Spin Mania Review & Giveaway - Drumond Park

Last week we were sent a great new game from Drumond Park - Spin Mania! The aim of the game is to spin three plates on top of three stands against the clock!

Using the motorised "Spinning Machine", you spin-up the three plates one at a time and then using your spin spike, transfer them, still spinning to the three separate stands.

Easy?  Well, it all depends on how tricky you want to make it! For the trial run (not against the clock in our case!) we practised just spinning and transferring the plates to the spin-spikes on a table top. My youngest is aged 5 (just below the recommended age of 6 years old) and he managed fine.

Then, to play the game properly, we had another go! Before the spinning starts, agree where the area of play should be, for example, just in the lounge, dining room or garden (if you're feeling brave in the cold weather). Before each player takes their turn, the other players secretly place the plate stands around the designated area. Try not to make it too difficult though! You can't actually hide a stand, but could place them in tricky places such as under a table or chair.

Then start the timer and go for it! Spin, transfer, find and place the plate on the stand - after the third and final plate, stop the timer and mark the score. The player with the shortest time wins! 

Play can be adapted for different age groups or even team play, involving a short obstacle course if you have the skill! You can even play on your own - perfecting your technique to increase your chances of winning next time!

We all had great fun playing this game - the difficult part for me was keeping a steady hand whilst giggling!  I'm sure the children were causing me a considerable disadvantage by pulling funny faces - no tickling allowed though!

In our opinion, this would make a great family Christmas gift - just make sure you have 2 C batteries in your cupboard... we always have loads of AA and AAA stocked up for Christmas but had to pop out and get some C batteries!  Spin Mania retails at around £22.99 and is available at all good toy and game retailers.  For stockists visit www.drumondpark.com or call 01506 855577.

The great guys and gals at Drumond Park have a copy of the game for you to win, so enter the Rafflecopter below and good luck!!! a Rafflecopter giveaway

Pumpazing Game Review and Competition - Drumond Park

"Booooiinnngggg!!!"  "Uh-Oh!!!"  "Booooiinnngggg!!!"

Have we all gone mad in our house?  No, of course not, but the arrival of the great game "Pumpazing" from Drumond Park made us temporarily full of giggles and boings!

Meet Zingy, the crazy blue character who, when his arms are pumped, launches his little Zinger friends into outer space (well, OK, just across the room) whilst catching you out with the "Uh-Oh" every now and again.

We played this game one wet evening last week... we had a few of these(!), so plenty of opportunity for indoor fun.  Zingy is passed to each player who pumps his arms until a "boing" or "uh-oh" sounds.  Using the Zingy cards as "lives" or "chances", each "uh-oh" means you lose a card and plays continues until there's just one player with a card left - the winner!

The game is suitable for 2 or more players aged 4 and over.  My daughter is 8 and joined in for the first round but it didn't really appeal to her age group... however, my youngest aged 5 has played with it over and over again!  After school and after a quick snack, he usually disappears into the living room and has a "rest" and watches TV...but now I know exactly where he will be.... just follow the noise of "boing!" and "uh-oh!" and the giggles and sure enough, there he is!

I don't know what produces the most fun...the anticipation of the next Zinger launch or the running around looking for the little critters afterwards!  I can honestly say that I have never seen a game like this one before - totally unique.  Just make sure you remove those ornaments that have been in the family for a lifetime and also watch out for babies who might not appreciate an unexpected Zinger paying them a visit!  Lucy the dog didn't seem bothered by the Zinger's but then, she's not a "ball-chasing" dog anyway!

This would be perfect as an easy party game so Zingy will be making and appearance at our Hallowe'en Party over the half term break!

There was a bit of a sulk when, randomly, one of my children got the "uh-oh" 3 times on the run, but in a larger group this wouldn't happen, by law of probablility anyway!  And we had a couple of "boings" with no action but this just increased the giggles of surprise when the Zinger did pop!

Pumpazing retails for around £19.99 - for stockists visit Drumond Park's website here or call 01506 855577.

Courtesey of Drumond Park, I have one Pumpazing Game to give away to one of you lucky guys or gals... simply complete the Rafflecopter below to enter.



a Rafflecopter giveaway

Foooz Pro Match Set Game Review - Drumond Park

Table football without the table!  This game's great for travel as it can be played anywhere!  Any reasonably flat surface can suffice as a football pitch - in fact the lumps and bumps of a duvet cover in bed can add to the skill and difficulty level!

Foooz Pro Match Set from Drumond Park games is great for any football fan.  Living by the rules of  "no football in the house" this certainly breaks all the rules!   Grab your Foooz figure and with a single twist you can shoot it, bend it, chip it and blast the ball, just like your favourite footballers!

With 2 players, 2 goals and 2 balls, this is the ideal game for a playdate or family game to keep the children entertained - my son and daughter enjoyed playing the game and loved the fact that it's fully transportable!  This will definitely be something to take along when visiting family from far and wide over the Christmas holidays.  Small and compact but lots of fun!

You can play the game in various ways - as a traditional table-style football game, as a skills try-out using the template for winning points as the goals are scored or individual practice to perfect your game.  Even hubbie was impressed, even though he's not a big football fan.  They were able to design the kits for each player thanks to the choice of stickers in the pack.

The inner cardboard insert provides a great background for the goal area (and helps to catch balls that run astray with any missed goals - less lost balls!)

Once you have got to grips with the Foooz Pro Match Set (priced at £19.99), you can up your team numbers with a couple of Challenge Sets (£9.99), each of which contain another player with all the ‘trimmings’, and a goal.

The game is suitable for ages 5 and up - I think that this is an accurate reflection of age suitability, my son is 5 years old and really enjoyed the game.  And, great news, there's no upper age limit so get Granny and Grandad involved in the action too!

***DISCLAIMER***

We were sent this product for free on the understanding I would write an honest review of what I thought about the product. I received no payment and the review is my own honest and unbiased opinion of the product and I retain full editorial control and integrity

"Deadly 60 Tracker" Board Game Review from Imagination

"Deadly 60"... the popular BBC children's TV show which draws the parents in too!  Wildlife presenter, Steve Backshall tracks down 60 of the world's deadliest animals and shows you what they are capable of!  The Deadly 60 Tracker board game from Imagination Games enables you, the player, to track down the animals yourself completing challenges by the roll of a die and collecting essential items for the adventure.

It's a creepy, crawly and crazy game where each player is given a ‘deadly animal’ to track down, and you must race around the board to track the animal down. With plenty of danger lurking, you have to take risks to beat off your opponents. The first player to successfully track down three Deadly 60 animals wins the game!  This really is a fun family game to play, great for the festive season or anytime throughout the year!

We've played the game a few times and it was a hit with my daughter and her friends at a sleepover last weekend.

Try to land on the blue squares to receive essential items or take a risk with the red squares... complete the challenges to be awarded item cards but fail the challenge and lose items that are necessary for your adventure!  The choice is yours, play it safe and steadily build up to your target or take a chance but beware!!!

In the game pack, there's a handy leaflet with fantastic "deadly" facts about 30 of the world's deadliest animals... a great start point for further research for inquisitive minds - on the CBBC website there are bags of information and online games that expand on the Deadly 60 games.  Have a look and you never know, one day you could be on safari with your child tracking the animals down for real!

The game is aged at 8 years old and above - this is set appropriately as my daughter was able to play this with her friends without an adult "interfering"!  Up to 6 players can take part so ideal for larger families or when you have vistors over the holiday period!

The only difficulty we had was finding the green die on the board when it decided to camoflauge itself... all part of the fun though!

There are three Deadly 60 games in the series from Imagination Games...

Deadly 60 Board Game (RRP £14.99)

Deadly 60 Ruckus Card Game  (RRP £4.99)

Deadly 60 Trivia Box (RRP £7.99) 

All available from Amazon, WH Smiths, Tesco and other good retailers- watch out for them this Christmas!

Silent Sunday 16th September 2012

"It's A Chicken" Game Review - Paul Lamond Games

This was a great game gladly received by our family to review from Paul Lamond Games.  It is suitable for ages 5 and over - great for our family as we can all join in!

The basis of the game is to draw pictures as directed by the card chosen from the draw pile (no pun intended!) - the first to guess the picture being drawn wins the round and gets the number of points as determined by the timer (clucking chicken, noisy egg timer!).  The cards very handily have 3 sections - a picture to copy for the younger players who cannot read, a medium-difficulty picture prompted by a word and a more tricky picture again prompted by a word.  A roll of the die determines the level of difficulty - however you can play to suit the age of the players.  We've played just using the pictures as a guide to copy... but also when bedtime came and play was reduced to Mums/Dads and Grandparents, we used the difficult pictures and still had great fun!

As a helping hand, the game sheets have circles ready printed on them as a base for starting the drawing - a great help for the younger players although some shapes had one or two of the parents flummoxed - funny how our minds work differently than the children's!

Here's examples of my son's artistic creations.... apologies for the expression on his face...he had had a long day at school!

He's only 5 so right at the lower age range for this game but really enjoyed the fact that he could join in with no adult help!  Complete gaming independence here we come!

I can see this game making an appearance at family dinners as a children's favourite... from an educational point of view, it's great to encourage and develop pencil control and reading skills but still having fun at the same time!

Just a side note... you need to buy batteries separately and there aren't any pencils in the box but the little wooden pencils from blue and yellow homeware's shop work great :)  A postive note, from a "thinking ahead" point of view, there are plenty of sheets of paper with the starter shapes on them, but also on the back of the instruction there are blank templates so that you can photocopy more when required...a never-ending supply of peace and quiet (broken every now and again by the clucking of a rather loud chicken!).

Paul Lamond games are available at Smyths Toys Superstores, online or instore.  Have a look at their range of games - there's something for everyone this Christmas!

"Christmas in July" 2012

Last Tuesday I went to my first PR event - Christmas in July 2012.  I made the epic journey starting at 4am with two of my friends; fellow bloggers Really Rachel and Missing Sleep.  As well as viewing and testing the new toys available on the market for Christmas 2012, we were also helping to judge the UKMums.tv mums choice awards.

True to my name I enjoyed sampling the multitude of cupcakes on offer with each display being sponsored by a different toy or PR company.  We also had ice cream with lots of different toppings and of course, Christmas Cake!

  
We thought that we would have lighter bags on the way home, having eaten our stash of goodies on the journey down to London, but receiving a goody bag full of exciting toys at the event meant that we were more laden down on the way home than we expected!

The toys on display from all traders were great - from pocket money toys up to "main" present toys, involving educational and traditional games to electronic and state of the art gagets!


Gifts for boys included GO Mini Stunt Launcher from Golden Bear Toys.  Each Mini has it's own characteristics unique to that model - wheelies, skids and spins are all part of the fun.  They do not need batteries which stops the TV remote constantly being devoid of batteries when needed in an emergency!  I also liked the new HEXBUG designs - the scarab beetle moves fantastically speedily and is so much fun to watch as the bugs explore the environment around them.

The girl's stands were just as exciting as the boy's ones - a new range of Bratz dolls named Bratzillaz (MGA Entertainment) seemed a favourite to me, along with the Novi Stars dolls; each one having it's own unique feature... bubblegum smelling or glitter-filled to name just two!  I also liked the Orbeez Soothing Spa from Character Options - a relaxing foot spa for tweens to pamper themselves (and their Mum's - hopefully!).

There were lots of creative play options too - with all the rainy days we are having, wet weather play is sure to be a hit over the summer as well as for Christmas!  Wooky Entertainment have some great girly craft products; also I was especially impressed with a range of games from Scotchi.  Although the packaging and instructions are in English, the actual game pieces have no written words on them and so can be used bi-lingually.  As a bi-lingual Welsh/English family, these games are great to develop language skills for both my children and myself as a Welsh learner.

There were plenty of pre-school gifts on display... I liked the Stacking Hoops from Play To Z Ltd.  As I have no pre-schoolers in my home any longer, I would gladly borrow one or two to enjoy playing with their toys and games!  They also have sensory tales packs which are able to used by older children to help develop their imaginative and creative play.  I loved the ethics and background behind the Play To Z Ltd range of toys; you can read more about their research here.

With a little time before our train home, I made a quick detour to King's Cross Platform 9 3/4 for a photo opportunity... 

Keep an eye out over the next few weeks for some reviews of fantastic products for Christmas 2012 and there will be some giveaways too!  I can't wait for Christmas now!