Last night I spent the evening at a board game cafe. A 6-year-old family member and I had a wonderful time playing board games and eating pizza.

On the way home I realized we’d devoted 2+ hours to old-fashioned gaming in a place that does not have televisions or computers. We spent the entire time surrounded by people who were also talking, interacting and playing board games. No one was working on a laptop or staring at a cell phone. I didn’t even bother to check my phone the entire time.

It was a much-needed change for both of us. This may turn into a regular activity!

As for the games…

We played a handful of different family friendly games, but the clear winner was this:

Amazon.com

It’s a rather ingenious game that uses a multi-layer board and magnetic game pieces to create an ever-changing labyrinth beneath the game board. The objective is to be the first to reach a pre-designated and randomly selected spot on the board. The challenge is in getting the game piece across the board without losing the metal ball magnetically attached to the bottom (located on the underside of the board) by knocking it up against a wall of the labyrinth. Every time the ball falls off, it rolls out to a corner (like in a pool game) and the piece goes back to the beginning.

I kept thinking that it was an awful lot like late 1980s video games. For those of you who have never played: back then, ‘dying’ or losing a level meant going back to level 1. Every. Single. Time. That’s actually a big part of the reason why I never became a (video) gamer.

Yet, the board game reset was fun. In fact, it was fun and challenging for both of us (child and adult), which is difficult to do!

I strongly recommend trying this one out.

I also suspect Santa just might bring a copy to our house this year. 🙂