I am pretty much sure that most of you people who read
this have their own game collection with boxes neatly tucked away in you black
or white Kallax, and you buy your games online, from the retailer you trust, a
large department store, at your friendly local game shop or at conventions and
fairs like Spiel Essen. You play at your own gaming table – or any large table
in your house that doubles as such – and at your game club and other such obvious
places. But have you ever bought a game at the supermarket and eaten it up even
before you brought it to the table?
Alright, the latter concept sounds a bit extreme, but it is not entirely
impossible. There are, in fact, edible
games! Between boiled sweets, popcorn and chocolate bars, you can actually take
a bite out of Rummikub, Trivial Pursuit and Twister, as this find in the sweets
department of a large German supermarket chain gives proof of. The best time to
look for such specialities is before Christmas, but you can come across them
all year round.
You find all kids of old classics here: A candy version of Twister, Uno made of chocolates, Ludo (Mensch ärgere dich nicht!) and the “original” Monopoly. The latter might have been introduced to make the infamous sentence “I hate Monopoly!” practically unutterable, at least among chocolate lovers. Most of them have chocolate components with wrappers camouflaging them as playing pieces of some sort and printed edible “paper”.
They are very playable, and if you have a good portion of self-restraint some are perhaps even re-playable, but it would be safest to avoid any AP, or the piece you want to place might melt in your hand. So much is certain: These games are not recommended for temperatures of 30° Centigrade or over, and they come with an expiry date.
They are very playable, and if you have a good portion of self-restraint some are perhaps even re-playable, but it would be safest to avoid any AP, or the piece you want to place might melt in your hand. So much is certain: These games are not recommended for temperatures of 30° Centigrade or over, and they come with an expiry date.
The idea to have a sweet review of the most positive moments like in this edible game could be a nice addition to your New Year’s Eve celebration. It is clearly reminiscent of „Trivial Pursuit“. A pity that the box with its dial of trivia questions has outlived its purpose when empty. Maybe it can be refilled for some re-playability.
In a few cases the game is not a high calorie re-make of an existing game, but has itself and what you are doing with the content of the box as a “theme”.
In this example, gummy drops in different colours and flavours – nice and not so nice – come with a custom die. You roll and have to face the “challenge” according to your result, namely eat the next gummy drop the die has assigned to you. That is the game, all of it, and it comes with a warning to stop playing well before you get sick.
Gosh and golly, when do you “play” such a thing? And with whom? Was it inspired by Bertie Bott’s Every Flavour Beans from Harry Potter? In that case I would wish for a nicer box. I also did not buy it, so I cannot vouchsafe if there was or was not any ear wax candy in it.
I can imagine torturing children who come a-trick-and-treating on Halloween with this! Joke aside, it could work as a little Halloween prank for the occasion, adding some extra “spice” to all the gruesome special effects our home has been known for when it functions as the most popular Halloween House for the children in the neighbourhood. That would make some sense. Problem was, this beauty of a game only appeared on the clearing sale shelf in January, but then it might have been around on time for the start of November, who can say? I think I will actually keep my eyes peeled for this in October.
Would I twister myself around sweets and buy the chocolate Munchopoly or any of the others? Certainly not. An edible game may pass as a novelty gift from a gamer to a non-gamer and be considered original and funny, but I am tempted to add “in a warped kind of way”. For somebody who does not normally enjoy board games, the special “theme” would not really add a lot to the enjoyment of the content. Maybe this would be different with an outright board game hater who would gleefully destroy the whole box (and no real live game hurt in the process…).
But what a cruel gift to give to any true board game lover, or worse, to any serious board game collector!
On the bright side, they are ideal for those of us who constantly face serious storage problems with every new game they acquire…
My suggestion: If you want to appease your sweet tooth with a game related treat, bake a cake with a board game theme! There are great examples of such cakes known to mankind, but however nice they are to behold, they do not camouflage as playable, durable games but are first and for all a cake to enjoy with a nice cuppa on the side – and then you can get out a real board game and play together with your friends!
Good play – better day!