I grew up in a boardgame friendly house. My parents played boardgames all of the time, and Charlie and I loved games too. I remember my parents playing word games like Scrabble & Probe, and they played lots of Kismet; a cousin of Yahtzee. Then, of course, Trivial Pursuit came along in the mid-80's, and my parents loved that game. Hence, the game playing tone in my life had been set. There are so many games that I loved to play as a kid, but I'm going to try and hit the highpoints here:
Probably my two most favorite games to play as a kid were Risk (#1 favorite) and Battleship (I even had Electronic Battleship!) I loved to get my mom to play me, and sometimes she would. I would beg and beg and beg until she would finally say, "ok, set up the board and I'll come play." I would then sprint to the game and set it up as fast as I could before she would change her mind. She pretty much always beat me, but I still loved it. I would try so hard to beat her, but she wouldn't let me win. I loved competing with her.
Then, there was Grammer's house. Now, at Grammer's house there were limited indoor activities. There was plenty to do outside, but if it was raining or night time, you were pretty much going to be looking at watching Hee-Haw or playing the only game she had: Hi-Q ....anyone? Remember Hi-Q? Yeah, it was a loner, play-by-yourself game. Although, it was good when in a Texarkana boredom pickle.
Ok, now I'm going to reach a little bit. In elementary school...like 5th grade...I discovered Mastermind. I guess we had like game time sometimes. I'm sure this doesn't happen in school anymore...no fun now probably. But, back in the 80's I would always grab Mastermind. It is a two player game, and I found that I could pretty much beat people at it, so this must be why I fell in love. It is a random game. But, I can tell you that I had a love for that little strategic jem. Anyone else out there heard of Mastermind?
Now, sometimes there are games that I had to play at my friend's house, because he/she had it and I didn't. An example of this is the old school game that I loved: Perfection!! How much fun was that game?! It had the timer that made you all tense as it ticked down while you tried to jam all the different shaped pieces into the board. If time ran out, the whole board would "pop up" and the pieces would go flying. Good times.
There were so many other games that I loved to play with friends and family like, Clue, Life, Mad Magazine Game, Pente, and of course Monopoly...duh. Unfortunately, I didn't get to play one of the all time bests, Operation, very much because I didn't own it and either did my friends.
Then there were the games that I beat my mom down about until they would finally arrive under the Christmas tree. Christmas Circa 1984 : Chain Lightning! I was obsessed with getting this game and setting up all the hundreds of teeny-tiny dominoes. Then, when I finally got it, I only set it up like a handful of times because it was so labor intensive. But, I still was proud that I owned it.
Subbuteo was another game that I was determined to get for a gift. I was totally into soccer in elementary school. I loved Pele, had a hacky sack, was into Tatu of the Dallas Sidekicks, and I had Subbuteo. Now, once I actually got the game, I didn't really "play" it. It seemed to just sit there set up for me to look at. It was hard to get anyone to really play the game because not many were familiar with it; it was frustrating to go around flicking the little players trying to get them to kick it; and basically, I would just rather go out and actually play soccer in the yard or at the park or on the Atari than focus on this game. But, don't get me wrong, I thought the field, players, goals, etc were totally cool to set up and look at.
Well, there is a little insight into my old school game days. I still love games. Scott isn't really into games. It is pretty much like pulling teeth to get him to play anything. I'm always saying to Scott, "Didn't you play games at your house growing up?" Then, his answer is, "No, we played outside." I guess Arizona kids don't know the fun of rainy day competition.
And, to think it all started with Candyland and Chutes & Ladders!
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