In recognition and support of teachers throughout Australia, Funatical is this month, holding a very special one-off prize draw for teachers, nominated by their students, parents or teachers themselves (self-nominations are welcomed) in their community, to receive a package of Funatical educational games to use in their classroom to the value of $150. Teachers in kindergardens, pre-school, primary and secondary schools are all welcome as we have games to suit all ages.

Teachers in kindergartens, pre-school, primary and secondary schools are all welcome as we have games to suit all ages. We often meet teachers who use their own wages to purchase our games for their classrooms and students because they simply cannot get access to very limited funds that are often applied to other areas such as administration or sports rather than for learning resources and so we would like to thank these teachers with a very small token of our appreciation.

All you have to do to nominate your teacher is enter their details and answer a few questions in the Exclusive Prize Entry Form Below. Each entry(1 per person) will be entered into the prize draw.

The Winner will be announced in early November in our newsletter, on our website and on our Facebook page.

How it works

• How do I earn my reward points?

Every purchase earns you reward points. At the moment, for every $1 dollar you spend, you will earn 1 reward point towards your account. These reward points can be used for purchases of any product from this website. When your purchases are confirmed and invoiced, the aquired reward points will be approved to your account and from there you can easily use these points at the checkout for your next purchase at funatical. Funatical is also giving 10 reward points for each customer that creates an account with funatical & for each valid product review, these rewards points can be viewed in the rewards data page within your account.

• You earn a bonus 10 points when you create an account at funatical
• You earn 1 reward point for each dollar spent at funatical
• You earn 10 reward points for valid product review

• How do I earn my reward points from referrals?

Within your account, you can send a referral email to your friend and from there, you and your friend can both earn points when your friend places their first order.

• You earn a bonus 10 points when your friend places their first order
• Your friend earns a bonus 10 points they place their first order as well

• How do I use my reward points?

Simply browse our website catalouge and view our extensive range of toys, games, puzzles, art & craft products. Each product will have an points amount that you would earn when you purchase that product. Once you have finished shopping, simply navigate to the checkout and select if you would like to use your current earnt points on that purchase.

• Each product has an reward points total
• Reward points are multiplied when purchasing in quantites
• You can view how many points are usable at the checkout
• At the checkout, you can view how many reward points you will earn

• How do I access my reward point data?

When you log in to your account and navigate to your dashboard, you will be able to view your reward point stats easily. Also you can access the referral form from your account as well. There are links below as well to navigate to these specific pages.

• Each product has an reward points total
• Reward points are multiplied when purchasing in quantites
• You can view how many points are usable at the checkout
• At the checkout, you can view how many reward points you will earn

• Quick Links

These are links below as well to navigate to these specific pages. You may need to log in before navigating to these customer account pages.

• Go to my rewards points stats
• View My reward points data
• Refer a Friend

Based on your feedback we are now looking to hold our next Factory Direct sale in September 2011 so mark your diaries and we’ll be sure to get back to you when we firm up the date.

In the meantime, don’t forget to join up at our website www.funatical.com.au to receive updates on new stock arrivals (lots coming in the next couple of months) and special offers as well as other updates, including the upcoming release of our much-improved “Teachers & Parents Resource” page (coming soon but checkout our current page here) to help you select appropriate products for you.

…oh, and please share the love with your families, friends and colleagues…we will love you for it.

Cheers,

Greg & Robyn

“Educational Games” often provides a similar response, unless I am talking with a teacher or a parent of child with a learning difficulty or disability…they know all too well the value of these games to the education of their children.

But what about “Board Games”? or is that Bored Games? When used together these 2 words seem to evoke fear or at very least a distinct lack of interest from most people.

Is this because for years we were subjected to playing Monopoly for hours on end (sometimes even spanning over days), knowing early on that the lucky few to land on the more expensive streets first would invariably end up winning…or was it from playing Trivial Pursuit for what seemed an eternity, against smarter or at least older opponents and being subjected to the humiliation when the winner gloated that you only got one piece of pie…I am sure everyone has their own list of stories similar to what I experienced as a child. I too was put off board games because they were painful and rarely what I would consider FUN.

But then in my thirties, working as a Business Consultant, I found Funatical…or should I say, Funatical found me.

I couldn’t believe just how many incredible games they had…and why I hadn’t heard or seen any of them before. These were really well made, attractively packaged and great fun games and yet not only did I have no idea they existed, but nor did just about everyone I knew and almost everyone I have met since. I knew there had to be a reason and I was determined to find it, so just like Mr Remington…”I was so impressed I bought (into) the company”.

Since then I have toured the length and breadth of Australia and presented our games to retailers, parents and teachers. Almost to a person the response has been similar to mine when I first found Funatical…everyone is impressed and amazed that you can actually buy such great games in Australia. These are not the games that you grew up with (Monopoly, Scrabble, Trivial Pursuit and the like) that are repackaged and re-released year after year with a new licenced super-hero or cartoon character on the front but still pretty much unchanged since when we were kids.

No…these games are different in so many ways:

• They don’t have a complicated set of rules to learn (in fact most take a couple of minutes to learn the rules)

• They don’t have a multitude of different pieces, cards or moves

• They generally don’t take more than 10 minutes to play

• They are so much fun that one game is rarely ever enough

• They truly do teach children general life skills, thinking skills, problem-solving techniques, even simple and fine motor skills as well as specific curriculum-based skills such as ABC’s and English communication, Mathematics, Sciences, Geography, and much more.

• They truly do stimulate children to become interested in learning

• They are well made, often from environmentally responsible techniques and materials including plantation timbers or recycled/recyclable papers and cardboard.

• They most definitely are NOT on the shelves of Kmart, BigW, Target, Toyworld and the like BUT, you may well find them at your local independent toy store, educational catalogues, web-sites and other businesses who simply love the games…not just the profit margins.

What my experiences have taught me is that there seems to be a general misconception in the population at large, amongst parents and even teachers alike that games, in particular the non-electronic and non-sports variety are simply not fun enough, nor educational enough to warrant consideration as a worthwhile form of entertainment…but on the other hand, my experiences when showing OUR games has also taught me that when people do find our games, they almost invariably and instantly fall in love.

Also, why not take a look at our BrainBox, Blue Orange, Tantrix, Pentago, Abalone, Gigamic, Gen 42 games and our PhotoPearls and NABBI crafts and find out for yourself.

For first timers the Nurnberg International Toy Fair (Spielwarenmesse) really is a sight to behold with 16 large halls and more than 10 times larger than our own Toy Fair in Melbourne this coming March, it does take some time to get all the way around.

For John who has been coming for over 12 years and for me a 4^th timer, the 2011 Nurnberg Fair has been more about catching-up for a “bier” (when in Germany…) with our existing suppliers to deepen our relationships and to view, and play, all of their new offerings for 2011. With so many great brands and with so many great new offerings just from our existing suppliers, our decision to focus solely on our existing suppliers was made easy, as we have had no need to source any new brands.

This year is looking exciting with Abalone’s belated return late in 2010 and now in the stable hands of French publishers Asmodee who have decided to revamp the packaging and to expand the range to include the new and exciting game “Offboard” from the inventors of Abalone. “Offboard” is a fun, fast and challenging game for all ages and is guaranteed to surpass Abalone’s 4 million games sold.

BrainBox publishers Green Board Game have built on the incredible success of the current stable of titles including BrainBox All Around the World, Nature, Mathematics, My First Pictures and the latest best-seller Australia, with the release of 3 great new titles (World History, Olympics, My First ABC) in addition to 2 completely new ranges including the value-packed BrainBites tins in 4 great kids titles and Brain Links card games in 8 great titles including Brain Links Environment, Solar System, Chemical Reactions and more.

If you want something that will absolutely blow you away, then look no further than the latest developments from those ingenious Swedes at Photo Pearls. Come and see me at the Fair and I promise I will blow you away with their latest gems…and a lot of nice surprises for our retailers and retail customers.

Never to be outdone, the “other Swedes” at Mindtwister have a new suite of challenging and fun mind-twisters for everyone in the family…as well as a nice new compact design for the incredibly successful and much awarded Pentago, making it an even better value offering.

And as usual Gigamic, our great friends from France, continue to surprise us with not only their continued dedication to producing quality games, but also their ability to reinvent their offer with some brilliant new games in Cubulus and Kabaleo, their new “Cube” range of games and the all new  Katamino Pocket which is a nicely packaged travel version of one of the best educational games on the market.

So make sure you keep an eye on our website www.funatical.com.au and on our future blogs and email campaigns…and for our retailers, if you are considering visiting the Melbourne Toy & Hobby Fair in March, be sure to contact Nic at sales@funatical.com.au to setup a meeting time and get ready for more fun with Funatical.

Next week I am off to the city that never sleeps for the New York International Toy Fair for an update on the latest developments in the US, so from me its…

Auf Wiedersehen!! from sunny Germany

The funny thing is, the Monopoly purchased 13 years earlier was still in its plastic wrapping. And the Scrabble had been opened but was pristine…we recalled opening it once roughly 12 years ago, before packing it up and then moving with both games about 5 times before settling in our current home 6 years ago.

As we pulled both games out of the cupboard, tossing up whether to donate them to a worthy cause…or put them back for another 13 years, we realized that because they are in the cupboard they are “out of sight, out of mind”. But then, who in their right mind would have them out on display?

Lesson learnt – Games in cupboards come out years later fully wrapped! Wasted $120, moved 5 times, still in wrapping, we bought them because everybody has them…Sound familiar? For starters they take too long to play, no way on earth I’ll go around to a friends place for an afternoon out and play Monopoly for hours or more…BUT a 10 or 15 minute game is no skin off my nose, no risk, but one thing is for sure, if it only lasts 10 to 15 minutes and it’s interesting, whether I win or lose I’m probably going to try it again.

I remember going to a friends place at Morayfield (acreage north of Brisbane) recently. Friends we see maybe once very 6 months. This night I took Pentago which I’d never played before. We “cracked open” a red wine and started playing. 15 games later we looked up, our wives were asleep on the lounge chairs with the fire crackling in the background…ahhh the serenity…so we decided on just one more game!

Pentago is a 10 – 15 minute game and sometimes can even take just 5 minutes. It wasn’t a huge investment of time at the outset yet we played for hours. Why? 1. Because we were prepared to give it a go as it wasn’t a huge time impost; 2. It was quick and easy to learn – it has 2 rules. 3. It was a lot of fun to play. 4. Even though it was quick and easy to learn it was actually quite challenging to win (or to not lose)…especially after the first couple of attempts. 5. It’s designed by the Swedes so it looks great and takes up no space…so you can leave it out on display. A recipe for success!! To top it all off it cost just $40…Big Deal! We drank more wine (1 bottle of wine cost just as much yet within an hour it was gone! We still play Pentago today!

Pentago is not alone…Pentago Multiplayer has been designed for families and Abalone is another classic and has sold more than 4,000,000 copies. Other games that are quick to learn, great fun to play and look fantastic on display (because they are also wooden works of art) from French company Gigamic include Quoridor, Quarto, Quixo and Kakazu all at less than $50. And for the kids, French-American company Blue Orange specializes in colourful wood games that look great on display and are often as much fun for adults as children including Gobblet, Gobblet Gobblers, PigzUp, Chicky Boom, Pengoloo, Zimbbos, Froggy Boogie, Crazy Cheese and a new range of games for families including Sumoku, Bendominoes, Double Shutter and Yamslam, most of which are less than $40. UK game company Green Board Games has a range of “BrainBox” games that are vaguely similar yet better than Trivial Pursuit and cost just $27.50 – they include BrainBox Australia, BrainBox World, BrainBox Nature, BrainBox Maths and for the younger ones, BrainBox My First Pictures.

So remember, if you want to try the “same old same old” this Christmas and waste maybe $70 of your hard-earned cash, then please don’t let me stop you…but if you would really like something a little different, something that is not just quality materials, quality made, quality to play and looks great out on display, then take a look at any or all of these great games at www.funatical.com.au and please also tell us what you think…we love getting feedback. Positive feedback is always nice and is appreciated BUT negative feedback is even better as it helps us improve on what we do and what we sell.

And have a very Merry Christmas enjoying some quality time with your family and friends!!

Cheers,

Greg

To my surprise this year was the quietest in history as the games were opened and…while the drinks continued to flow…the challenges went out.

I brought a range of games to suit all ages (our family ranges in age from 2 to let’s just say somewhere shy of 70 but over 60), but interestingly the youngest in the family had no hesitation in challenging their older and wiser (?) relatives…and even winning from time to time.

We played Quixo….Quarto…Quoridor…Gobblet…Tantrix…Pentago…Hive…and even completed some Visual Echo 3D Jigsaws (intended for my 8-year-old niece but quickly became a group activity as so often happens when we show these jigsaws at trade shows)

This truly was the first time I had played many of these games, despite owning and working in my games importing business…and it was the first time I realized just how THESE games – unlike those that everyone knows and has hidden away in the depths of their games cupboard or wardrobe (Monopoly, Scrabble etc.) – are so quick and easy to learn and just how challenging and enjoyable they are to play over and over. The Christmas party at Mum’s finally broke up and after a few more catch-ups at various locations, we headed down the Gold Coast for the week. One of my very generous sisters who is now based in Sydney often books a few rooms for anyone (and everyone) in the family to stay at during the week-or-two-long holiday. And, no surprise, everyone made sure I brought the games again…

These days whenever I show any of our games and other products (especially Photo Pearls) to shop owners, teachers, parents and pretty much anyone else I can convince to listen for a few minutes, they always say the same things…”these are incredible games”, “I can’t believe these are available in Australia”, “…I have never seem them anywhere”

…of course this doesn’t come as a surprise because we don’t sell to Kmart, Target, BigW, Myer, Coles, Woolworths and any other monoliths you can think of. We sell these games ourselves at www.funatical.com.au and to schools and teachers and we also sell them through a multitude of small family-owned specialty games shops, baby and children’s stores, gift shops and even some licenced Post Offices and newsagencies as well as Australian Geographic stores (where you will find Brain Box Nature, Brain Box Australia, Tantrix Game Pack, Pentago, Pengoloo, Zimbbos as well as the travel versions of the wooden coffee table games Quixo, Quarto and Quoridor .

So this Christmas, if you are looking for some great gifts that nobody else you know has, that will keep you, your family and your friends entertained and interacting together, that are great fun but also great for the kids’ education, why not visit a specialty games store or our website and look for some unique products you will never see on TV, nor find in one of those department stores.

This year we also have some great new products and ranges including the very popular Brain Box games and Abalone which just arrived today and is already flying out the door this afternoon. Before disappearing off shelves 3 years ago, Abalone sold more than 3,000,000 copies and was crowned “Game of the Decade” and is now finally back. For the creative ones in the family there is also NABBI for the younger ones and Photo Pearls, one of the cleverest products I have ever seen and definitely also the best-value product on the market, for the older kids and for mums. There’s also our quality European made Jigsaws from Trefl And last but definitely not least are the Blue Orange games that are all-wood, painted in bright and safe water-based colours and are some of the best games you will ever find – the latest in this range is PigzUp which joins Gobblet Gobblers and Chicky Boom released earlier this year, Pengoloo last year’s world-wide best-selling Penguin memory game, Froggy Boogie and many more. There’s also the Blue Orange family games packaged in bright red tin boxes including Yamlsam, Double Shutter, Bendomino and also Crazy Cheese, Sumoku and Pocket Yamslam in handy travel packs.

If you can’t find something for everyone…then you are just not looking!

For the last 6 months since BrainBox Australia was released at the Australian Toy Fair in Melbourne, the phone has been ringing off the hook with customers asking us when it is coming in…WELL, YEARN NO MORE AUSTRALIA…Today after many months of development and refining we finally received our first delivery of BrainBox Australia and we are now scrambling madly to get them straight back out the door to our customers who have waited patiently (thank you all) and just in time for Christmas.

If you don’t already now the BrainBox series then you have been missing out on this incredibly popular “game in a cube”. It is a compact ten minute memory game in a unique format for as many players as you want and is perfect for home, the classroom or to take on holidays.

A player takes one of the 53 cards, studies the images and text on the card for 10 seconds (dictated by the sand/egg timer included), then hands that card to an opponent and rolls the 8-sided dice. There are 8 questions on the back side of the card and the opponent reads out the one corresponding to that rolled on the dice. If you answer correctly you keep that card and draw another from the box and repeat…if you answer incorrectly, the next player draws a card and repeats.

The trick with this game is that some of the questions relate specifically to interesting facts on the card such as “Does the State Badge (of SA) have a kangaroo on it?”, whereas others are a little more obscure, such as “What colour cap is Allan Border wearing?” and “Is the Tasmanian Devil standing on two or four legs?”. BrainBox Australia is uniquely Australian and covers the whole gamut of Aussie themes including culture, history, natural and man-made landmarks, Aussie Heroes and Legends, sporting ‘Greats’, geography and general knowledge on all the States, creepy crawlies, dangerous creatures, bushrangers, Aussie screen stars, Explorers, plants, animals, famous Aussie inventions, Hats, Cars, Wine Regions, National Parks and more. There’s even a card dedicated that most famous poem and now popular anthem “Waltzing Matilda”. You can’t get much more Aussie than that kids…

But if you are still yearning even more for those days gone by, then perhaps Squatter, the iconic Australian sheep-farming game is more up your alley. Invented by Bob Lloyd and first published in 1962, Squatter is such an icon that it is now part of the Australian National Museum’s display archives. We often hear of people (even many wanna-be’s from across the ditch…) who enjoyed playing Squatter as kids and who have searched high and low for a copy of it for their kids. There are reportedly even copies of Squatter selling on e-bay for up to $100 and yet many people don’t realize that they can buy a brand new copy of Squatter from many Toyworld stores and other specialty games stores, end even directly from our website for around $40.

So now we think we’re doing our bit to keep our unique Aussie culture alive…what about you?

View these products and more at our website  www.funatical.com.au

We are finally back in the land of the living and plan to keep you updated on the Funatical World of Games in entertaining and educating you and your friends and families.

While we see our games and crafts as FUN products for all ages, in recent times we have started to focus much more on education and the role that games (and in particular OUR games) play in educating our children. The first hurdle in this regard is to ensure the games are fun…we think we have that all squared away. Then we decided to dedicate a specific area of our website to everything educational (http://www.funatical.com.au/educational/teachers-and-parents-resources.html) for parents, teachers and our growing family of retailers. We decided we needed a specific page so parents, teachers and our retailers could checkout all of the games and crafts that are available to teach specific skills to our (collective) children, including general learning and life skills (Concentration, Memory, Problem-Solving, Creativity, Logical Reasoning and even Relaxation and more) as well as specific Curriculum-Based skills in areas such as Mathematics, Sciences, English, Study of Society & Environment (SOSE), The Arts, Languages Other Than English (LOTE).

While we are steadily working our way through the games and classifying them, we are continually updating the information on this page (and the related link pages). Our plan is to not just “point” you in the right direction (by explaining the educational attributes of a game – what games do what), but to also show you how to “use” the game in a way to teach or develop a particular skill or learning). When you visit the page and explore the menus and links, you will see that both Tantrix and Katamino have very developed manuals on their educational benefits and how to use the games (located at http://www.funatical.com.au/media/PDF/TantrixTeachersGuide1.pdf and  http://www.funatical.com.au/media/PDF/KataminoEducationValuesStudy.pdf.). And Richard Lloyd, teacher and also son of Bob Lloyd (inventor of our Aussie game “Squatter”) has put together a guide on using Squatter in education (located at http://www.funatical.com.au/media/PDF/EducationalBenefitsOfSquatter.pdf.).

You may also recall our last blog back in May http://blog.funatical.com.au/?p=246 where we talked about one of our oldest and best-known games, Gobblet which had been reviewed by the Mathematical Association of Victoria and was given the thumbs-up.

Over the coming months we will continue to expand this area of the site so that all of our games and crafts will not only be categorized but will also have guides available to assist parents, teachers and our retailers in selecting the right game/s for you and to ensure that you maximize the value of each game you purchase.

So keep an eye on our blogs and on the site for more updates…

Note: Our Teachers and Parents Resources page also has all of the rules available for you to review on screen or to print out, as well as all the international awards that our games have won…including Tantrix Match which won Australia’s Puzzle of the Year 2010. You can also watch on-screen demonstrations on many of the games from the Teachers and Parents Resources page.