We were sent a copy of the game Animals of the World by Tactic for the purposes of this review. For full disclaimer please see the end of this post.
With an animal mad nine year old, and a seven year old whose learning topic for the week from school is animals, it seemed the perfect time to review Animals of the World, from Tactic. A family game for 2 to 6 players and everyone aged 8+.
Now, Animals of the World is a game that claims to test your animal knowledge and it certainly does that. At several points playing I found myself wishing that I’d paid far more attention when I’d last been at Whipsnade Zoo with the kids!
How to play
In this game you are aiming to use your animal knowledge to initially collect as many animal cards as you can, by showing off how much you know about the animals pictured on them. But your cards only count if you can then correctly identify the continent where the animals live in the wild.
The game starts with each player laying out four animals cards face up in front of them. Players then choose an animal from those laid out by the other players and try to identify the animal. If they can do so correctly they win that card. They also get the chance to win a second card by answering the question on the back correctly. When players win cards they then have to try to work out which continent they live in (in the wild, not just where the zoo is that you might have seen them in!) and place the card in the correct place in front of them.
Depending on how many people are playing a certain number of cards are identified as question cards at the start of the game. The other animal cards are there as possible bonus cards. Once all the question cards have been exhausted players check the continents that they have allocated animals to and score a point for each one that is correct.
What we thought of Animals of the World
It’s one of those games that sounds a little complicated when you first read the instructions, but once you’re in the swing of it is actually straightforward. Well, the game mechanics are – identifying some of the animals not so much so!
Little Miss C and I had great fun playing, even if it did make both of us realise just how poorly we know all the different big cats in the wild. The game also taught us a thing or two about animal habitats. The question cards have a huge amount of information on them, and I can easily see animal mad children spending hours just reading them as a sort of card based animal encyclopaedia.
Where to buy Animals of the World
Tactic’s Animals of the World is available to buy online from The Range with an RRP of £13.99
For more toy and game review on Penny Plays please take a look here. If you’re looking for more family board games, including some vintage ones, then here you go.
Disclaimer: We were sent a copy of Animals of the World for the purposes of this review. All opinions remain my own. The product links in this post are not affiliate links.