Once Upon a Time Storytelling Game

When Jeff and I were on our honeymoon in London we haunted all of the book stores I could find.  I looked them up, and there was 100 something book stores, and several game stores.  More than enough to fill the time between going to museums and the Globe.

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At one of those stores I found Once Upon A Time game.  I love the idea of this game, the pictures are gorgeous, and if you’re a fan of fairy tales, you’ll fall in love with them too.

 

I however have not figured out the trick to playing it in real life with adults, I don’t know if it’s I’m not good at thinking up stories on the fly with other people, or what it is, but it can be hard to play.

The general premise of Once Upon a Time game: you get 5 story-telling cards, and a “Happy Ending” card, you are trying to tell the story so that you use all of your cards and get to the happy ending you have.

 

Sounds easy right?

 

It’s not, because other players will try to steal the story with their cards, so if you mention something they have, they can steal the story.

 

That’s where it gets tricky if you’re playing with lots of adults who know the key phrases used in fairy tales they can work their way around using those phrases, but they can’t do it too often because you will catch them at it.

 

But, you know what my favorite way to use this is?

 

Not as a game.  As a way to stretch the kids imagination and storytelling skills.  Left to their own devices their story will sound like this “Once there was a boy and he was strong.  Then he went out and fought bad guys, and then… and then… and then…..  Finally he fought them all and won.  The End.”  Both of those words are capitalized when they say it, you can hear the capital E.

 

But, that’s a boring story.  Very boring story.  Like, I want to go to sleep as they tell it to me.

 

However, you add these cards in and they start to come up with a better story.  They add in interesting details because they’re required to.  They think up more descriptions because their character is called “Mysterious old crone,” rather than “woman I saw.”  It adds richness to the story.

 

So, I don’t tend to recommend this for game play as much, but it’s not the type of game Jeff and I enjoy.  Okay, I enjoy it even if I’m not good at it, Jeff claws his eyes out because it’s subjective.

 

But get Once Upon A Time game  for the learning opportunities.

 

As a side note, NotebookingPages.com sale is ending today, if you don’t have a membership yet, why don’t you?  I’m loving it.  If I get it done before we drop the kids off, a monumental achievement, you’ll get to see our awesome crawdads………

 

If you’re interested, I’m collecting game posts on my Games pinterest board.  Feel free to look for more game ideas there.