The Presidential Game {Schoolhouse Review Crew}

One of the bonuses about being on the Crew is when we are able to review something fun, like games. Even better is when those games are also educational!

A few weeks ago, we received The Presidential Game, The Most Powerful Game in the World.

This game is played by two teams, which can be one or more persons per team. The game comes in a sturdy box, and contains: 1 20" x 30" Game Board, 1 Score Pad, 3 Blue Dice, 3 Red Dice, 80 Politics Cards, 40 "Write-Your-Own" Politics Cards, 150 Republican Votes (red chips), 150 Democrat Votes (blue chips), 1 Access Code to the Electoral WebMap Calculator.

The object of the game, of course, is to win the Presidential election by capturing at least 270 of the 538 electoral votes at the end of the game. Before the game begins, the players must determine the length of the game (in other words, the length of the campaign period), by choosing the number of "weeks" until the election.

Thirty weeks is a game that will last approximately an hour, which will give each team thirty turns. A turn consists of rolling the dice, and either Campaigning or Fundraising. Which will be done must be declared before rolling the dice.

To campaign, the team must declare ahead of time in which three states they will campaign. Then they roll the 3 dice, and decide which die corresponds to which state, and places that amount of votes on the state. One thing we found unclear: if one of the chosen states is a state that only has 4 electoral votes, and if each die is either 5 or 6, do you still go ahead and put all 5 or 6 on that state?

To fundraise, there are only 4 states from which to choose: California, New York, Florida, and Texas. Again, it must be announced ahead of time in which state they will go fundraising. This time, only 2 dice are rolled. Then the player has the option of putting all votes on the fundraising state, or at least half on that state, and the rest on other states. The team also draws one of the Politics cards, then must do whatever they are instructed on the card.

We tended to play our teams, Jen and Little Bit on one team, Botanist Boy and I on the other team. We never managed to get hubby or Tim to play along. We also learned there is a bit of a learning curve, especially in the beginning. We certainly are learning more about elections, electoral votes, and why the electoral votes are divided up the way they are.

We just returned home from vacation to Florida. We took the game with us, because the boys planned to spend a couple days with their best buds. They were to take the game with them so they could play it with their friends, but the little rascals conveniently (on purpose?) left it in the trunk of our car when they transferred their stuff to our friends' vehicle.

This game is designed for ages 11 and up, so it fits well for our family. Still, Little Bit needs quite a bit of assistance, due to his developmental/learning delays. I think our friends would have enjoyed it as well, even though the younger one is 10. She is more developmentally mature than Little Bit, and their mom would have been there to supervise anyway.

Be sure to check out the FAQ page, for more clarification of the rules, etc. You'll also want to read what the rest of the Crew members have to say about The Presidential Game.

Cost: The Presidential Game can be purchased for $35.00.
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