Over the weekend we played a board game called Dixit - it's one I'd never heard of and to be honest I wasn't sure we'd enjoy it. From the description it sounded like we needed to be creative (something some of us aren't very good at) and no one particularly wanted to make their brains work when we tried it.
About Dixit
Dixit is the lovingly illustrated game of creative guesswork in which your imagination unlocks the tale!
In this multi award-winning board game, players take turns to become storytellers describing a picture card from their hand in a quick statement. Each remaining player then secretly proposes a rival picture card to throw the other players off their game when they vote for the card they believe was yours.
But beware! Your stories must be tactfully ambiguous as to reveal your card to only some of the other players - if none or all of the players guess correct, no points are scored!
Suitable for 3-6 players, aged 8+
Trying out Dixit
To begin with we had a practise, we showed the boys how to play while keeping all the cards visible. This way we could all watch and understand the purpose of the game and try to work out ways we might win.
On the practise round we did okay, although the description of the card was too literal and everyone guessed it right. But it did make us realise that we had to be more cryptic or intelligent about how we described our cards.
The real game
To begin with we all struggled, thinking of creative descriptions that wouldn't give away the card you could see was difficult, particularly for LP. At 8 years old he can't really think of cryptic descriptions or even how to begin - but he did okay.
After a while we got into the game and we all managed to gain some points. Unfortunately because LP is only 8 and couldn't really come up with many ambiguous descriptions he didn't get as many points as he would've liked.
It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge.
Albert Einstein
By the time we finished the game (I won by the way!) we were into it. We managed to come up with good descriptions and gain points. Some sentences surprised me, some made me laugh. It was a fun afternoon.
One of the things that made me laugh about this game was what they call their playing pieces - rabbeeple, an obvious nod to Carcassonne and their "meeple". The scoring board was a little frustrating at times because when your rabbeeple are on the board they cover the number, and the numbers are arranged in a way that it's not obvious which one is next without seeing the number. We worked it out but the Hubby got a little frustrated at times.
What we thought
We had a rocky start but once we got into the game we enjoyed it - more than we thought we would. It was fun trying to come up with sentences that would trick the others and I know LP was proud of himself when he thought up good sentences.
I did think that there'd be another use for the cards in this game though, which BP found interesting. The cards are beautifully illustrated and I have no doubt they'd be brilliant as writing prompts. When BP is looking for something to do I think I'll be handing him one of these cards and telling him to come up with a story!
A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others.
Ayn Rand
Overall this game was good, I'm not sure it'll become a game we play all the time but I am sure we'll play it again.
You can purchase Dixit for £29.99.
I was sent Dixit because I am a part of Asmodee UK Blogger Board Game Club. All opinions are my own.