Man, we were properly obsessed with this book when it first turned up at ReaditDaddy Towers and you know what? Though our copy is pretty well mauled, we still use it today as there's no better way to pass a long boring school holiday than to delve into this exquisite book and start putting together a new game idea.

We're totally in love with board games (well, games of any description really) and Kevan and Viv have done such a great job of including absolutely everything you need to create your own awesome game ideas. All you really need to bring to the table is yourself, your besties or kids, and your imagination.

We read through the whole book before embarking on a project we'd had on the backburner for a long time - a strange board game of sheer chance where your aim is to make your way around a supermarket, snagging as many goodies as possible but avoiding the wandering grannies who inhabit the store, and will nag you to bits to go and pick their prescriptions up for them - thus robbing you of the chance of nabbing more groceries than your opponent.

We worked on several versions of the game, inspired in some part by horrible shopping trips we'd had in the past - and amazingly the game held together pretty well. So well in fact that we still dig it out from time to time to play it.

We devised several other board games and a couple of card games too. I firmly believe that there's no better bonding experience for a family than to tough it out designing a game, then of course playing each other at it.

Certainly a better way of deciding who gets to do the washing up than tossing a coin.

Original review links and articles: 

ReadItDaddy's Second Book of the Week - Week Ending 20th September 2019: "Board Games to Create and Play" by Kevan Davis and Viviane Schwarz (Pavilion Children's Books)

Building our own board game with "Board Games to Create and Play" by Kevan Davis and Viviane Schwarz (Pavilion Children's Books)

By now you'll probably have seen our "Book of the Week" review of "Board Games to Create and Play" by Kevan Davis and Viviane Schwarz, just out from Pavilion Children's Books.

We take our board gaming very seriously indeed at ReadItDaddy Towers, as you'll probably know from regular visits to the blog. So we couldn't wait to start building our own game using this fabulous book.

We'd had several ideas. C wanted to do something with cute kittens in it but we couldn't think of a central theme. For ages we'd joked about doing a videogame that was based around being stuck in a supermarket on a saturday, frustrated that everyone else moves slower than us, or just sits there gossiping right in front of the aisle or section we want to grab our food from. So there was the seed of an idea and "AULDIES" (formerly known as PIDL) was born.

First we started off with a very basic rule set:

Roughly sketching the rule set (with C's awesome picture of a speeding granny!)

We used one of Kevan and Viviane's board designs, slightly adapted to feature the sort of stuff we find in our local supermarket and drew up a basic version in pencil first...

PIDL board complete with roughly sketched game pieces

Doing things quickly, we built the prototype game and couldn't wait to get on and play it.

Basically, you throw two dice - the big white one to move your grannies, and the black one to move your game character. The idea is to move around the board and pick up your shopping. But the grannies can block you, and if they land on you - or you land on them - they will send you all the way back to the Chemist to pick up their prescriptions!

At any time the player can 'bank' all their items by moving through the checkout squares, effectively finishing the game but the player with the most points for their shopping isn't necessarily the player with the most items, so there are tempting bonus items to grab, and the 'gamble' of going back into the supermarket for items you've forgotten, or just to try and out-score the other player!

So we played it - and surprisingly we laughed a lot, and it worked as a game concept!

Ooh an unbearably smug victor!

(Needless to say, C won!)

I'd probably say building the game took around an hour, the rule set about half an hour - and then the next day we went in to try and build the "Proper" coloured version of the game with player pieces, shopping and a colourful board design from C.

Drawing characters and shopping items. MAN that was hard!

C getting busy colouring in and designing the board

The final result - a game that C described as "The Best Board Game She's Ever Played!" and hours of fun for both of us. Really can't recommend this book highly enough, it's absolutely perfect! So here's the nearly finished article (we still haven't come up with a name and a logo but if any board game companies out there want to back us, we're all ears, hah!)

The final game - as busy, crazy and chaotic as a real supermarket full of old ladies!

"Board Games to Create and Play" by Kevan Davis and Viviane Schwarz is out now, published by Pavilion Children's Books (kindly supplied for review)

Our Second Book of the Week should appeal to those of you who know your Meeple from your Exploding Kitten! Super-fab board game experts Kevan Davis and Viviane Schwarz have created the ultimate maker project book for those of us who love to shake a dice or spin a spinner in our spare time.

"Board Games to Create and Play" is the sort of book that's designed to be pulled apart, scribbled on and turned into something truly amazing (I know, it's not easy for us to wreck gorgeous books - but this one positively begs you to!)

Inside, Kevan and Viviane have given you all the information and templates you'll need to start building your own games - and a ton of superb ideas covering just about any subject you can think of basing your game on.

"Cobweb Castle" - A superb example game to get you started with ace ideas!

Game design is educational, teaching kids valuable lessons about building rule sets, structural construction of the actual game / play pieces (if you really want to go all-out to create something super!) but also about building something that's fun to play, even downright sneaky and tactical if you're so inclined.

The example games are fab fun to just play through as well, if you're not feeling creative. But once you've dived into this book you'll find the perfect entry point - not just for board gaming, but for making your own - which is durned exciting stuff in itself.

An introduction to game design and what you'll need.

It's a truly brilliant timesink - and it's definitely going to be something we'll spend a lot of time with as we're absolute board game fanatics. In fact if you want to find out how our first game design went, check out our accompanying article here!

We really can't recommend this book highly enough and can't wait to start building our next game! Thanks Kevan and Viviane, you've come up (top) trumps with this one!

Sum this book up in a sentence: A superb jumpstart kit for would-be board game designers, or just folk who love playing games from a truly amazing creative team!

"Board Games to Create and Play" by Kevan Davis and Viviane Schwarz is out on 3rd October 2019, published by Pavilion Children's Books (kindly supplied for review).