Catan: Junior product reviews

Almost six years ago, my brother decided to gift a copy of this to me, for my birthday, the thought being that I could play it with my then six year old. At the time, I wasn't hugely into family board game time (I blame my ex for this) and even if I had, we were still playing the generic Hasbro games. Catan Junior, is, as the name suggests, an easier version of the Catan range of games that have been popular since they came out and have spawned many versions (including a Star Trek one). The premise is simple, you want to be the first to build all of your hideouts.

The game is quick and easy to set up, everything is made nice and clear for all to follow and the rules are so simple they are just on one double-sided page. Each turn, you roll a dice, which determines who gets how many of what resource, the more hideouts you have on that number, the more of that item you get. Everyone also gets a handy little card which shows nice and clearly, what you need to build what or use to get a parrot card, which can help you out. There is the chance to make life harder for your opponents in the form of the ghost captain, this encourages a bit of strategy from the kids.

At the time, I didn't expect it to go far with Mr6 but he got the gist of it so quickly and beat me the very first three times we played it (and no, I did not let him win). It took a year or so for my middle child to get into it, my youngest hasn't been bothered with it yet. What's good though, is that here we are six years later and it has stood the test of time and multiple plays really well and even though my older two could easily shift up to Catan, they still enjoy the fun pay this provides. It's also worth noting that it is doubly easy to switch between 2 players to 3-4 players, simply by flipping over the board.

Easy to learn, hours of fun, I'd recommend this even if you never plan on playing Catan.