ThinkFun Robot Turtles Game

This is a fun little game to teach young ones very beginning and simple logic. Their goal is essentially to create a set of instructions (think: "go straight, then turn left, then use your laser to melt some ice") that you the adult enact, acting sort of as their computer. It can scale well to different age and maturity levels by changing what obstacles are on the game board and changing the layout. We haven't gone through all of the available options as my son isn't that advanced yet, but i see this having legs for a couple years (4 to 6) and maybe longer.

This game is not a long-lasting game (per-play), but I hope it will retain replayability for the coming years as my daughter gets older. The premise is fun, and so far my 4 year old daughter seemed to enjoy our first session (we played 5 games in a row, even introducing the ice walls on the 5th game)... I like that the game has increased levels of difficulty and complexity that can be engaged based on the skill and advancement of the players. It does seem like it is made more for play in households where there are more than one child/player, however, based on its advised gameplay rules. However, I went ahead and played both the "mover" and one of the "masters" roles with my daughter playing another turtle "master" and it worked well enough. The quality of the game construction is excellent. It far exceeds the general low-quality construction I find in most board games have purchased in recent years, so that was a nice plus. You do still have to punch-out the gameplay cards from their molds, but this is a pretty quick process, and with the thickness of the cardboard, they pop out easily and cleanly.

I got this game for the kids this Christmas. In short my 6 year old boy loves it. My 10-year-old is probably beyond it, but we haven't played the advanced aspects yet. I tried this out with an early 3-year-old and she really didn't get it. A 4-year-old boy did grasp but wasn't terribly interested. Small samples, but there you go. When you watch the marketing for this it makes it sound like every kid will love it - not the case. In terms of the game's extendability (because we're all IT people here right?) it's definitely there. You start super-easy and almost boring (this is how my 10-year-old lost interest I think) and then you add the wrinkles/challenges (game calls them unlocks, which kids understand!). The best unlock I think is the challenge of writing your instructions out completely, and then running the program, seeing if you get it right first time, and then debugging and rerunning the program. That was the first time it REALLY felt like we're learning programming. We haven't gotten to function frog yet - all the kids think it means the frog jumps over the obstacles, but the reality is much more interesting. You use the frog to call a function that runs that bit of code. The only challenge will be developing a map that lends itself to repeated sequence of actions (i.e. fire laser, move forward several times). I would think the instruction book could include some game designs that can handle that. One other gripe related to the last comment - the first thing the instruction book says in the game is: "don't read this instruction book, go online." OH COME ON! If I wanted to read directions online I wouldn't have shelled out $40 for a board game when I could have bought 10 programming apps for their iPad for the same money. The least you can do is respect my decision and support it. Board games have written directions that work. Nuff said. But all in all, great game, should be in every elementary school classroom. I look forward to playing this with my mini-me this week.

I initially read about this game on NPR's All Tech Considered Weekly Innovations Blog and I was extremely excited about the game concept and signed up on the creator's website for updates. When he announced that he would be selling through Amazon, I quickly jumped on the chance to get a copy. When it arrived I was a little disappointed, I expected cool bells and whistles, but instead the game appeared simplistic and I thought it would be boring. I WAS WRONG, WRONG, WRONG! My son (aged 4) LOVES this game which should be enough in itself (SERIOUSLY, how often do you see an extremely hyper, goofy boy want to sit still for hours on end to play a game) but when a programmer friend came by and watched my son play it and explained to me the importance of what that "simplistic" game was teaching I was hooked.... This game is not only a great educational tool for all of the future evil geniuses, but it is fun and offers mothers everywhere a bit of stationary fun.....

I was so excited to purchase this game for my five year-old for Christmas. The drawings, instructions and production quality is very good. The game is easy-to-teach and learn. My problem is that once you get the concept, it's quite boring and lacks "replayability." My daughter played it a few times in the beginning of January and now she doesn't want anything to do with it. She says, "I get it. Go left. Go right. It's borrrrrring. Let's play something else." In fact, I have to agree. We've assembled games with other kids and it's even more boring waiting for them to assemble their instruction sets. We've played card by card and also by putting together longer instruction sets. I remember the first few games as being very fund and interesting because it was new. But, I can't get her near it now. I haven't explained the sub-routine element to her yet, but the instruction sets are so limited that I really wonder how often anyone uses these in a meaningful way. Sub-routines are an important element of streamlining a program. But, this doesn't seem to be a practical component of the game. I probably am being generous with three stars, because I wish I didn't buy it. But, it was so well done that I gave it one or two mercy stars.

Of all the games my 4 yr old has, this is my personal favorite to play with him. So much more engaging the Candy land or chutes and ladders. (He loves those games as well.) It requires mental activity (not just luck) and it’s cool watching his brain work as he has to calculate and plan all of the steps in his head. It’s also fun for me as I get to create intricate routes / mazes for him. There was a point that he lost his excitement after a few weeks and I now have to lure him to play again. But, he’s also that way with the other games as well.

I am a programmer. I first bought this game years ago for my nieces / nephews who were around 5, 7, and 10. It went over quite well. This time I bought it for my just turned 3 preschooler. I modified the first stage of the game so that: 1. We put the four lady bugs (he likes those more than the gems) all around the board. 2. He puts the turtle in the starting spot. He lets me know where he's heading. 3. He picks one card, and I move the turtle right away. I ask him if that's what he wanted to do. If it was, he keeps going. If it wasn't, he removes the card and we put the turtle back to how it was. This way he can see the trial/error right away and start to develop a connection between the cards and the turtle. Sometimes he'll put more than one card down, so I'll point at the card and the turtle and do each action really slowly. Anyhow - huge hit!

We played this game the first time with 5 people - 3 adults, one 4 year old, and a two year old in the lap of an adult. My grandsons loved the choice between "turn right" "turn left" or "go straight" and the adults intentionally made "mistakes" so they could hit the bug and yell "Bug! Bug! I changed my mind!" I love that kids can take risks and make mistakes without penalty as part of the learning process. This was also reinforcing their knowledge of right/left/straight, turn-taking, and working by steps to reach a goal. We did not include any obstacles in the first go-round, so the game was very simplistic, but with supervision, more complex concepts can be introduced to further teach pre-coding skills. The kids enjoyed the use of turtle noises when the turtles were being moved, and the adults had a blast doing the turtle dance to entertain the kids when we finally reached our jewel at the center. Anecdotally, the boys wanted to play this game so much that they gathered all the pillows in the house (about a dozen) and stacked them up beside the game cabinet, then climbed up and got the game! We were amazed that they came up with this plan and successfully executed it too!