Pass the shovel…
Another Christmas present, this one, and it’s a Rio Grande boxing of a little kids’ game from the always charming Doris & Frank stable, with the somewhat lame title of By Golly. Basically, this is pelmanism (i.e. “pairs”) with a little added cheese. A load of animal cards are placed face down in the middle and you have to match the cards you have in your hand using a combination of luck and memory. Some additional silliness is that among the face down animals are a couple of cards depicting piles of animal poo. If you turn over one of these you need to then turn over a shovel card to avoid a penalty.
I must admit that I rarely get on well with these memory games. I can either concentrate hard and do OK, at which point I don’t have as much fun, or I can just go with the flow and generally do badly. Enchanted Forest has enough “other stuff” to it to be more amusing, particularly with a table full of players, but even so, memory games aren’t my first choice. Miss B seems to have similarly mixed fortunes and feelings. Generally she enjoys herself with this sort of game, but can get frustrated after a while. Still, the theme is fun, the art is (thanks to Doris) charming, and it’s fairly quick even given our incompetence in play. Plus it’s a heck of a lot better than some of the other pair matching games out there.
The verdict from Miss B (aged 5): “It was rubbish!” Me: “Why was it rubbish? I thought you liked it.” B: “I did like it but we were rubbish at it!”
The game: By Golly! (Rio Grande), 2 to 6 players, age 5+.
