I think that’s why I am looking for alternatives. if I have to traipse though the gumdrop forest one more time I might have to add Candyland to my next bonfire.
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Oh, sorry. Missed the point entirely. It happens way more than you’d think.
It might sound like a nightmare, but a real easy game that my youngest absolutely loves is Spoons. Yep, the old game with a standard set of cards where you try to sneak a spoon when someone gets 4 of a kind. It’s super simple to learn with the only problem being holding 4 cards and cycling through new ones coming his way. We use a card rack for him, so he doesn’t have to hold them in his hands, and it works.
While not a huge leap over the tediousness of Candyland, I find that it is a lot more fun to play than the Hasbro standards. Something about watching him get all excited when he’s looking for that last card to make a foursome, and how excited he gets when hands start grabbing for spoons makes it more than palatable. It’s also a game where only one person “loses” each time, and it’s easy to make sure it’s not him. I don’t let him win often, but if he’s lost a few in a row, I’ll usually toss him a bone and make sure he’s not last man out.
Probably not what you’re looking for, but it’s the first thing off the top of my head. I’ll try to think of some other games we throw his way.
Aside from Candy Land, my 4 year old likes Pizza Party, Chutes and Ladders, Uno Moo, and a couple of obscure ones called The Ladybug Game and one for Hey Diddle Diddle, The Cat and the Fiddle
I do not necessarily recommend the Ladybug one. It knocks them back a lot, can get frustrating for little kids. Uno Moo is good, and the Cat and the Fiddle game is very simple and short.
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I had not seen UNO Moo…that looks neat. I recently introduced UNO to my 5yo. I took out all of the special cards to start with, so we only had color/number cards. The big learning thing here has been how to fan and hold cards…it’s a learning process for her.
We have recently added wild cards also, but just the normal kinds, not the draw 4. What’s really funny is that she really wants to use that wild card right away, because she knows it’s “special.” So learning to hold onto it has been a big deal.
Similarly to the wild card situation, my mother bought us Sequence for Kids…that’s been the big hit for the past two weeks. Having a Wild Card and a Destroy card in there has been interesting as she tries to be patient and hold them until they are really needed.
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Oh man! Someone else has Sequence for Kids! I forgot about that one, because unlike the others it is one I just play with Emma, rather than as a family. She likes to do it some mornings before the baby gets up. She has yet to grasp the higher strategy of it (and still has a hard time with the free spaces) but she seems to take to it well enough. And it got me interested in the original, which I hope to play sometime.
My mother bought the Ladybug Game for my twin sons when they were little, and I’m now trying to hide it from my youngest in hopes she never finds it (my wife won’t let me just get rid of it). I’d rather play ten games of Candy Land than one game of that nonsense.
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Bug off Mantis!
No, seriously. Please go away Mantis. And take the stupid Bully Ants with you.
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Oh, and Uno Moo is a new acquisition but has been great for letting her learn the basics. It is figures instead of cards, animals instead of numbers, and boils it down to just wilds and skips. She picked it up almost immediately.
Viva Topo and Ravensburger’s Race Through Space both use a mechanic in which you have several units you want to race, but if they fall too far behind, you lose them. So those end up giving you decisions to make about which unit to move and how much risk to take on while still being pretty simple roll-and-move games.
Giro Galoppo is a race game in which you start with six cards, and simultaneously choose which to play. Not roll-and-move, and there aren’t really turns, but it is a race game with wooden horses and riders my kids found fascinating entirely separate from the game.
None of these take very long to play, and all give at least some decisions for an adult to make so they don’t want to gouge out their brains. No reading and fun components in all, so I’d probably get whichever has the theme your kiddo finds most appealing.
This barely counts as a game, but if Dropmix, which is more a toy than game, counts, then this does, too:
I bought my son a Cozmo robot by Anki for his 5th birthday and the things is awesome. It is expressive and charming and plays some fun little games. Watching my son interact and play games with the robot and his cubes is a lot of fun.
My parents brought over some of my old games the other day, and Emma has fallen in love with Flash Match Junior, a VHS memory game from the 80s. It really is a clever setup, with simple rules and a lack of frustration.
One physical game gifted to my 3yo this Christmas that has worked well is called Hoot, Owl, Hoot. It’s a co-op game that emphasizes communication and strategizing among the players. We had three kids aged from 7 to 3 on the edge of seats if their owls would make it to the nest before the sun came up.
I will also endorse of My First Carcassonne. It simplifies the rules, but still has some strategic depth for how to place the tiles. It’s best with 3-4 players, since it makes it more likely your tile placement could help another player.
Following up on my request for sandbox-style building games, I just downloaded Pocket Build for .99. It is a pretty cool little sandbox builder with no actual “game” of any kind that I can see. The controls took my 5-year-old a bit to grasp, but he’s been building his own little medieval fiefdom ever since we downloaded it.
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I just tought my 5-year-old how to play a basic game of Santorini. The rules are easy enough that he understood how to play in about 30 seconds and even had a basic sense of strategy. He laughed maniacally every time he played a roof and blocked me from winning. I did have to throw the game to let him get a win, but Santorini is definitely a kid-friendly game.
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Pocket Build just updated and now the little people walking around will sometimes stop to smoke. I can’t fathom why this was included, but be aware if you were looking at it for your children if this is an issue with you.
Strange to see such an inclusion, given that nowadays just having someone smoke onscreen in a movie is usually enough to bump it to PG-13 at least.
I played Ghost Fighting Treasure Hunters with my 5-year-old last night and it went well. It is basically the lightest version of Pandemic you can imagine. Your task is to go in to a haunted house and carry out the treasure. You do so by rolling a die to move. Ghosts are spawned in various rooms almost every turn and as they accumulate, the chances of losing the game increase, so you need to balance your objective versus keeping the ghost outbreak in check. Fun family co-op.
My son can’t read yet and I’m starting to suspect that he may have increased difficulty with the skill for one reason or another, so I can’t yet move on to games that have any text, so even a game like Forbidden Island might be a little too much for him to handle. This one fit the bill nicely.
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My kids loved this one (Ghost Fighting Treasure Hunters), even the older ones (one of them is a freshman in high school). It was hard enough to keep them interested, but fun enough that the littler ones didn’t lose interest. We gave it away to one of their little cousins, and I kind of wish we had kept it.
Any thoughts on switch games for kids? I’ve had a scan through the thread, and most other places we talk about switch games for adults, bayonetta, breath of the wild etc.
My boys about to turn 5 and asked for an iPad, which he totally doesn’t need. Thought I might float the idea of getting him his first Nintendo, but needed to arm myself before going to the mrs with the idea. I’m sure you all know what I mean 
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My son just turned 5 and my daughter just turned 3, for reference.
They both like Mario Kart. The game is great for the kids because you can set up a bunch of assists like steering assist and auto-accelerate. I bought some little plastic wheels that the Jot-Cons snap in for them. I am a fan of racing sports and games in general so it is fun to see my kids enjoy the genre.
We also have Just Dance for the kids, but that’s probably hit or miss depending on the kid.
My son also adored watching me play Zelda and helping me with the temple puzzles.
A new Kirby game just came out that sounds as if it has a lot of AI assist, so that may be good, but I can’t say for sure.
Finally, for now, there is a Mario tennis game on the way that might be good for kids if the motion controls are well-implemented.
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