Candyland Bingo Review
Bingo! You win a gingerbread man infestation.
My wife and I have decided there’s a special place in the foulest depths of Gehenna for the developers of this game. (Fancy Nancy says Gehenna is a fancy name for hell.) Candyland Bingo is simple version of bingo for children aged three to six. The bingo cards have a combination of four colors that match colors on a spinner. Spin the spinner and put your chip on the matching color on your bingo card.
Did I mention the chips? The round cardboard covers that have a place in every single room of our house? I suspect they’re breeding because they are everywhere. The “chips” have been used as pretend food, real food for a large breed of dog, pretend coins, tiny pretend plates, and non-pretend projectiles. Okay, so there’s a fun factor there but it’s not in playing the game. The bits end up all over the place so you have to wonder if it’s a game or litter.
I don’t want to hack on the game too much because it’s a decent game for the littlest game players. They can learn about taking turns and um… learn four whole colors. Well, sometimes the little stinkers just like playing with mommy and daddy and if they like the game then what the heck. But the freaking pieces! If the world gets destroyed by a giant meteor, there will be two things left: cockroaches and little round cardboard pieces with a picture of a gingerbread man on them.
Needless to say you can play the game with missing pieces. It also has a decent “Try not to Win” factor as the parent can avoid trying to get a bingo by placing their tokens in a random fashion. The tokens seem to be too large to be a choke hazard. The real danger may be that the game prepares your children for the evil of bingo halls or perhaps worse, could turn them into insufferable little hipsters who play bingo for the irony factor. If they really wanted to add some realism they could add some candy cigarettes.
Final Analysis: If someone gives your child the game, don’t toss it. The little ones can have fun with it. But for heaven’s sake, don’t buy it . There are too many better games.
