June 2011 New Specialty Toys — General Games

In this princess-themed game, players must complete the secret tasks as they race around the 3-D castle in search of the jeweled tiara. This game teaches kids to use their logic-based puzzle solving skills.

In this game, players race around the island, filling their treasure chest with gold coins. Encourages number recognition, counting and first adding skills.

Players become healthy-eating champions as they compete to eat the most nutritious food. Parents and caregivers can playfully reinforce healthy habits, such as exercise and good food choices. Adding and subtracting the points earned or lost throughout the game also helps children with their math skills.

In this Bingo-like game with letters and words, kids practice and learn letters and words as they pick up nuts and race around the 3-D monkey tree. Challenging and easy cards are included, so that parents can match the game to their child's ability. The design of the 3-D-tree and the peanut cards keep children interested as they learn.

Children learn numbers up to three by matching the sleeping and the awake animals. The 3-D sheep counter adds a lot of fun to the game, and your child's counting skills will improve playing this game.
Awards: The TOY Award UK

Kids must discover the hidden fairies and wave the sparkly magic wand to win the game. This counting game helps children start to comprehend numbers and easy additions up to 10.

In this scavenger hunt, kids learn about colors, shapes, letters and numbers. Players can be as young as 4, but it's also great for older children.

Hickory Dickory Dock    Learn about time as your help your mouse climb to the top of the clock. Every time you know the time for an activity displayed on the cards, your mouse can move up. A quick game that'll re-enforce your child's time-telling abilities!

In Red Lorry, Yellow Lorry, players create traffic chaos as they race to match the vehicles and their colors. This is a game for young kids similar in concept to Domino or Quirkle.

Dixit Odyssey lets even more players have fun than ever before. Anywhere from 3 to 12 players can participate in this storytelling game. One player is given a picture card, while the other players receive a hand of six pictures. The designated storyteller uses a word or phrase to strategically hint at his picture, and the other players each choose one of their cards that best fits the description. Everyone then bets on which picture belongs to the storyteller. Game play takes approximately 30 minutes. Launch date: July, 2011.
— As of 05/11/2011 a previous version of this product (Dixit) had 4.7 out of 5 stars on Amazon.com, based on 41 reviews. The product had only one rating below 4 stars. Pros: Creative; equally fun for adults and children. Cons: A reviewer who gave the game three stars said the scoring system was overly complicated and that the pictures on the cards are almost too elaborate.

The first of Mayfair’s expansions to Steam, this set offers three tracks in the same pack. One side has a map of the Mid-Atlantic United States. The other side has two maps: Belgium & Luxembourg and the Brussels Metro. These boards are sure to challenge Steams players with their region-specific rules and challenging topography. Details on the three maps included — Belgium & Luxembourg: An Expansion for 2 Players, Build an Importing Empire. Brussels Metro: An Expansion for 3 Players, Develop Intercity Transit. Mid-Atlantic US: An Expansion for 3-7 Players, Railroad Empires in the Civil War Era. Also Included: An Extra Steam Tile Sheet. NOTE: Requires ownership of MFG4551 Steam™ to play.

This game is easy enough for first time game players and the game can be made infinitely more challenging simply by adding more owl tokens into the game. This allows the game to age with the child or for older kids (or even adults) to play with younger kids. Like in Candyland, kids practice color recognition and moving tokens. Unlike Candyland, Hoot Owl Hoot is a cooperative game, meaning all players are playing for the same outcome together. A cooperative game eliminates stress, builds self-esteem, and teaches kids that playing together can be fun. Kids learn to work together, they share in the game play, and they practice cooperation. The object of the game is move all the owls from start to the nest before the sun rises. Players take turns, but work together. Launch date: May 2011.
Awards: A Dr. Toy Best Green Product for 2011; 2011 Parents’ Choice Silver Honor Award; 2011 Parents’ Choice Major Fun Award; 2011 Disney FamilyFun magazine Toy of the Year (T.O.Y) Award.
— As of 05/23/2011 this product had 4.8 out of 5 stars from 10 reviews on Amazon.com. Pros: Teaches kids to work together; difficulty can be increased as players get better; eco-friendly.

Say Anything Family has 350 family oriented questions that allows families to enjoy the laughter and fun of the original party game. Ask a fun opinion question, everyone else comes up with an answer, secretly pick which one you like the most, everyone bets on what they think you just picked. Reveal the answer and score. "This game is fun for both parents and kids, while helping kids develop social interaction skills," Luke Warren, a rep for North Star Games, told TDmonthly. Launch date: March 2011.

Reverse Charades is a fun twist on a classic stand-by (where one person acts out words for the team to guess). With Reverse Charades, the entire team has 60 seconds to act out as many words as one person can guess. It's a fast-paced, fiercely fun team competition that's great for groups such as families, work teams, school groups, party-goers or among a few close friends. The things that sets it apart is the "overall inclusive nature of the game to entertain large groups across all ages," Bryce Porter, Chief Party Officer of RETROPlay LLC. told TDmonthly. Launch date: October 2010.
Awards- 2011 Major Fun Award, voted 2010 Best New Family Game by KSL Studio 5

Exercise your mind and outwit your opponents with Mosaic 4, the new fast paced 4 in a row abstract strategy game! Mosaic 4 is set up on a board of movable squares. Two to four players compete to be the first to get 4 tokens in a row. On their turn, each player can either place a token on the board, or shift an entire row or column of movable squares over by one space. The rules are simple but the game gets increasingly challenging. Mosaic 4 comes with instructions in English, Spanish, German and French. "The movable board squares add an extra challenge," Mary Lin from Gridly Games told TDmonthly. Launch date: April 2011.