This copy of Crokinole was kindly received from the Spanish games retailer laPCra
The Beginning
It was during my evening with Steve Berger at his Sevenoaks and Tunbridge Association of Gamers STAG that I first heard about Crokinole, a game he mentioned as popular with his family. Not surprisingly, for me at least, I had a quick look at it on BoardGameGeek (BGG), read some reviews and looked at some photo’s. It looked interesting and very different from any of my existing games so I duly added it to my BGG Wish List, as a way of not forgetting the idea.
Given its cost let alone let alone its size (28 ½” diameter) this was quickly dismissed from my Essen shopping list and I thought no more about it, until…
I received a mail from Brett Gilbert a fellow member of the UK Gaming Media Network (with his own blog Brett Spiel ) saying he had won a Spanish prize for one of his games, Oracle Pathway which has since been picked up for publication by one of the French games publishers, Asmodee, and that given the work that Imagination Gaming do he was willing to share it with us. This very generous offer allowed the northern / core element of Imagination Gaming to acquire a number of extensions to Pitch Car whilst its southern outpost received a copy of Crokinole.
The Game Arrives
When the big day and the large package arrived imagine how disappointed I was to discover that the board was coming apart and poorly finished:
A. The outer board was screwed to the inner board from its underside but most of the screws had come loose and were moving freely in their holes;
B. The fibre board outer board although screwed to the inner board had no felt backing to protect what ever table / surface it would be placed on;
C. The central well cap came away in my hand;
D. Some of the 8 central wooden pegs fitted their holes whilst others would only go part of the way in;
F. The box that holds the playing pieces was nicely finished except that it’s cloth insert was loose and larger than the space it was supposed to cover and the holes to be used for the scoring pegs were so small the wooden scoring pegs would never fit them.
The Game Is Fixed
Anybody who knows me knows how useless I am when it comes to any form of DIY / game repair so the imminent arrival of my brother-in-laws for a weekend indicated it was time to start thinking about fixing Crokinole.
Phase 1 meant:
1. The purchase of wide short counter sunk wood screws from local specialist;
2. Ordering Crokinole Tubing Assembly Kit or equivalent components from local DIY store;
3. Order cribbage pegs to use for the scoring board (we could obviously have just increased the size of the holes on the scoring board but that wouldn't have been nearly as much fun);
4. Ambushing one brother-in-law!
Phase 2 (with said brother-in-law in charge of proceedings) meant:
1. Marking the boards in such a way as to realign them when ready to bring them back together (the outer and inner boards were only partially secured by the original screws);
2. Remove remaining screws and drill new counter sunk holes to accommodate our newly acquired screws;
3. Scratch both sides of the boards (and the central well cap) where they sit against each other in order to give the glue a better surface with which to bond;
4. Apply “No More Nails” to the surface area then re-align the boards and screw them together;
5. Glue the central well cap in place;
6. Apply some form of felt backing to the outer game board to protect both the board and any surface on which it will sit;
7. Go and make coffee and come back later in the day;
8. Polish the central playing board and the player disks;
9. Cut 8 lengths of ½” rubber tubing and screw them onto the central board in place of the wooden pegs;
10. Drill 6 additional holes on the scoring board. 4 at one end of the run of holes to act as place holders for the two pegs and 2 at the other end to denote a score of 50;
11. Job done, now we can play the game!
Playing The Game
1. The purchase of wide short counter sunk wood screws from local specialist;
Phase 2 (with said brother-in-law in charge of proceedings) meant:
1. Marking the boards in such a way as to realign them when ready to bring them back together (the outer and inner boards were only partially secured by the original screws);
8. Polish the central playing board and the player disks;
Playing The Game
Played as a 2 player game each player has 12 wooden disks. Players take turns flicking their disks, using thumb and forefinger, onto the circular playing board. The disk can be placed anywhere along their starting line (the outer quadrant line opposite their opponent) with not more than half of the disk over this line. If an opponent’s disk or disks are already on the board then the disk you flick must touch one of them either directly or if you also have disks on the board by knocking one of them against one of your opponent’s disks. Should your disk and any of those of your colour it touches fail to touch an opponent’s disks then your new disk and any of yours it touched are removed from play!
If however there are none of your opponent’s disks on the board then your disk must come to rest touching or within the 15 point ring. The Crokinole board has 4 scoring zones, the central well worth 20 (disks making it into this are immediately removed and placed to one side to be scored at the end of the round), the central circle, worth 15 points, the middle ring, worth 10, and the outer ring, worth 5. When all the disks have been played the players count up their points and the winner scores the difference between the two – Crokinole is a game played over a number of rounds, the winner being the first to a 100.
The game can also accommodate 4 players where each player has 6 disks and players work in two teams or for 3 players there are two alternatives: 1 player takes 12 disks and plays against the other two both of whom have 6 disks or alternatively you buy another set of disks in a third colour and everybody plays against each other.
What We Think Of The Game
Crokinole is lively, fun and requires a degree of skill that will reward practice. As a game it can be played in 10 to 15 minutes and by most ages. With the physical nature of the game it makes an excellent family game with the only issues (ignoring all those mentioned earlier!) being:
1. Its sheer size, plus understandably the instruction stating it should be stored flat and with nothing on top of it, could make it difficult to store;
2. Price, this is obviously not a cheep game.
3. I feel it player best as a two player, although we didn't try either of the 3 player options. The four player is fun but seemed to be more chaotic with disks flying everywhere.
All that said I feel it to be an excellent addition to the collection that will prove its worth over time in particular when working with non gaming groups, care homes and in community settings.
Postscript
If you are interested in investigating this little known game than:
A: Check out the following retailers for some stunning and very different boards available in the UK, mainland Europe and North America:
- Jaques of London (based just down the road in Edenbridge)
- Willard
- Hilinski Brothers
- Muzzies' Country Lane Woodshop
- Mr. Crokinole
- Ferti
C. Note that at the time of publishing this post the Mayday Games web site is stating "has discontinued its prior crokinole boards and has a new and improved board "
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