John Adams 10455 Think Words Spin Game, Multicolor

Product Information

This modernized version of the classic old-school 80’s variety of Upwords is fun and challenging for all ages to play. It makes a great Friday night game for the family, a fun indoor activity for a rainy or snowy afternoon, or an occasional break from worksheets and online instruction for school spelling and vocab lessons. Isle of Man, Isle of Wight, Northern Ireland and the Scottish Highlands) may take longer to reach you. In the immortal words of Kylie Minogue: “I’m spinning around, move outta my way”. Why? I don’t hear you ask. Well, it’s because I have been given the dubious honour of being the Zatu blogger that gets to review Think Words Spin. The recent addition to the family game genre from John Adams aka Ideal. This is a two to eight player game according to the box - it is! Having said that, I have heard my eldest son play it on his own to try and get all the letters pushed down. I do however make sure I am choosing appropriate categories that the kids can at least participate with. The category cards have a couple of options and so our house rule is to choose the best one the card. Components

minute, then Dabble might be the word board game for you. This game tests not just your vocabulary skills, I will also mention the box has a hole in the front. Why does any board game producer or manufacturer think a hole in a box is a good idea? This is just asking for things to fall out in my opinion. I hate holes in boxes about the same as walking barefoot on a pebbly beach. Master Word– This is like the traditional game Mastermind, but with words. So there is a person that knows the word you are trying to guess, and the other players give 4 words each round, with the guide then telling them how many clues they guessed that relate to the word. It can be a bit subjective on what the guide thinks is related, but as Mastermind was one of my favorite games as a kid, I just can’t help but like this game. I like the ability to make Think Words! as long or as short as you want. It answers that plea for one last game before bedtime without having grumpy children the next day. You also feel like it is sort of educational too, as it helps build vocabulary and spelling.Are you in search of a game for a specific event? Or something themed? You want to be on the lookout for something that you can either use at home or out with people or something for an event like bridal showers or birthday parties. Some themed games will make the night at parties. Unlike its big brother this boasts seven different ways to play, which makes writing about the gameplay a bit more tedious. That said, each variant basically follows the same formula: Spin the spinner until it stops, match the colour to select the category and letter, shout out an answer to win the card. If you are looking for a social deduction game, I highly recommend When I Dream as it has a unique twist on the genre. Werewords is also pretty good, it’s pretty similar to the One Night Ultimate Werewolf social deduction games but adds in the twist of word guessing that makes it a bit more interesting. Codenames is a game for 2 – 8 players that takes about 15 minutes and is very easy, taking only a couple of minutes to teach. The frenzy Think Words imbues onto my children is genuinely brilliant to watch. I don’t love playing this game, but I do like it and as such it is a good family game. That said, there are a lot of family games out there that my kids can grasp that sees us happily playing on a bit more of a par with one another. Dobble is, in my opinion, the best at that and if you don’t own it, you really should.

The cards are a little flimsy and small. As a result, my boys have managed to bend quite a few now. I’m still managing to sleep at night and haven’t resorted to buying a new version because of these minor creases. However, there is a little part of me that wants to. I do like the way the cards store away inside the underneath of the letter wheel. There seems to be enough cards too, something like 144 different categories. I dare say if this was played every day over a wet half-term it might not be quite enough. It is plenty for the occasional game though, and to be fair that is how often you will play it. Younger players do not get ‘their go’ and can get a bit lost in the melee. Therefore playing with a mix of ages, and because of the differing range of vocabulary, there is an unfairness this game cannot get around. The different ways to play are actually good and temper the difficulty rating slightly depending on the audience. Whilst we will do everything we can to meet the delivery times above, there may be factors outside of our control and we cannot guarantee delivery within this time frame. A couple of the variant games are more different. An example would be "Game Four" which sees players distribute all the cards as letters, spinning the red plastic spinner to choose two letters, all players then have to think of a word that begins with the first letter and ends with the second, the example given being an S and a G, with someone shouting out "Shopping!" to win the card. How it plays The age limit of 8+ years is dependent on your child, if they are good at knowing what words start with what letter and are confident around that then there is no reason why a slightly younger child couldn’t play. I have played this with my 4 year old but he needs considerable help – I still think this helps his vocabulary and spelling through osmosis but ultimately he just wants to hit the button in the middle which resets the timer, so we usually team up.Okay, okay, I admit it, I’ve misquoted Aretha so let’s move swiftly on because I’m going to teach you about this game, like the son of a preacher man… Gameplay I like the ability to make Think Words as long or as short as you want. It answers that plea for one last game before bedtime without having grumpy children the next day. You also feel like it is sort of educational too, as it helps build vocabulary and spelling.

This is a two to eight player game according to the box – it is! Having said that, I have heard my eldest son play it on his own to try and get all the letters pushed down. When I was looking at Think Words Spin it was sort of billed as a travel version of the original. Now I am not convinced by this. I think a travel version of a game should be able to be played on a small surface. From my youth the stalwart was Top Trumps or other card games. Today you have other options like Dobble and Skull, the joy of these is that you can literally play them anywhere, be it on a picnic blanket or on a table on the train. The age limit of 8+ years is dependent on your child. If they are good at knowing which words start with what letter and are confident around that then there is no reason why a slightly younger child couldn’t play. I have played this with my four-year-old, but he needs considerable help. I still think this helps his vocabulary and spelling through osmosis. Ultimately, however, he just wants to hit the button in the middle which resets the timer, so we usually team up.

Key Facts

They're based in convenient locations including supermarkets, newsagents and train stations. Plus they're often open late and on Sundays. Think Words is an excellent game for the kids to play with a few of their friends of the same age. It takes little explaining to children new to gaming and they would all enjoy the fast-paced nature of it. With that in mind it is a good game to play on a sleepover. If you don’t want them playing electronics all night or if the movie has finished and they are predictably not ready for bed this would fill time. The 10-second timer does add an urgency to the game. This, in-turn, hinders the thought of words that could lead you to victory. For me, the timer can cause my brain to just reboot like an old computer and even makes me forget words I have already primed whilst others were taking their go. At some stage it is inevitable that someone will put their hands to their head and pull a “Gah!” face like something in the Beano. At this point you see their mind melting behind their wide open, but blank eyes. There are quite a few good word-guessing games out there. The most popular by far are Codenames, Codenames: Duet, and Just One, which are all fantastic games. But if you are looking for something similar but that has its own unique twist (maybe someone in your gaming group already owns these games or you’ve played them to death), then So Clover! and Cross Clues are both fantastic games with similar vibes. It is however very transportable, as it is quite small. I think that the original version is also quite transportable, but my wife disagrees. It is a fairly moot point because neither of us would take either version above some of our other transportable or travel games. Think Words Spin vs Think Words!

Now I am not suggesting that this takes up a load of space on a table but it does needs a bigger footprint than you would expect when looking at it. That is because around the spinner you need to lay out the other cards. I think this game therefore takes up more space than its predecessor. Think Words Spin also need a flattish playing surface.In Codenames, you are split into two teams. Each team has a spymaster, who gives the clues about the words to guess, and a team of field operatives, who need to guess the clues. There is a 5-by-5 grid of 25 spies (represented by words) on the table, and the spymaster is given a grid to say which people are spies and which people are assassins. They have to give one-word clues to their team to guess the spies without guessing any assassins, and they have to do it faster than the other team. A couple of the variant games are more different. An example would be “Game Four” which sees players distribute all the cards as letters, spinning the red plastic spinner to choose two letters, all players then have to think of a word that begins with the first letter and ends with the second, the example given being an S and a G, with someone shouting out “Shopping!” to win the card. How it plays So, for example, if the subject or category was “Things in the Bathroom” you could say “Toilet” and push down the T followed by a slap of the central button to reset the timer. Play moves on to the next player who might say “Sink” pressing the ‘S’ and play moves round until all the letters are depressed. A player is eliminated from the round if they run out of time, give a spurious answer, or don’t say an answer before the ting of the timer. Detective Club– This is a social deduction game, where the clue giver lets everyone know a word except one person, and then everyone has to play cards that relate to that word. The clue giver then says the word and everyone has to justify why their cards are related to that word (with one player completely bluffing) and the other players have to figure out who’s bluffing. It’s a very fun game involving words, but since you aren’t guessing a word it didn’t make the list. Okay, okay, I admit it, I’ve misquoted Aretha! So, let’s move swiftly on because I’m going to teach you about this game, like the son of a preacher man. Gameplay