Au Francaise! Bananagrams in Paris!
Our beloved Bananagrams, the word game we all know and love here in the United States, has arrived in France. For the early-adopting but late-to-this-particular-game French, who have been waiting anxiously for the game to finally set sail across the Atlantic, the glorious day has arrived. Je’arrive! or something like that.
Second only to inscrutable philosophy, the French love for word and letter games is nonpareil. You would think they’d invented language the way these lusty logophiles bend their minds to master the letterplay in a good Banangrams game. And third only to their love for word games is theFrench love for a good party. We all know how much trouble they tend to get it when the Champagne starts flowijg, no? Wink wink. (I have no idea what I’m talking about). What better way to enjoy Bananagrams then than at a small get together. I can just picture the fun.
What makes Banangrams so dadblasted fun for families is that adults can easily play against kids without worrying that their age or educational advantages will spoil the fun. It’s easy to level the playing field by adding handicaps for adults (adding more letters to the growups’ stash in the beginning, and/or grownups draw two letters when kids draw only one, or by requiring adults to spell only certain objects, such as fruits, or behicles, proper names, or words with a minimum of 4 or 5 letters, etc. You get the idea. It’s easy to make up your own devices to make the older players’ lives miserable.
So what took so long for the the game to get to France? You see, Banangrams started out in 2006 as a small family company, sans the global marketing reach and monstrous budget of the larger game companies. And it was only after several years of the game’s increasing success that the family saw that the demand beyond United States shores could be met successfully. As the company expanded, and its distributing network grew more efficient, the possibility of international expansion slowly became a possibility.
So! In case you’re bouncing around France and forgot your bananagrams at home State-side, just pop into any local toy store: Bananagrams can be found at most major toy retailers in France.
What Makes Bananagrams So Popular?
When it comes to spending quality time with the family, many people are going back in time to the days where families sat around the table and enjoyed a good board game. There are so many great games on the market now that it can be hard to choose the best one. Bananagrams, a word game that is very similar to Scrabble, has been a very popular word game for the last few years for a couple of important reasons.
First of all, Bananagrams is quite inexpensive when compared with other games. Instead of paying $30, $40 or even more for a board game with a bunch of parts and pieces, Bananagrams can be purchased for less than $15 and comes in an easy to carry banana-shaped case. There are 144 letter tiles and that’s it- no cards, dice or other pieces that could be easily lost.
Secondly, the game is easy to play no matter what age range the family members are. Even if you have young kids, everyone can still join in on the phone at their own level. While the 5 year old spells their sight words, the older kids can spell harder words. Everyone is challenged at their own level.
The Rules
The concept of the game is simple: You build your own crossword puzzle as fast as you can trying to use up all of your letters. Of course, there are other rules for the game which will involve you choosing more tiles from the center of the table. The object is to be the last person with no tiles left.
So portable!
Because there is no game board to worry about, you can take Bananagrams with you anywhere. It would be a great game to play on vacation when you are sitting in a hotel room looking for something fun to do. It’s also a fantastic learning opportunity for kids. For instance, make it a race using the 144 tiles and have the kids spell out their spelling words for the week.
But wait! There’s more! Bananagrams is even great for young kids!
The game is recommended for ages 7 and up, but anyone can play as long as they can spell at least smaller words. There are also a few Bananagrams accessories that you can purchase including the double Bananagrams set which has 2 complete sets. There is also Bananagrams Jumbo which has double the amount of tiles (288).
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