Gamewright | Forbidden Island | Board Game | Ages 10+ | 2-4 Players | 30 Minutes Playing Time

Co-operative games are becoming a favourite in our household. We have Pandemic - Game in English (in my opinion one of the greatest of all board games) which I play with adults, not with our children who are aged 5 and 7. The first co-op game the children played was Castle Panic Board Game, which is a great game, and it was almost played every day: TV was forgotten, troll slaying was in! Then we got Castle Panic: The Wizards Tower, a brilliant expansion for Castle Panic, but one that in a strange way left Castle Panic in the cupboard unplayed. The main reason for this was that the new Wizard cards required reading, and the 5 year old, as a result, lost interest. It was difficult to revert to the original version as it was so basic by contrast. Plus, Castle Panic can easily go on for over an hour, and during the game the children will say "I want to do something else" and off they go.Enter Forbidden Island. Reading all the other reviews I'm sure you'll get an idea of what the game is about. A game takes about 30 mins, so it's easy to sneak a game in before bed time. The game doesn't rely on reading, with cards having pictures that says it all, so even the 5 year old can shout out "Sandbags!" or "Airlift!" or feel dismay when drawing a Water Rise card. The adventurer roles also capture the imagination of the younger players (with perhaps the exception of the Navigator, whose ability to move other players is a bit more subtle), whether it be a diver, a pilot, or Explorer. The treasure figurines also look good, and help to the atmosphere that you're risking your lives to get something truly valuable. For me, the genius of the game comes from setting up the tiles to form the island, so that the layout is never the same. What's more, you can alter the shape of the island (check out the variant rules on the Forum website) which alters the difficulty of play.In Pandemic (by the same author) which has notable similarities, you win when you cure all 4 diseases. What is different with Forbidden Island is once you gain all 4 treaures, all players still have to get to the helipad, known as Fool's Landing, and use the Airlift card to claim victory. This adds a sense of complete closure to the game, and also added tension as there are still oppurtunities to loose before everyone is lifted to safety.And full marks for presentation. The game comes in a tin box with well presented instructions, and is easy to take around. I wouldn't take Pandemic on a camping trip, for instance, as there are quite a few little pieces to loose. Forbidden Island, on the other hand, is easier to fit in a suitcase and is more durable.In a few years time, I'm sure the children will get back to Castle Panic and be able to play the whole game in a single setting, and when they reach 10, I will introduce Pandemic to them. As for now, Forbidden Island is all the rage. The suggested age of 10+ is a bit high. My 7 year old daughter has easily grasped the concept and tactics, and is able to make her own suggestions, and I think could play this game with children of a simlar age. The 5 year does need adult supervision.Overall, excellent! A very good introduction to co-op games for any age. For adults though, I thouroughly recommend Pandemic.

This was a Christmas present for my nine year old son. I had played it before and though he would like it, but I was surprised to see how easily his younger brother, my seven year old son, picked it up.The game play is actually very simple with players competing against the storm that moves around the board burying locations deeper under the sand. All players win or lose as a team, with the team losing if the storm becomes too ferocious, the board gets buried in sand or any of the team dies of thirst.Each player has different abilities to help them discover pieces of the flying machine you need to escape. Combining this with the desert constantly shifting and items in random locations, each game feels different to keep it fresh each time.What has impressed me most is how well balanced the game is. The difficulty level of the game can be varied nicely, by simply changing the strength that the storm starts at. All the different characters feel nicely balanced too, with distinct strengths, none of which are too insignificant or too powerful. Most importantly, they are sufficiently different to encourage the players to adopt unique roles within the team.The game is driven by collaboration, with the storm taking a go for every player's. If players don't work together, the team will fail quickly due to dying of thirst. If they don't utilise their unique individual strengths for the benefit of everyone, the storm will usually overwhelm them before they escape.If you've not tried a collaborative game before, this is a great one to start with.I can thoroughly recommend it for younger players too. The fundamentals of the rules are easy to grasp. The instructions are well-written and most eventualities are covered. But there will never be an argument as everyone is on the same side. And when someone loses a game, there is no-one who has won to wind them up.Perfect for competitive siblings!

My wife got tired of losing at board games so we decided to bump up our cooperative games collection. We took a chance on this and boy are we glad we did! We never played the precursor Forbidden Island before this, but you don't really need to. It has all the elements and mechanics from a cooperative game you would expect: characters with abilities, fighting the spread of something (in this case, sand) whilst also trying to complete a quest (collect all items required to power your escape vehicle). They work very well in this game, especially with the randomised 'board'. Unlike Forbidden Island where the tiles are placed face up, they're placed face down in this game so you have to discover the board as you go along. And this has the added dimension of characters having water levels to maintain so they don't die of thirst. This along with trying to fight a sandstorm, collect items to power your ship (which is a pretty cute little thing) and having a board you have to discover (so you don't know where everything is) make for a very challenging game.Some of the rules are not made clear, eg: the use of the Sun Shield is a point of contention. We play it such that you can use it when the sun starts to beat down, in the same way you would use an umbrella when it starts to rain not in case it will rain!On the whole though, it's an absolutely brilliant game that's very difficult to beat. It's one where you really can benefit from selecting the right characters and using their abilities. It's a pretty difficult game to beat which makes it so much more satisfying when you do. Amazingly, it's a very easy game to pick up and play with the rules being very simple. A must have for any board game collection and a fantastic variance on cooperative play.