Dioctipoid – The puzzle for the logical thinker!

A few weeks back I received an email asking me if I would be interested in conducting a review on a new range of puzzles called “Dioctipoid”

The Dioctipoid resembles something of the classic Rubic cube except Dioctipoid isn’t a cube it’s actually a ball!

Little man (aka, a boy with aspergers) is rather good when it comes to this type of thing! Yes, there are numerous situations where Little man isn’t so great at “Thinking outside the box” yet, puzzles requiring logic, doesn’t seem to be one of them.

Dioctipoids are made up of both white and brightly coloured triangles, to solve the , players must rotate each segment around the arrow, the puzzle is complete once the pattern on the box has been achieved.

This isn’t by any means an easy thing to do (trust me I’ve tried)!

Dioctipoid provided a good delivery service with the products arriving in just a few days. I was presented with a lovely surprise, when discovering I’d been sent not one but two puzzles, the Dioctipoid 1.0 & 2.0 with of course 1.0 being the easiest (well, so they claim)!

I decided that, as not to over excite the Little guy, I’d hold back on giving him the second puzzle, this would also allow him to give the first puzzle his full attention.

The first puzzles (1.0) requires the player to make a pattern of stars, I must admit that while Little man embarked on his puzzling mission, peace and calm was restored in the house (well, for a few hours at least)! I decided that while Little man got to work on the puzzle, I’d sneak off to the sanctuary of my bedroom/come office and engage in a spot of social networking, however, this didn’t happen! Nope, instead I found myself having a pop at puzzle 2 myself & believe me this was almost as addictive as twitter.

Did I solve the puzzle? Did I heck! I found myself stating out loud “It’s a fix, it can’t be done” (of course it can)! I just couldn’t do it! I admit, I did get a tad frustrated (see picture below)!

However, Little man did, with the use of logical thinking and patience he managed it fine, completing puzzle 1.0 in a few short days. Little man took lots of breaks and didn’t sit up working on the thing in till the small hours (unlike some I know)! His still working on number two which he was pleased to receive, me however, I gave up and started on puzzle 1.0, did I finish it? The shame, of course I haven’t… You can’t be good everything you know!

Dioctipoid are aimed at children aged 8+ and is a challenging puzzle for both child and adult alike! Each Dioctipoid comes complete with a special token which should be retained as these will enter its owner into a spectacular online Gala phase of Dioctipoids planed competition which has been rumoured to offer a major prize.

We love this funky puzzles and are having awesome fun trying to solve them, they are great for children with Asperger’s and I can see us get others. To checkout Dioctipoid for yourself click Here

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Let’s play a little Dotto

I love reviewing board games as for me they’re a way of encouraging social interaction and having a child on the autism spectrum, makes that an important factor for me.

As mentioned in my last review of the board game ‘Faqir’, blog-match successful teamed us up with the guys at Tactic Games. Not only was we sent Faqir but also the game ‘Dotto’ in which I’d like to share with you all today.

DOTTO

Dotto is a dice game that requires luck, skill and speed! Race against the clock to match the sequence on the card to the positioning of the coloured dice on the board, the only problem is the timer (supplied) goes of randomly meaning you have to be super quick the entire time.

Warning… Beware not to pick up the “Miss a turn” card and watch out for the reverse card, that will completely reverse the order of play.

WHAT’S IN THE BOX:

Game board

10 coloured dice

Timer

55 pattern cards

15 tokens

pouch for storing dice, cards and tokens

Rules/instructions

I’m a little confused as to why they didn’t just use the card that was popped out the board allowing room for the dice, to be used as the tokens as these no longer have any use.

WHO’S IT FOR AND HOW MANY PLAYERS:

Ages 6+

2-5 players

PUTTING DOTTO THROUGH IT’S PACES

“I absolutely loved it!”

What a big kid I am. I’m really competitive and give no chances, not even to my children. I played the game with both Little man and his sister, ‘Alice-Sara’ It was originally just the two of them but only five minutes in, it was turning into a game of war so I intervened.

My daughter gave up half way through and I almost lost Little man a few times when he got the total hump when I was leading and also through frustration, convinced the timer was plotting against him, (I do admit that the unlucky little bugger seemed to always get the shortest amount of time to copy and build his pattern sequence).

Little man does have a range of difficulties that come down to his inability in doing things in sequence unless there are visual aids to assist him! Luckily with this game you get just that in the patterned coloured cards. The timer was a different story altogether. He hates having to rush things, plus the fact he had no control over how long it would be before the buzzer went off, drove him loopy!

Regardless of these factors he stuck with it, giving all he had which was awesome.

Practise would clearly help to better develop a child with autism’s sequencing skills and their ability to deal with the unexpected (buzzer).

Alice gave a big fat no stars score (through ignore this she didn’t even play and I think that’s properly why.

Little man gave it a 3 stars *** where I gave it the full ***** five stars it deserved.

Note: The timer takes three AAA batteries (not included) and you will require the use of a small screwdriver so worth having one to hand.

WHERE TO BUY:

Get Dotto for £14.99 at Amazon

and a variety of other toy providers

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Alice Kicks some butt!

Blog-Match the brilliant peeps that match bloggers with brands have paired us with the fantastic Tactic games.

 Tactic sent us two board games to review, Faqir and Dotto (which will follow in another post)

 So, what’s it normally like playing board games with two very competitive children, one who is rule band and throws an almighty strop when he loses?

A nightmare that’s what it is!

 Five minutes in and all hell broke loose. 

 Now, I should state If it was just me and the little man then his fine, he just can’t play alongside his sister unless his in control and things are going his way! Not easy to put this into practice when playing a board game.

 Later that evening Little man went out with his father and I took Alice and the youngest around my mothers house and decided to bring the game and ask my younger sister and her boyfriend to play the game with Alice. There was no point me even trying with my toddler about.

 Lucky my sisters boyfriend said he would give it a go and with much excitement Alice sat down to face her opponent.

 Inside the box

 On opening Faqir we found a board with lots of hole, 28 brightly coloured plastic cones, 24 faqir cards, 4 Faqir dressing rooms and a handy pouch to store cards and cones. 

 What each player requires

 Each player has a certain number of cards depending on how many are playing.

Each player has a dressing table in which they place one of their cards behind.

Lastly

Each player is given a set of cones, there are 4 different colours to choose from.

 Aim of the game!

 Players must place their first card behind they’re dressing table, leaving it only partially visible to their opponent.  Each card has a number of holes (like what you get if you hole punch paper) the holes make up a pattern. The players will take it in turns with the youngest going first (Yep it’s in the rules) each must make the same pattern on their card on the board. This is done by placing the supplied cones (aka nails, into the holes on the board) Once the pattern is complete and the players card can be placed on top of the nails avoiding injury and a nasty anti-tetanus jab 🙂 they move on to another card. Once all your cards have gone you have a winner.  

Piece of cake right!

No, not exactly it isn’t! You see, as mentioned above each players card is partially exposed to its opponent(s) resulting in part of the pattern being revealed. This may only be one or two holes but still it gives players a clue to their opponents movements allowing them to try and block you. 

 The contest

On the left we have Aaron, sister’s boyfriend aged 18 years

On the right we have Alice-Sara ten years his senior at just 8yrs

How is this even fair?

 Does Aaron have the ability to easily beat his younger opponent with his ability to think outside the box?

 No way, this is my daughter we are talking about!

Competitive should be her middle name.

 Jammy dodger pulled it off.

Whoop Whoop

That’s my girl

Alice scores it top marks ***** 5 star

Where Aaron gave it a lower ***  3 star… um I wonder why?

I later played this with little man and I think its brilliant for an older child with Aspergers as It improves non verbal reasoning skills and helps the child look beyond what he thinks he see. 

Well, Little man done well and I just bet him right at the end but it was close, very, very close!

Faqir by Tactic Games

Age 7+

2-4 players per game

Around 30 minute game time per round.

 Amazon currently stock this and I’ve checked and the good news is they have six in stock for £18.99 

Amazon

Visit the Tactic website for more information

http://www.tactic.net/