In an effort to review games of all kinds and being fathers to children who love to board game, this review is a part of our series looking at games catering more towards children of all ages.  These reviews will not follow our normal rating structure but instead will be shorter, more to the point, and will feature one rating from 1 to 5.

Review

Where’s Waldo? Where’s Charlie? Where’s Willy? Where’s Walter? Where’s Wally? Whatever you call him, he has been hiking across children’s books, cartoons, and even board games since 1987. In this iteration, called Where’s Waldo? Join the Search and released in 2012, you and your friends race to find objects across 8 different scenes from the beloved Where’s Waldo books. The first to collect the object on the game card that was drawn wins that card. The first to collect 8 cards wins.

Players lay out all eight game boards, along with the spinner board as the center piece, in a 3×3 grid.  Off to the side, the three types of cards (Waldo, Wizard, and Woof) are placed in stacks and then four colored game chips, used to mark items you find on the boards, are given to each player. 

The game is simple enough where each player spins the spinner and draws the appropriate card which directs them what to find on the game boards.  Each card plays slightly differently:

• Waldo cards show pictures of hidden objects that can be scattered across all eight game boards.  All players look simultaneously and the first to each object with one of their chips, collects the matching card.  The turn continues until all objects have been found.
• Wizard cards give a description of an object, instead of giving the outright picture.  Each Wizard card also has a number representing the number of this item that must be found.  Again, players search simultaneously and once a player finds the correct number of objects, they win the card.
• Woof cards send the players off to find pictures of Woof’s bone.  Anytime this card is drawn, players must find exactly four bones.  Once completed, the first player to do so wins the Woof card.

There are also two spaces on the spinner that cause some chaos to unfurl in the game.  If the spinner lands on a Wenda space, all game boards are flipped over to show the black and white side.  Lastly, if the spinner lands on an Odlaw space, that player can choose to re-arrange and mix-up the boards any way they see fit.  Players who want to be cruel to their opponents are even allowed to turn the boards upside down!  The first player to collect a total of eight cards, wins the game.

I am giving Where’s Waldo? Join the Search an overall rating of 5 out of 5 for pure nostalgia!  I grew up with this line of books in the 90’s and am looking forward to a new generation of kids having fun searching for the stiped shirt, bespeckled fellow known as Waldo!