This post was written by Jon Beall, who contacted us requesting to write some thoughts on Dixit Journey.
This is an impression of what it is like to play Dixit Journey with 3 expansions. By way of explanation, I rarely play games 3 times in the past.
I have 3 kids under 10, and my 10 year old can render no colour, and he is legally blind. As a result, there are certain games we play a lot. Dixit is one. We have played it a lot and by a lot I mean 40 times. (This is far from 3!)
E likes games but due to him having Blue Cone Monochromacy (https://www.blueconemonochromacy.org/blueconemonochromacy/) he prefers art he can pick up and look close at. He likes the art. He likes Dixit because the art is unexpected. He loves art, graphic novels, drawing, and playing chess. (I wrote a column on chess, called “The Sacrifice Necessary to Win”.) All of this has to do with art. (chess is art in my opinion).
He often wins at Dixit. You get points if someone guesses your card, or if it was your turn and no one guessed the winning picture. The only people that occasionally beat him are his parents. I wrote a column in the past called “Losing at Boardgames” because Kim beats me so much at games.
My 6 year old states that they like the art in Dixit, and they like that our 4 year old tells them what cards they selected. He also likes it because our whole family is involved. He states that dad (that’s me) plays silly cards (it is because we have played it so many times). The 6 year old likes to trick people. Perhaps that is because he knows his brother can’t see, although he doesn’t articulate that.
Any version of Dixit will get monotonous without expansions. We have 3, although the expansions we have are out of print though others are not. Expansions are needed, especially in repeated plays. (We have 3 kids, which is not why we have 3 expansions.
This is needed whether your base game is Dixit, or Dixit Journey. Our base game happens to be Dixit Journey. You need a scoring track, tokens, and rabbits which are used for scoring. We lost a rabbit, and so we use a plastic dinosaur instead. The plastic bunnies are not important, just add a little extra to how the game looks on the table.
I will be writing about board games as a dad. I will particularly note if my son can see the colors on the game. For instance, red and black look identical to him. As an example, I introduced him to a fine game where all of the pieces were red and black. He couldn’t see the pieces. This is primarily the reason that Connect Four is Yellow and Black, instead of Red and Black, as it was when I was a kid. I will write about board games as someone who has OCD and Asperger’s but who loves board games. My eldest son has BCM. My middle son has sensory issues. Dixit is the rare game that is good for all of us. These tokens can be replaced, but not easily. Think of these more like “Balderdash” and less like “Scattegories”.
I love board games, writing about board games, and introducing my kids to board games.
(Contact me at jonbeallcopywriter@gmail.com, or find me on Linked In.)
