(This joke was brought to you by Piper, this week’s featured short-haired not-quite-seven-year-old; art, toy and Morphology-enthusiast, devoted bracelet and necklace-wearer; comedy-appreciator; and MAGIC MORPHOLOGIST!)

Morphology Games: If you could give a copy of Morphology to anyone in the world, who would it be?
Piper: I would give Morphology to my sister.

MG: Fill in the blank: Morphology is (BLANK).
P: Morphology is… cool.

MG: What do you like about Morphology? What do you hate about it?
P: Like: that you can be really really creative. You can play however you want. Hate: that sometimes you lose.

MG: Why are you a Magic Morphologist?
P: Because I know how to play it!

MG: What do Morphology and life have in common?
P: Morphology and life are both creative.

MG: Anything else you’d like to share?
P: I like that the pieces of Morphology are in the word on the cover, it looks creative. The rope is the O and the round yellow bead is the other O and I like the frogs and the beads and the glass beads.

Check out this Morphology creation–it’s one of the words that Piper requested! Can you guess what it is? Check our Facebook page for the answer (and the rest of Piper’s guessing game words)!

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On Friday, we Furted. If you’ve never Furted, you should try it. It’s a hoot.

(No, not a TOOT! A HOOT!)

Furt is one of the silliest and eclectic games we have on our board game shelves. Just take a look at the cover and you’ll get a pretty good idea of what this game is all about (which is to say, no idea at all. Get used to that feeling.)

To begin, you’ll choose a character card (nope, these ain’t your grandma’s characters… opt from candy corn, double rainbow, beaver with a scary chainsaw and a heel-clicking gnome among others) and then complete a variety of ridiculous directives with the goal of making it into the volcano.

(We were tempted to ask why anyone would WANT to go inside of a volcano… but that seemed the least of our worries.)

Grouchy people, beware: Furt WILL make you smile. It’s just plain goofy. As Wiggity Bang Games (the wacky geniuses who spawned this game) say on their website, it also defies logical explanation. We’re just going to throw out some of the hilarious things you might end up doing on this crazy journey we call life… er, Furt.

• - “If you’re male, speak only in a high falsetto while on this hot spot. If you’re female, practice your deep bass voice.” [Funniest implementation of this rule: Marvin.]
• - “You. Are. A. Robot.” ["Boo boo bee boo boo bee booo beep." Yes, that is how robots        speak.]
• - “Keep a straight face while your opponents verbally assault you with one or two funny words at a time.” [Kind of ridiculous when some people (ahem.. Matea) can't even keep a straight face before the assault begins.]
• - “THE VOLCANO HAS SPOKEN! And it says that corn nuts are not actually real nuts. Just so you know.” [Dangit.]
• - “Choose one other player. You must spell aloud the last word of everything they say in regulation spelling bee format.” [Cue complex science words.]

This week’s Magic Morphologist, Tammy Glynn, is one of the few Morphologists we’ve met in person (…besides our friends and parents…) …and, oh, what fun it was! Tammy and family joined us at Marbles: The Brain Store to play Life Size Morphology, and then again at the Chicago Toy and Game Fair a few weeks later.  Don’t let Tammy tell you otherwise: she and her family are born Morphologists. Even the dog. (Seriously–she steals pieces and hides them in her crate.) Come on, join in the joy–meet Magic Morphologist Tammy Glynn! 

Morphology Games: If you could give a copy of Morphology or Morphology Junior to anyone in the world, who (and which game) would it be?
Tammy Glynn: Morphology Junior… to every kid that has ever said, “I’m bored.”

MG: Fill in the blank: Morphology is…
TG:  …creativity waiting to be made.

MG: What do Morphology and life have in common?
TG: Sometimes you just have to take a step back and take a new look.

MG: What do you like about Morphology?
TG: I love that the whole family can play together. Morphology, believe it or not, is a challenging game for me. I am severly left brained, so this is a good work out for my mind.

MG: Why are you a Magic Morphologist?
TG: Far from it… but working towards it [almost] every day!

Check out this Morphology creation commissioned by Tammy herself! Can you guess what it is? Check our Facebook page for the answer–and for the rest of Tammy’s guessing game words!

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One thing we love about featuring Magic Morphologists is that they give us five brand-new, super-creative words to build for the daily guessing game on Facebook. This week’s set from Magic Morphologist Mike is no exception. Mike’s Morphology guessing games are a whole different ball game; we’re hoping we stepped up to the challenge. Meet Mike: Resident of Vacaville, CA, worker in an “awesome retirement community”, newly-hitched, game- and puzzle-lover and cat- and wine-lover (are those all related?)… and Magic Morphologist! 

Morphology Games: If you could give a copy of Morphology or Morphology Junior to anyone in the world, who (and which game) would it be?
Mike:  I’d give a copy of Morphology to my parents for their beach house in Florida. It’d be a fun game for groups to play together, and they always have lots of guests coming and going.

MG: Fill in the blank: Morphology…
M: …fosters creativity and is lots of fun!

MG: What is your favorite Morphology piece? Why?
M: It would probably have to be the glass beads. I’m always attracted to shiny things.

MG: What do Morphology and life have in common?
M: They both imitate art, and in Morphology’s case can create art!

MG: What do you like about Morphology?
M: I love that you have to think in order to participate, I love that it can challenge you. I love that there is usually more than one way to look at the scene that’s been created.

MG: Why are you a Magic Morphologist?
M: Well, I must confess I don’t own a copy of Morphology myself. I have fun trying to guess at what you guys come up with each month or so, and I keep crossing my fingers and toes hoping to win a copy, makes it fun!

MG: Anything else you’d like to share?
M: Team Edward!!!

Can you guess what this creation is? It’s one of the words requested by Magic Morphologist Mike! Check our Facebook page for the answer–and for the rest of Mike’s guessing game words!

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Morphology Games: If you could give a copy of Morphology or Morphology Junior to anyone in the world, who would it be? Why?
Jeanette: I would give it to my 5 year old niece because she is having trouble with her speech & other issues in school. I really think games like this help out kids with learning disabilities.

MG: Fill in the blank: Morphology is (BLANK).
J: Morphology is… a crazy fun ride on a roller coaster.

MG: What is your favorite Morphology piece?
J: My favorite piece is the little person! Woot!

MG: What do you like about Morphology?
J: I like how Morphology can bring the whole family together, and it is not boring if you play it over and over again like Candy Land. What is there not to like?

MG: Why are you a Magic Morphologist?
J: Because I am super awesome, and usually get the guessing games right. I love Morphology & wish I could share it with the world.

MG: What do Morphology and life have in common?
J: Life is one big guessing game after another just like Morphology.

MG: Anything else you’d like to share?
J: I love what you have done with this game, and hope that one day every house hold has a Morphology game in their game closet.

Check out this Morphology creation–it’s one of the words that Jeanette commissioned! Can you guess what it is? Check our Facebook page for the answer–and the rest of Jeanette’s words!

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Last Friday we played Array, Cubu and Spectrix, a colorful line of games from Funnybone Toys. (“Three games?!?!?” Don’t judge us. It was a long week.) Here’s how our brains felt before we played:

(I’m adorable and ready to go.)

Here’s how they felt afterwards:


(So…. sweaty…)

Meet the brain-drainers:

ARRAY: The simplest of the three games, Array is a bit like a colorful version of dominoes. Players race to get rid of their cards by creating (you guessed it) “arrays” of colorful cards. There also some  ”splattering”, “slamming”, “splicing” and “slicing”  involved. (We would have tolerated a break from the alliteration in the case of “splicing” and “slicing”, but we understand the allure.)

 
CUBU: There’s a simple concept at the heart of games like “Speed” or “B.S.”: playing “up” or “down” from the number on top of the discard pile. CUBU takes that concept, ties it up in a really confusing knot and then asks you to untangle it. You’re trying to get rid of your cards by playing them in sequence based on the position of a particular colored box relative to the boxes around it.

[If you made it through that sentence with your interest intact, here's an example sequence of red boxes from "1" (the innermost spot) to "6" (outermost of 6 boxes)[L to R, both rows]:

It’s pretty much impossible to differentiate between the colors without having the cards right in front of your nose, so maybe just take our word on this game. Even if you do “get it”, try playing as quickly as you can. Your brain might explode and splatter the room with boxes of different sizes and colors. (Granted, that would probably look really cool.)]

SPECTRIX: If you tried to play Rummy in the paint section of Home Depot, it might look something like this. Spectrix asks players to place their cards into color matches or color sequences to be the first to get rid of their cards; sets of three or more are placed on the table for anyone’s use (you can add or rearrange). Given that we’ve played Rummy a good 100 times (at least) between the three of us, we expected to breeze through this game. Not so. We came up with a lot of hypotheses about why this color “wheel” rectangle was so hard for us to follow (the most feasible one being that we are all fully colorblind).

Kate: The array of options made my spectrix feel very cubu.

Matea: Like me, these games know what it’s like to be pretty and misunderstood.

Jocelyn: I think this was the clearest part of any of the directions:

The verdict: Funnybone Toys has come up with three visually captivating games (particularly in the form of Cubu and Array). They also did what they set out to do: they gave our brains a workout. Our major complaint was that the instructions functioned less like brain warm-ups and more like parts of the hard work (we ended up asking ourselves a lot of questions about the rules that didn’t have clear answers). That being said, we got through three successfully silly games with minimal accidental-cheating–and lots of successful slams, splices, sequences and spectrixes. (Spectrices?)

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Morphology Games: Fill in the blank: Morphology is (BLANK).
Kristin: A great game for all those different gaming groups in my life.

MG: What is your favorite Morphology piece? Why?
K: Green Fuzz Ball… ’cause it is green and fuzzy! [Note: this piece comes in our Expansion Pack. Check it out.]

MG: What do Morphology and life have in common?
K: Funny! Random! Exciting!

MG: What do you like about Morphology?
K: Fun and easy to play with family group or gamer geek friends or wordy nerd friends.

MG: How did you learn about Morphology Games?
K: Facebook!

MG: If you could give a copy of Morphology or Morphology Junior to anyone in the world, who (and which game) would it be? Why?
K: I would give Morphology to my dear friends and their 4 amazing kids, Ainsley, Brielle, Camden, & Daelyn. We have been gaming for years and the kids are now learning to game with us and would totally love Morphology!

MG: Why are you a Magic Morphologist?
K: I don’t know….maybe….that could be fun….is it secret? is it safe?

Check out the Morphology creation below–it’s one of the words that Kristin commissioned for the guessing games during her Magic Morphologist week. Can you guess what it is? Check our Facebook page. We’ll post the answer to this guessing game (and the rest) over the next five days!

P.S. Kristin really is a Magic Morphologist. Look at the new piece she magically added to her Morphology toolkit! Can you guess what word Hubbard the kitty is trying to convey?

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We’re seeking qualified Morphologists for an important mission: to get our games into as many hands as possible. All it takes is passion for the game and a desire to share with your friends. For every game you sell, you’ll earn discounts on Morphology Games products and other prizes!

Check out the full details here.

We can’t wait to play with you!
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Finally, a fun, intuitive and portable way to answer the age-old question: Pirates, or Ninjas?(If you’ve never asked yourself this question, you might not be a ten-year-old boy.)Those weren’t just throwaway adjectives:

Pirates Vs. Ninjas is fun. Loud dice rolling, exciting weapons (ever heard of a Shuriken?), epic attacks and rallies… what more could we ask for in a combat game?

Pirates Vs. Ninjas is intuitive. The rules are logical and easy-to-master. There are six different weapons ranks at your disposal in your “quest for world domination” (yes–the stakes are high); higher-ranked weapons (like Dragons and Sea Monsters) can take out lower-ranked weapons (like Cannons and Shurikens). We won’t get into too many gameplay specifics here, but there’s a nice blend of strategy and luck involved. (Presumably this mirrors the reality of Pirate vs. Ninja warfare as researched by the folks at AB Games.)

Pirates Vs. Ninjas is portable. All you need to play PvN is the 18 dice provided and the Rank sheets (until you memorize them). The practicality of two interlocking dice-rolling-cups means you can carry on legendary duels practically anywhere!

Matea: Why are Pirates so loud?
Jocelyn: They just arrrgh!
Marvin: Given that the future of the world is on the line, I’m going with the guys who can turn invisible and walk on water.

The Verdict: Pirates Vs. Ninjas is great for a quick thrill; even first-timers can jump right into a speedy battle for their legendary figures-of-choice. We hope to get our hands on the other challengers set, Army Vs. Aliens, for more permutations of interesting match-ups and alliances… Ninja and Pirates vs. Army and Aliens? Those are teams we’d like to see.