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eZthewashingtonpost.
friday,april3,
2020Friday $19.95
In this solo adventure card
game based on the classic novel
“Robinson Crusoe,” you are Fri-
day and you’re trying to help
Crusoe get off your island. “A t the
beginning, he’s not very skillful,”
Donahue says. “He keeps coming
across all these hazards. He
needs your help fighting them,
and to improve his abilities so
that he can get skillful enough to
leave your island.” Fans of strate-
gy games like Catan will enjoy
how challenging the game is —
especially when they’re trying to
kill time in isolation. “This is the
first solo game I’ve ever played
that feels like you’re playing a
European-style game, but in a
solitaire version,” Donahue says.
“It’s a hard game to win.”For couples or roommates
Watergate $3 5
One timely and relevant
choice for Washingtonians is the
new two-player, card-driven
game Watergate. One player
takes on the role of President
Nixon, the other, a journalist:
To gether you relive the Water-
gate scandal of the early 1970s by
drawing cards and trying to
outwit each other. “Nixon can
win a couple different ways,”
Donohue says. “He wants to get
the most influence or [control]
the press, and the press is trying
to connect informants with proof
to get to Nixon.” The game can
play out in different ways, allow-
ing you to rewrite history. But
depending on which cards are
used — over a fast-paced 30 to 60
minutes of gameplay, it isgrounded in reality. “All of the
cards are based on truly histori-
cal things that happened, or
people,” Donahue says. “I learned
a ton when I played. I knew the
basics and stuff, but there was a
lot in there that I didn’t even
know.”For families with young kids
Monkey Around $17.9 5
If you’re looking for a game
that a 2-year-old can play with
slightly older siblings (and par-
ents), Monkey A round is a s trong
choice because it encourages
children to get up and move,
Aarons says. Cards prompt play-
ers to make different movements
— like hopping or marching —
while holding a banana-shaped
bean bag. “It’s good because
2-year-olds aren’t good at sit-
ting,” Aarons says. “If you’ve got
an older sibling, it’s going to be
something that’s going to hold
their interest more than some of
the other things at that age.”Kids on Stage $19. 99
Think of Kids on Stage as
charades for children. Though it’s
aimed at ages 3 to 5, the game has
universal appeal. “What’s impor-
tant is finding games that parents
will more likely enjoy doing with
the kids,” Aarons says. “Kids can
tell when the parents are more
engaged.” Players use a spinner to
move around a board, then draw a
card that has a simple line draw-
ing of an object, animal or action
that they then need to act out. “It’s
really easy for the child to under-
stand,” Aarons says, noting that
it’s also good for building commu-nication skills. “I actually can
remember one time in my house
where we had a 2-year-old, a
5-year-old, an 8-year-old and a
10-year-old all playing this togeth-
er. Because it’s charades. And a
10-year-old will still play cha-
rades.”For families with older kids
(or group housemates)
Sushi Go! $14. 99
A card-drafting game modeled
after 7 Wonders, Sushi Go! has a
simple concept and a universal
appeal, because of the cute, car-
toonlike playing cards. “You’re in
the restaurant and you’re trying
to grab sushi as it goes by,”
Cooney says. The object of the
game, which is played over three
rounds, is to collect different
types of sushi to make maki rolls
or sashimi sets, passing along
cards you don’t want to your
opponents. “Somebody who likes
strategy games or heavier games,
they’ll still play Sushi Go!,” Aar-
ons says, noting that the game is
recommended for ages 8 and up
and can be played with 2 to 5
players. “People really respond
well to g ames that are simple and
easy to pick up,” Cooney adds.
“It’s not Dungeons & Dragons.
It’s not spirits and monsters. It’s
just sushi. It gives you that sense
of normalcy. And you probably
aren’t going out to eat sushi right
now, to be honest.”
Say Anything $19.9 9
If you’re sick of playing Cards
Against Humanity over and over,
Bethesda-based North Star
Games has a game that recalls
that millennial mainstay. “Ex-On the Town
BY RUDI GREENBERGAs most Washingtonians ad-
just to staying at home during
the coronavirus outbreak, many
are realizing that there are only
so many hours you can spend
staring at screens each day.
Board games are providing a
natural reprieve and a way to be
social with those you’re isolating
or quarantining with.
Area board game stores are
seeing a surge in business and
phone calls as we increasingly
spend our time at home, so much
so that, even before any local
governments ordered the shut-
down of nonessential businesses,
businesses like the local chain of
toy-and-game shops Child’s Play,
Capitol Hill’s Labyrinth Game
Shop and Silver Spring’s Dice City
Games had either closed their
sales floors or converted shops to
pickup or delivery only, with some
even offering virtual shopping
concierge services over video chat.
Games can teach us about the
situation we’re in, particularly
the cooperative strategy game
Pandemic. “When you see the
way this echoes out [in the
game], you get to see why you
probably should be staying in,”
says Child’s Play owner Steven
Aarons.
To help keep you occupied
while inside, we asked Aarons,
Labyrinth owner Kathleen Dona-
hue and Dice City owner Jimmy
Cooney to recommend games for
different scenarios, whether
you’re alone, with roommates,
part of a couple, have children of
differing ages or just want to play
something with your friends on-
line.
For people who live alone or
anyone self-quarantining
Bandido $12.95
It’s up to you to catch a
prisoner who is trying to escape
from jail by digging tunnels in
Bandito. Although the card g ame
can be played cooperatively with
up to four players, Donahue m ost
often plays it solo. “I’ve been
obsessively playing,” she says.
“It’s really good for puzzle people
who like strategy and spatial
reasoning games.” The cards all
have tunnels on them, some of
which have multiple openings,
and some of which lead to dead
ends. On each turn, you must
play a card, connecting tunnels
as you go (amping up the replay
value). “You’re trying to some-
how manage to build this net-
work of all of these cards, where
they’re all dead ends or they all
loop back on one another,” she
says. “You’re trying to c lose off all
of the openings, and sometimes
it gets really hard.”
cept it’s not dirty, but you can
make it dirty if you want to,”
Donahue says. Each round, a
judge asks a question, like
“What’s the one item you can’t
live without during a quaran-
tine?” and then everyone writes
down t heir answer on a n individ-
ual whiteboard. The answers are
revealed and the round’s judge
secretly picks their favorite an-
swer, while everyone else tries to
guess which they chose for
points. “So even if I write down a
really stupid one, or I think my
answer is horrible, if I see some-
thing else I like, I can bet on it,”
Donahue says. “It works out to
where you’re actually encourag-
ing people to vote for the one
that they think other people are
going to vote for. And it makes
people think about who they are.
That’s why I really love it for
families, because it’s a great way
to get teenagers to actually talk
to you about stuff.”For friends who can’t get
together in real life
Dungeons & Dragons $20
starter set
The timeless tabletop role-
playing game Dungeons & Drag-
ons is having a bit of a pop
culture renaissance right now,
according to Cooney, with new
starter sets based on characters
from Netflix’s “Stranger Things”
and Adult Swim’s “Rick and
Morty.” Although D&D is often
thought of as being played in a
basement stocked with Moun-
tain D ew a nd Doritos, the experi-
ence easily translates to the digi-
tal space with videoconferencing
apps such as Zoom: Everyone
just needs a starter set that
comes with a rule book, charac-
ter info and dice. There’s even a
new guide book, “Explorer’s
Guide to Wildemount,” that’s
based on a players’ group called
Critical Role, which live-streams
games on the video platform
Twitch. “D&D is all about being a
dungeon master, writing a story
and setting up that story to
challenge players to really use
their logic, their wit to solve
problems,” Cooney says. “D&D
can be as abstract or as on the
nose as you want. People are
playing quarantine campaigns,
some are playing in a completely
utopian escapist world.” The
game is also good for isolation
because it can last as long as you
want, useful in a time of uncer-
tainty. “I’ve known some [cam-
paigns] that go for years,” says
Donahue, whose store is plan-
ning to host campaigns for cus-
tomers via Zoom.
[email protected]Board and card games to while away time inside
alexander Sobotka
The games section of Child’s Play, a toy and game shop in Chevy Chase. Child’s Play owner Steven
Aarons recommends the game Monkey Around because it encourages children to get up and move.