Children learn a lot through play, it is a great way to get them involved and engaged with education without them even knowing that they are learning new things and expanding their knowledge. Board games are excellent for helping development a variety of skills such as social interaction, language and communication skills, patience, how to win and lose, and lots more. But sometimes we all need our own space and need to be by ourselves for a while. Well, the fun and learning doesn’t have to stop there – SmartGames do a range of children’s logic puzzle games for single players that are great fun to play but also help to develop cognitive skills in flexible thinking, logic, problem solving and spatial insight. We have already played the Little Red Riding Hood Deluxe logic game so wanted to give SnowWhite Deluxe a try.
SmartGames SnowWhite Deluxe is a single player logic designed to introduce young children to logical thinking as well as the use of symbols. It is suitable for children aged 4-7 years old (although as an adult, the harder Expert and Master challenges are great fun). ShowWhite has 48 different challenges, ranging in difficulty from Starter to Master, and each challenge only has one solution to find SnowWhite.
In the box:
- 3D House
- 7 Dwarves
- SnowWhite
- Witch
- Booklet with 48 Challenges & Solutions
- Extra Storybook
SnowWhite is played in a 3D house, and you play the challenges on both sides of the house, inside and out. The game board, or in this case game house, is a plastic house with colour coded closable shutter windows. The floors of the house have grooves within them so that you can securely place the playing characters of SnowWhite, the 7 dwarfs and the Wicked Witch so that they do not easily dislodge, meaning no upset kids if they knock the house over mid challenge.
The aim of the game is to find out where to put SnowWhite between the 7 dwarfs and the wicked witch? And she moves around a lot so there are 48 different challenges to do so.
The challenge book contains 48 challenges spread over 4 skill/difficulty levels: Starter, Junior, Expert and Master. Half of the challenges use the interior of the house whilst the other half use the exterior. All the challenges in the book are beautiful illustrations to help provide the starting layout for each challenge (the house in the illustrations is the same as the plastic game house, and the book uses the same coloured-coded dwarfs to tell the story as the ones used in the game). There is no text for young players to read.
This is a challenging brain-teasing logic game for a single player. The player sits in front of the house with the challenge book, picks a challenge from the book (it is best to start from the first challenge even it you think it is too easy as it gets to used to how the game works) and places a small number of characters into the rooms, as instructed in the easy to follow diagrams of the challenge book. The aim of the game is to use logical thinking and problem solving skills to try and work out where the other pieces should be placed. There is also some extra information with the challenges to show what room a particular dwarf does or doesn’t go in / which dwarfs may or may not be in a room together etc. – enough information to help you solve the puzzle, and this along with the available slots and whether twins or singletons need placing means that there is only one possible solution per challenge. The solutions to each puzzle are shown in the back of the book, meaning the child or a parent can easily check the solution is correct or use it to point the child in the right direction.
Overall, the SmartGames SnowWhite Deluxe logic game is an excellent, fun and challenging game for young thinkers to ponder over and use logic and deduction to work out the answer. It is a game that puts problem solving and logic skills to the test as well as teaching children how to read, interpret and follow diagrams from the book.
I’ve briefly mentioned that half of the challenges use the interior of the house and half use the exterior. The interior challenges mean that all the playing surfaces can be seen as the inside of the house is orientated towards the player. When playing the exterior challenges, the house is turned the other way so that you see the door and windows – depending on the challenge some of the shutters are closed, some are open so you can see into the house. Whilst I don’t think the exterior challenges were any more technically difficult, they do add an extra dimension as players must also mentally visualise who might be behind a closed door or window shutter.
The challenges start off at a good skill level to gently introduce the concept and game play, without being too difficult as to put young players off, but as you work your way through the book and players get more confident, the challenges gradually get harder, with the Master challenges quite tricky (and great for adults to do as well).
Our experience of SmartGames puzzles is that the quality of the components is excellent and will easily stand up to heavy-handed play of young children – SnowWhite is no exception, it is a very well-made solid game. The components are bright, colourful, and visually appealing with a child-friendly theme that will appeal to a preschool audience. It even comes with a family friendly picture book that has a modern twist on the original Show White story.
This is a fun and challenging game with plenty of educational value. With a price of £19.99, I think this game is fantastic value for the quality of the pieces, the challenging playability and the educational value. It is one that I would wholeheartedly recommend to parents with young children, preschool and upwards.
Rating: 5/5
RRP: £19.99
For more information, visit smarttoysandgames.co.uk.
