This Game is Bonkers and I LOVE it!

Growing up there wasn’t the wide variety and creativity in board games. Most of them were roll-and-move games. Some were short and others were long. Then at some point, I was given a game called “This Game is Bonkers!” I loved it. Gone were the Monopoly arguments or the boredom of going endlessly around a circle. No, this game was different.  Fast forward a few years and my Mom has moved a few times, and the game disappeared in one of the moves. It made me quite sad because I’d looked forward to playing it with my theoretical someday kids.

I’d given up ever playing This Games is Bonkers again.

Then I found it. It was on clearance at Barnes and Noble. Barnes and Noble has become one of my prime places to go for board games of late. Between that and my local game store, it’s a danger to my budget.

What is This Game is Bonkers?

Apparently, it’s a classic board game that is now in its who knows how many printing, it first came out in the 1970s, the same year I was born, and the edition we got was in the “Retro 1970s colors” not the crazy colors of the early 90s…..

This Game is Bonkers operates on the traditional roll and move plan, but after you move you place a tile and that is where the fun gameplay is.

Why I love This Game is Bonkers

You had all manner of tiles to place, there’s the straightforward “Go to score” tile moving you to earn a point, but my favorite was to create a multi-step process to head to the goal. If you land on this tile, then you go ahead five, which lands you on a go-back three tile, which lands you on a go-ahead 6 tile which lands you on a score!

Or the even better one where you go into a loop where you earn a point.

This is a game of spatial reasoning and a bit of programming for the non-programmer.

Who is this game for?

• Families that want a quick game. Our longest game was 20 or 25 minutes.
• Families that want to move beyond the normal roll and move, but aren’t ready for advanced strategy.
• Families that want a fun, silly game.
• Families that want simple instructions. Roll the dice, follow the instructions on the space you land at, continue following instructions until you land on an empty space, and place a tile or go to score (or lose, sadness). It’s that simple.

More fun board games

• Minecraft card game
• Munchkin card game
• Say Cheese Multiplication math game
• Favor of the Pharaoh
• Quiddler