 7 out of 8 spins will result in you ending your turn with nothing. So before you get a "place" piece the spinner is essentially comprised of 7 lose a turn spots and one "place" piece spot.
As such, it is highly likely that you will spend a good period of time just passing the spinner around and around and around endlessly until someone finally gets a "Place" and the game begins.
ALSO - This means that it's entirely possible for at least one player to NOT get a "Place" piece at all before the game ends.
Wow.
Does that seem fun? Would that be fun for your 5 and up kids? I think not. It's an awful design.
So once we gave up on that rule and each chose our "place" pieces, we then spent another fifteen minutes spinning around and around to try to collect all the parts. NOT FUN IN ANY WAY. It was the most tedious thing we've EVER played. Worse than Cootie.
Finally to salvage the evening and end the game, I just said "Okay who has the most pieces?" And we had the person with the most pieces (5) tell us a story. Then we let everyone else tell a story with the pieces they had accumulated.
SUGGESTIONS:
So, if you, like me, bought this thing based on those glowing reviews and find yourself saddled with this sucker in your game collection, what can you do with it?
My recommendation is to just use it as a straight storytelling tool with your kid -- it's cute for that. You could do the same thing with pictures you drew with your child together though and save your money, but like I said, the pieces are cute.
So how we "play" this now is this...We just ignore the rules and the spinner. We have kids pick a "Place", then a hero or rival, then a second hero or rival, and then one each of the remaining elements. We have made up some supplemental elements too and pasted them onto cardboard to add to the "storytelling". Then we each take turns telling our stories. That's a heckuva a lot of fun, and really it's just great for that.
In fact Eeboo, we'd actually buy expansion packs of cardboard punch out story elements to use with these if you sold them just to add new levels to this...I would strongly suggest that you redesign this to be used as a straight storytellers tool and scrap the rules you designed, because they clearly weren't playtested.
No one should bother to play it as a game the way Eeboo has designed it. It's not a game -- it's an exercise in maddening, wearisome monotony. But it does work as a storytelling tool, and that's the only reason this thing is getting two stars from me. We do have fun playing with the pieces separate from the game.
As a toy/educational tool? 4 stars.
As a game? 0 stars.
Thus 2 stars.
It's great if you pull the elements out of it and just ignore their rules.
5 of 5 found the following review helpful:
Break away from the plastic (boring) toys! Aug 22, 2010
By CJ
First, seeing kids toys that help promote a sustainable future (you know, for your kids!) is very welcome. On top of that, it is a great game that is simple enough for toddlers but allows kids of any age to play since almost everyone enjoys using their imagination. Listening to the stories your kids come up with is priceless, so the game is quite a bargain at that. Eco-friendly, highly entertaining, and less expensive than so much of the junk out there - who could ask for more?
4 of 4 found the following review helpful:
Revised Rules Make It A Success Aug 16, 2011
By Lisa
"teacher mama"
I bought this game for my daughter's 5th bday because she's been on a Red Riding Hood kick. My daughters (5 & 6) own a couple of these Eeboo spinner games. They're excellent quality for the money and they encourage imagination. However, I must say we've changed the rules.
Eeboo rules are standard: Spin the spinner, then pick an item from the category you land on. If you already have one of that item, you lose a turn. If you land on "lose a turn", you lose a turn. Then, it's the next player's turn to try to land on an item. When we play by the Eeboo rules, these spinner games are TORTUROUS. Inevitably, we'd sit around for 20 minutes frustrated while someone tried to land on some needed category.
Here's our "House Rules" and we play these games several times a week.
1. Youngest goes first.
2. Youngest spins and lands on a category, such as "Hero." Youngest picks "Hero" FIRST, then player to left picks a "Hero" around the circle until EVERYONE has a Hero.
3. Next player spins and lands on a category, such as "Magical Object." Now, THAT player gets to pick FIRST, then around in the circle until every player has a "Magical Object."
4. IGNORE "Lose a Turn." Just spin again.
5. If you land on a category that's already been chosen, just spin again.
6. When you're down to the very last category (ie everything except "Treasure" has been picked) that player simply picks their "Treasure" first, then everyone else picks a "Treasure." We don't sit around spinning for hours until the person actually lands on "Treasure."
7. Now for what makes this game a hit--you use your pieces to make up a story. According to Eeboo, only the "winner" gets to make up a story about their pieces. Our House Rules say EVERYONE takes a turn making up a story about their pieces. This is the best part of the game, it's fun to hear what my girls come up with.
We use this same version of rules for the Eeboo Dress Up game. Some people might not be into "changing rules", but for use it's made the games a lot more "kid friendly" and fun.
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