216 – Halloween Traditions, Old & New – The Family Gamers Podcast

This week is spooky games and Halloween traditions, especially since Halloween is changing for a lot of people this year.

First, a 216 fact – A baseball has a total of 108 double stitches, equivalent to 216 individual stitches.

What We’ve Been Playing

Food Fighters (Kids Table Boardgaming)

Cloaked Cats (HABA) – not great at 2 players, but we’re looking forward to playing with the whole family.

Fort (Leder Games) – super cute deck/engine builder. We love the combination of a mechanically solid game with a cute and silly theme.

Prisma Arena (Hub Games) – A fantastic arena fighting game coming in November and available for pre-order now.

Skulk Hollow (Pencil First Games) – our review. In this play, we were very well matched in strategy, so the game dragged on.

Studies in Sorcery (formerly “Degrees in Darkness” – by Weird Giraffe Games) – a dark and lightly spooky game (you’re digging up graves to get materials for your spells). Resource harvesting with some card drafting, some press-your-luck, and engine building. On Kickstarter through October 29 – just $19!

Adventure Mart (Hub Games) – deck-building and engine building. Run a convenience store catering towards adventurers!

Meeple Land (Blue Orange Games) – build an amusement park. Part tile-laying puzzle, part worker/resource management.

Cinco Linko (Big Potato Games) – we’re still getting mileage out of this simple 5-in-a-row game. Best at 3-4 players (our review).

SNAP Review: Who’s the G.O.A.T.?

Nick and Izzy tell us all about this fun party game that’s perfect for families. It’s one part prediction, one part competition, and all parts fun!

Pick who you think will be the best at a variety of off-the-wall challenges, then vote by tossing your squishy goat.

See more pictures and a complete transcript on our SNAP review page.

Topic: Halloween

We’ve discussed spooky games before – episode 166, episode 116, and episode 68. We’ve been slowly adding to our list, but it’s nearly the same year after year.

We’re bringing it up again because it’s that time of year – and because Halloween will likely look different this year for lots of families, due to COVID. (Our town has “banned” trick or treating.)

So let’s talk about things we can do as a family to enjoy the season, even if parties and trick-or-treating have to be canceled (or scaled back).

We’re not sure if it’s worth it to dress up this year (past costumes include: paladins of Voltron, Mario/Luigi/Peach/Toadstool, and the Incredibles).

What else really matters? Candy! COVID can’t spoil that for us.

We always pick out pumpkins, and we always decorate them in some way (carving now, but stickers or paint when the kids were little).

Decorate the house – this is 90% the kids’ doing, because Anitra is not a fan. They keep picking up decorations from neighbors and friends?

Find out what members of the Facebook community are doing.

Pizza and movies? Playing games (Spookies is recommended). Maybe in the future we’ll continue our former neighbor’s tradition of creating a “hayride” with a truck trailer.

Candy/treat hunt – sounds great, but way too much work for our taste.

Some of our favorite games for the Halloween season:

Horrified (Ravensberger with Prospero Hall), which we first played last year around this time. A co-operative game that’s actually easier at lower player counts.

Unmatched (Restoration Games), especially Cobble and Fog.

VISITOR in Blackwood Grove (Resonym) – a great deduction game that you can play even with pre-reading kids.

Cryptid (Osprey Games) – another deduction game dealing with the supernatural.

Paranormal Detectives (Lucky Duck Games) – best with teens and up, since you’re solving a murder.

Grimm Masquerade (Skybound Games) – we love this logical deduction that masquerades (hah) as social deduction.

EXIT boxes (KOSMOS) – we really like The Haunted Roller Coaster and The House of Riddles, especially with kids.

Harry Potter games, such as Hogwarts Battle (deck building), Harry Potter House Cup (worker placement), Harry Potter Codenames, Death Eaters Rising (all from The OP).

Potions andalchemy make Anitra think of Halloween, so why not try Potion Explosion or Quacks of Quedlinburg?

Zombie Dice (Steve Jackson Games) will be on our list every year, especially since kids can play it at ANY age (as long as the theme doesn’t bother you).

Ghost Fightin’ Treasure Hunters is our other highest recommendation with pre-reading kids.

What are you planning to do for Halloween this year?

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