- Designed by Hans Raggan, Jurgen Grunau & Wolfgang Kramer
- Published by Rio Grande Games & Zoch Verlag
- 2-6 players aged 3-8
- About 20 minutes per game
Meeples – All of the pieces here are made to last and made very well. The tiles are a heavy cardstock that won’t bend or break under normal use. The wolverine pieces are done well, painted nicely. The wooden eggs come in various sizes and stand up to a lot of use without losing color or paint. The egg bowl is a nice piece of wood, polished well. The egg alarm is a small dowel with an egg on the end, it is a thin dowel and you will need to make sure the children are careful with it as it could break if played with roughly.
Theme – You are a wolverine (gulo) and you like to steal bird eggs to eat. One of the babies has been caught though and needs to be rescued. You have to take your wolverine through the swamp to get the baby gulo out of the vulture’s nest. As a typical gulo, you get distracted by all of the eggs along the way and tend to set off the alarm set by the swamp vultures to keep you away. The artwork on the tiles and in the game match the idea well, even if it is a bit silly, which is the point really.
Rules – The game is pretty simple. Lay out a track of face down hex tiles, save a set number for a small pile at the end in which the purple baby tile is mixed in. On your turn, you can either move to the next tile or flip over the next face down one. Then you have to pull out an egg from the nest of that color. If you knock eggs out of the nest or set of the alarm, you get scared and have to go back to the previous hex of that color. Sounds easy? Try to pull out an M&M from a polished wooden bowl without knocking over a thin, poorly balanced dowel. The kids will probably crush you as their little fingers dive in and out of the bowl quickly. Whoever gets to the baby gulo tile AND safely get the purple egg out, wins.
Game Play – This can move pretty quickly and get a lot of laughs, especially when adults have to try to grab the smaller sized eggs. After a couple of plays, the kids can handle this one without you, although if your youngest is still putting things in their mouths, keep them away from this game. One of the nice things with this one is that even if you get sent back to the start, you can still catch up by choosing a face down tile. This helps when a young player is sent far back along the trail and feels out of the game. Also, going first makes no real difference in game play and randomly choosing a starting player is a good idea.
Educational Value – The youngest ones will reinforce color matching, following directions, taking turns and other basic social skills. The older ones will start to see some of the strategy involved and think about cause and effect. If the egg alarm is very wobbly, it may be smarter to pick an easier color to avoid setting it off and being set back. They pick up on that pretty quickly.
Adaptability – There are a few ways to help the younger players play the game well. They will probably just go for whatever color they like best, so coaching there will help. You can also have them peek at the face down tiles, get two chances to get the egg by resetting the alarm or ignore any eggs that get knocked out.
Adult Fun Factor – Most of the adults that we have played this with enjoy the game for the game itself. There is a signifcant challenge for grown-up sized fingers to be able to get those eggs out of that bowl safely. Those eggs are pretty slippery and some are quite small, so as the kids pluck out the bigger ones with ease, good luck getting the others.
Hey I love the site! I have been looking for a good resource to help with younger kids games. I think I have found it. We love Gulo Gulo as well!
You took my idea again! But I got the review done before you! So, HA!!!!!!!!!!