My family is a huge fan of board games, especially the kids and I (my husband works all the time and rarely has the extra time for fun), and I love to find new and unique games for us to play. It’s so much fun to sit around the table playing and taking a break from the real world. I was so excited when our family was given the opportunity to review 2 new-to-us games! USAopoly was gracious enough to send us Wonky: The Crazy Cubes Card Game and Tapple: Fast Word Fun for Everyone. USAopoly has been manufacturing and designing games for over 20 years, oftentimes recreating popular games and making them even more unique and fun!
I absolutely love word games. I also love games that are both educational and fun, and I think that Tapple falls into this category. Tapple is recommended for ages 8+ and 2-8 players. Included with the game is a small deck of cards, 36 in all, with 2 different categories on each side for a total of 144 categories. The cards conveniently nestle into the bottom of the Tapple Wheel (this is wonderful for folks like us who regularly misplace things). There are 20 letters on the Wheel; the 6 least common letters for word beginnings are left out. To start, a player chooses a category, hits the timer button, and has 10 seconds to say a word related to the category they chose, and then hits the timer button again, and the game advance to the next player. This goes on until either all of the letters have been chosen or something can’t think of a word. The last player standing wins the card, and whoever wins 3 cards first wins. Once a letter has been used it cannot be used again. When the round is over, you just reset the letters by flipping a switch, and then start a new round. If ou have younger children who aren’t great with words yet, you could play without using the timer. Or, if all of the letters are used you can go ahead and reset them and keep going. We’ve actually done that a few times, and it’s fun!
I’ve never seen a card game quite like Wonky before. It’s also recommended for ages 8+ and 2 or more players. Included with Wonky is 9 blocks, 54 cards, a storage bag, and instructions. This game is played by dealing 7 cards to each player and placing the rest face down. The tallest player goes first, and then play goes clockwise. For each turn the players play a card, their required action may be to add a block to their tower. Once a card is played it’s placed face down into a discard pile. Some cards are specific to the size and color of the block to be used. If that particular block has been used, the player cannot do anything and play progresses to the nest player. Some cards will let you place any color of a certain-sized block, or any block of a certain color. There are also some sneaky cards! Sometimes you can pass your turn to the next player without stacking anything, reverse play direction, and there are some combo cards where you stack a block and then the next player will draw a card, or you can reverse play direction. This may sound easy enough, but the blocks are very oddly shaped and not that easy to stack into a tower! The first person to play all of their cards without their tower falling wins.
Ethan and I enjoying a fun game of Tapple on a recent sick day. Yes, we have a toy soldier in our living room. Lucas will not let me put it away.
The kids and I have had so much fun with these games! Wonky is a little easier for Lucas to play since the cards have pictures are directions are fairly obvious, but he’s played Tapple a time or 2. Both of the games are super fun, and I think the kids enjoy them equally. These aren’t like the board games we typically play, but once in a while I like to shake things up a bit, and the games have been a great addition to our collection! If you need a fun and unique game to play, check these 2 out. USAopoly has lots of other fun games to offer as well.
Be sure to click through and read the reviews from my fellow Crew Mates. Thanks for stopping by!
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