Dale Yu: Introducing the Gameroom / Holper Stolper

So, we had some friends (non-gamers) over to the house last weekend.  Given our crazy schedules, we had not been able to get together for about 6 months now.  It was the first time that they had been over to the house, so they received the grand tour.  As usual, the kitchen gots oohs-and-ahhs as did the screened in patio.  As we moved into the basement, I got ready to show them the game closet.  This is that part of the tour that I’m never quite sure what the response will be.  I’ve given my fair share of house tours in the last few months (we just moved into our new house in March) – so I’ve had plenty of practice “explainingâ€? the game closet.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m proud to be a gamer, and I’m proud of my game collection.  However, I must admit that to a non-gamer, the crowded game closet can be a little bit intimidating… Upon entry to the room, the visitor is visually beseiged by shelves in every direction stacked from top to bottom with games.  The floor usually has about 10-15 games that have either not yet been reshelved or simply do not yet have a permanent home.  Furthermore, all my other gaming accessories and paraphenalia occupy an old countertop which only adds to the relative clutter of the room.  Each time that I bring a new guest down to the room, I have to ready myself for the inevitable questions that will follow.  There are generally two main paths that the conversation can take: (A) Wow! Look at all those games… Why haven’t I heard of any of them?  (B) So, you mean these aren’t for the kids?  Well, who plays them then?  You mean, you play these games?  I’ve got stock answers for each of these questions, and then I usually let them have a few minutes to take in all the games.

We all have our own little space in our homes where we store our games.  From my conversations with other gamers, many of you are in the similar situation as me – we get whatever space is alloted to us by our spouse!  The space that I’ve been given has changed each time we’ve moved… with one constant – my games always end up in the basement!  Let me digress for a bit and give you a short history of my gamerooms.

In our first house, we had an unfinished basement.  The decision at that time was easy!  I pretty much got any space in the basement that didn’t already have boxes in it.  I had inherited a few particle board bookshelves that I used to start my budding collection.  At this time, I likely had more Magic: The Gathering cards than boardgames, so storage space was never an issue!  Two bookshelves was more than enough to hold all my games.  They stood next to each other in a nice little area over by the pool table.  In fact, one of the middle shelves held all of the billiard paraphenalia as well.  [To this day, I’ve never enjoyed Bottle Pool – yet I can’t bring myself to part with that stupid little brown plastic bottle I got free with my pool table!]

As I became more involved in the hobby, I started to really accumulate games quickly.  I was ordering the newest and greatest games from the online retailers.  I was also scouring flea markets and auctions to catch up on all the vintage stuff that I could find.  The two bookshelves were simply inadequate, and new storage space had to be found.  Acquiring more wooden bookshelves was too cost prohibitive – so I did what most Americans would do and went to WalMart to see what I could afford.  A simple solution was found – molded plastic shelves with interchangable parts.  I could now make shelving as high or as low as I needed without needing to take out a loan in the process!

Initially, my games didn’t need much organization.  They were pretty much put on the shelves willy-nilly.  Since I had an entire basement to expand into as well as an almost infinitely expandable shelf system, efficiency was not a priority.  My organizational system was dumbfounding to most.  “Hey, Dale, where is Settlers?â€?  “Well, the last time we put it away, I think it was on the top shelf of the right most bookcase…â€?  Oftentimes I was right.  Oftentimes I was wrong.  My gaming group often had a little treasure hunt on its hands each time we wanted to play a game as we had to all set about on a search for it on the shelves.  To this day, I still have no real organizational system.  I pretty much just remember where they are – which is a fairly vague system for 900ish games!  I remember once reading about Frank Branham’s catalogued system where each game has a location marked with sticker telling the location as well as a central database to allow for searches.  I tried to start that type of system and gave up before I had 100 games into the trial database!

So what have I settled on now?  Mostly, I arrange games by size.  Like sized boxes stand near other like sized boxes.  This means that oftentimes multiple games from a publisher sit near each other because usually those boxes will be of identical size.  However, I do have a few exceptions to this rule.  First, all my Settlers stuff lives on one shelf – regardless of size.  The same holds true for my Carcassone stuff which gets its own shelf as well.  I also have one small shelf that I use to separate games that I want to play – usually games I have yet to try or games that I have been meaning to play and want to make sure I get to on my next game night.  At any given time, there are likely 15-20 games on that shelf, although I think there are less than 10 right now!

I store my games, for the most part, standing on their sides.  I use large rubber bands to hold the lids onto the regular sized game boxes so that the bits don’t slip out of the box and get lost.  (I also use a whole slew of little plastic baggies to keep all the bits organized in the box, but that’s a column for another week…) I have been tempted to upgrade my rubber bands to the four-way rubber bands to really hold the games tightly together, but it jas just never been worth the expense to do this as they cost about $4 for 10 bands.  Smaller games get held together with run-of-the-mill office rubberbands from your friendly local office supply store.  Each game also gets a sticker placed on it to mark ownership.  Currently, I use the Avery Removable Address labels so that if I ever sell the game, I can remove my mark without any residue.

My games are, for the most part, in a converted storage closet in the basement.  The games share the room with the water heater, the furnaces and the junk dresser.  Pretty much every square foot of space in this room otherwise is dedicated to games.  So, where have I gone from my original two particle board bookcases?  Hmm… My games currently live on those same two bookcases.  As far as the plastic shelves go, I have 56 levels of plastic shelves each 36â€? wide.  I also have my small 12 to 14 inch wide bookcase for the “must be played soonâ€? games.  So that doesn’t sound so bad, right?  But what about all the children’s games?  They’re stored in various places around the house.  One shelf each in each child’s room.  Three cabinet’s worth of space in the basement.  One set of step shelves in the basement with smaller kids games.  And two large cabinets/drawers in the den full of Haba and Selecta games.  Whew.

As you can see, this arrangement of games can lead to sensory overload to the non-initiated.  Every month or so, I wonder if there is a better way to organize the games.  I’ve thought about re-arranging the shelves so they look less cluttered, but this seems like it will be too much work.  I’ve been offered some space on our “niceâ€? bookcases upstairs in the family room / library, but I haven’t been able to bring myself to separate any of my non-children games from the game closet.  So, even though I’d like to bring some of the games upstairs into the “publicâ€? part of the house where they might act as conversation pieces to my non-gaming friends, the games remain downstairs in the relative anonymity of the basement.  But at least in the basement, they serve as the exclamation point to the end of the house tour!

CHILDREN’S GAME OF THE WEEK

HOLPER STOLPER (Haba)
Designer: Manfred Ludwig
Ages: 5-99
Time: 15-20 mintes
Players: 2-4

Holper Stolper is one of the big-box games from Haba.  It is also called Bumpy Rumble in English.  It is a fairly simple dexterity games that can keep your kids occupied for part of the day.  The idea of the game is to deliver 10 goods to the other side of the jungle.  These goods are carried in jeeps across the board which represents the jungle.  The board is two-leveled, and there are circular holes scattered about the board.  In fact, there are 2 different boards included in the box to give you two levels of difficulty!

On your turn, you roll the die which is numbered 1, 1, 2, 2 circled, 3, and 3 circled.  If you roll a circled number, you automatically deliver one of your goods.  Then, you choose the corresponding jeep to the number you rolled and fill it with goods.  The “1â€? jeep is the narrowest and takes 2 goods.  The “2â€? is medium width and holds three goods, and the “3â€? jeep is the widest and also holds three goods.  Additionally, the driver is placed in the front seat of the jeep – it is simply a peg that protrudes through the floor of the jeep so that it can get caught in the holes in the board.  Two wooden obstacles are placed in holes in the board – the jeep must go around these obstacles on its tour through the jungle.

Then, you carefully push the jeep across the board trying to avoid the holes in the board.  If you get stuck (which is made clear when you are no longer able to advance the jeep due to the peg stuck in the hole), you must remove one of your goods from the jeep.  Then you pick the jeep out of the hole and continue from that spot.  You continue to do this until you are out of goods or until you are able to make it to the other side of the jungle and deliver all the goods remaining in the back of the jeep.

That’s really all there is to the game.  My kids really like it, though at their ages (currently 5 and 3) – the game is more of a toy or activity than a game.  They are more than happy to pull the game out and set it up and try to move the jeeps across the jungle.  However, they are frankly awful at navigating the jeeps at this point.  Even my five year old is still having problems being able to visualize the path he needs to steer the jeep – the driver peg sits squarely in the center of the wooden car so that the child will have to “rememberâ€? the location of the holes he is driving over for about one inch.  As they are often unable to get the jeep safely through the jungle, it’s not much of a game.  That being said, the kids still have a lot of fun just trying to do it, and I’m happy with that.

As the kids get older, I think it will be a good game for them to play.  It helps them improve their fine motor skills as well as advance planning.  The one problem with the game is that it may not adjust well for differing levels of skill/dexterity.  We have tried to reduce the number of goods that the younger players need to win – but often this is still not enough.  Let’s face it, my three year old pretty much only gets rid of goods when he rolls a circled number on the die.  If you reduce his winning number too much, he’ll win without ever delivering a good in the traditional sense if he is lucky enough.  Can the game be played by adults?  Maybe.  At least with my friends, the game merely becomes an exercise in lucky die rolling as there is simply not enough challenge with even the difficult board.  Probably 80-90% of the trips made by the adults end in a successful trip through the jungle; thus there is little suspense in the game.  Overall, I would still put this game in the “buyâ€? category.  It is a lot of fun – more as a toy at a younger age but then as a game for your children from about age 6 or 7.

Until your next appointment,
The Gaming Doctor

© 2006 Dale Yu

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Comments:

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I get better responses from the game collection Often, in fact, I get either NO or a delayed response. Either someone notices the shelf of horror action figures, which is bright and colorful--then their gaze widens to the rest of the monstrousity. Or they just breeze past it as a big, cluttered room. It just doesn’t stand out as much as the giant metal “Mausoleum” door to the library. Posted by Frank Branham on Aug 30, 2006 at 10:32 AM | #

I think it is great with these Children’s games reviews. I have two sons aged 6 and 4 and of course they like games, too. This year they got Nacht der Magier and Los Mampfos, both great successes. I really think that games are excellent. They do help you alot when it comes to raise the kids good. Everything from waiting for your turn, not cheating, be a generous winner, be a good (well...) loser etc. It is all there in the game. And what if they got better math skills, learn about different animals, other countries whatever. And in a couple of years we can sit and play Reef Encounter and other stuff… /Strömer, from Sweden Posted by Patrik Strömer on Aug 31, 2006 at 12:27 PM | #

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