Don't Get the Duck
- Board's Eye View
- 30 minutes ago
- 2 min read
Hayley Waite's Don't Get the Duck is a light dexterity pattern recognition game aimed at younger children: the publishers Duck & Dragon suggest ages 4-8 but we reckon it hits the mark with children age 3-7.
The game comprises 12 cute animals in a bag. The idea is that children feel the shapes and select an animal. If you pick the duck, you lose; the winner being the player who drew the most non-duck animals. That means pretty much the entirety of the rules are summarised in the title of the game: ideal for young children.
Three- and four-year-olds playing the game will need to be reminded not to peek - at first on their every turn because it's natural to look. They'll initially then just pull an animal figure out at random but after a few plays they'll get the idea that you can feel for distinguishing shapes. If little ones are playing with their older siblings you can handicap the older players by only letting them score the animal they draw if they correctly identify it by feel before pulling it from the bag. Get it wrong and the animal has to go back in the bag - at least according to our house rule.
The 3D-printed components are all enchanting - even the duck - so you may have a problem persuading youngsters to give them up at the end of the game. Our plays have mostly ended up with the animals all being conscripted as characters in a story before they could be recovered and returned to the bag to play again on another occasion. That means you can expect to get considerable play value from Don't Get the Duck that's quite apart from the game as it comes in the box.