Review: Wits and Wagers Family

One of the fun things about being on The Old Schoolhouse Review Crew is the opportunity to review games and other fun educational activities. Most of those would appeal to all families, not just families that homeschool. Wits and Wagers Family by North Star Games is one of the new favorites at our house.

How to Play:
We found that Wits and Wagers Family is best played with at least three players, and more players often meant more fun. When we had more than 6 people wanting to play, a few people simply partnered up and worked as one.

One player reads a question. Some of the examples we heard were:
* On average, how many new dinosaur species are discovered each year?
* What percent of US households have at least 1 pet cat?
* What percent of messages on Twitter are classified as "Pointless Babble"?
* How many stars were on the flag that inspired The Star Spangled Banner?

As you can tell, all of the questions can (and must) be answered with a number. Each person writes their number on their colored game board, and then the boards are arranged from smallest to largest.

Then everyone uses their colored meeples (pictured at right) to vote for the answer they think is closest to the correct answer without going over. My husband said, "Just like The Price is Right," but we had to explain that reference to our kids.

When the correct answer is revealed, the person that wrote the correct answer gets a point, and every meeple on that card gets points (1 point for the mini-meeple and 2 for the big one).

The score is kept for up to 12 rounds, enough chances for each player to read two questions for the group.

Thing we really liked about Wits and Wagers Family:
* It uses dry erase boards, and therefore we don't need to track down scrap paper to keep score. There's also no chance of running out of specially-designed score sheets.
* We like the fun of using the meeples to vote on the answer you think is correct. I like that you can give one guess more weight than the other. If you're confident that you know the right answer, you can go "all in" and put both of your meeples on the same answer.
* You can score points even if you can't answer correctly on your own.
* Most of the questions aren't common knowledge. It's more about fun guesses than knowing trivia, and nobody felt dumb for not knowing the right answer.

North Star Games has created several other games that would appeal to families. (My review of Say Anything Family is here.) According to their website, North Star Games are available at Target, Borders, and most specialty toy stores. Wits and Wagers Family retails for $19.99, and you can use their online locator to find a store near you.

If you'd like to hear what the other members of the review crew thought about Wits and Wagers, please visit The Old Schoolhouse Review Crew blog here. 

I received a Wits and Wagers board game as a member of the 2011 TOS Homeschool Review Crew, and I received no other compensation. In return, I agreed to give an honest review of the materials and how they worked for my homeschool family.