Small world is a board game that has turned electronic board game and is made by Days of Wonder.  In simple terms it is a game that you try to take over the world.  However, you do it on very unusual terms.

You start the game by picking out a race card that is paired with a random special power that your units have.  Some of the races that you can choose from are elf, amazons, and giants.  Then you simply take over different regions if you have enough race tokens to do so on your turn.  This makes the game play pretty fast as there is not a lot of interaction between players.  If you want to make a conquest and have the tokens to do it.  It just happens.  The only time that you can roll a dice is the last conquest of your turn.

The cool dynamic of the game is when you think that your race can’t compete with other races on the table because your special ability is lacking or another player is attacking you, you get to pick a new one and start your conquests over again.

The special ability rules for this game were a little strange and hard to get a grasp of when I played it the first few times about when they work and when they do not.  Then I played the iPad 2 player version of the game.  Because I played that version, it simplified the turns and showed me when special abilities were in effect and helped immensely with the board game version.

Also the setup of the game contains many cardboard pieces.  Needless to say the iPad version was a dream as far as setup and putting away all the pieces.  The setup time for the actual board game only took about 10 minutes.  The only issue I had with the iPad version is that it is only for 2 people.  If you own a iPad, I would recommend picking up the iPad version to see if the game is for you.  Plus then it will help as you explain the rules to your friends when playing the physical version.

The retail version of the physical board game is around 40 USD, the ipad version of the game costs around 10 USD from the Apple store.

When I first learned of this toy I didn’t know what to think of it, because I didn’t know what it was.  This is one of the best unique building toys that I have seen in a long time.  This building toy has such an open concept to building things that some of the best selling sets come with instructions to build 10 different items. 

So that’s the intro, by this point you have to be wondering what is a ZOOB.  ZOOBS are simply five different pieces that snap together in such a way that you can put them together in every possible way that you can imagine.  You can create people, objects, and even diagrams, with very few pieces.  The pieces are uniform so that you end up with an atheistic looking creation all of the time.  Also your creations are not as likely to fall apart due to the excellent fit that each of the pieces exhibit for each other.

This is one of those toys that you can start with a smaller set, but the genius behind the bigger sets is that the instructions for the smaller sets are also included in a bigger set.  For instance the 250 piece set has instructions for making 26 different things.  This gives you a great understanding for how the product can work, and all the possibilities of how the five pieces interact. 

This is a great inspirational toy, and I can see it in many classrooms in the near future.  I would recommend that you start off with a slightly larger set like the 250 piece set.  This gives you the best flexibility, and a nice storage container for the product to boot.

250 ZOOBS retail for 54.99 but you can get them on Amazon for around 35 dollars.