It’s been raining for hours and the ground is starting to get soggy! Noah needs help getting all of the animals into the ark for shelter. But first you’ll have to help them find their suitcases! Can you match all of the animals and get them into the ark before they get complete soaked?
How Do You Play Critter Cruise?
Critter Cruise is a memory game where you are trying to match each animal with their suitcase. Matched animals get to go onto the boat.
On your turn, you have the option of moving the character Noah either one space forward or backward on the path or you can leave him where he is. Whichever animal he is standing next to is the animal you are trying to match with a suitcase on that turn. If you are successful, you can lead the animal up the ramp and onto the boat. If not, you flip the suitcase back over and the animal stays on the path.
The suitcase tiles are scattered on the table. Hidden among them are suitcases showing water spots. If you flip over a tile with water spots, you turn over path tiles to their water side equal to the number of water droplets that are shown.
The game ends in a victory when either all animals have entered the boat. The game ends in a loss if all the path tiles have been flipped to their water side.
What Do We Think?
Critter Cruise has been a hit with our three oldest boys. I love that they can get this game out entirely on their own and play start to finish. The clever use of the box to make the ark really adds to the overall look of the game on the table too! And of course, who doesn’t love those classic wooden HABA animals?!
The theme of Critter Cruise is the biblical story of Noah’s Ark. There aren’t very many modern games like this for children with religious themes, so it’s a great option for parents that may be looking to add to their children’s biblical library outside of books.
One type of game I think all kids need to have is at least one or two great memory games. Critter Cruise is an excellent choice for those looking for a more classic feeling memory game with a bit more of a modern twist to it.
Skillful Memory Building
Something that I really like about Critter Cruise is how kids aren’t just able to make matches wherever they’d like. They are limited to which animal Noah is beside. With only the ability to move Noah one space forward or backwards on the line of animals waiting to get into the ark, they have make some decisions about which direction they want to move Noah.
If my kids flip over the suit case belonging to the elephant, but the elephant is 5 animals away from where Noah is, they won’t be able to just simply make that match on their next turn. They’ll have to work towards the goal of getting to the elephant one space at a time. What kids will learn though, is that rather than having a single goal of getting one particular animal onto the boat, they’ll want to work systematically — trying to find the suitcases of the animals they are by, while working towards the animals closet to them that they know their suitcase location.
One of the drawbacks of classic memory games is that there’s really nothing to prevent players from just randomly pulling tiles and hoping to make a match. While classic memory games aren’t bad, this style of play doesn’t foster the working memory growth as well as others. In Critter Cruise, because you don’t want to pull the water droplet tiles which could lead to a loss, kids think through their choices a bit more.
Great Cooperative Skill Building
When my boys play this, they tend to initially get caught up in going for their favorite animals first. Often these animals are not the same so what ends up happening in the beginning is they just move Noah back and forth, going nowhere until they learn that they have to work together.
I love this need to cooperate and work together!
For kids in the 3-5 age range, memory games can sometimes feel really punishing, especially when playing with an older sibling. It’s hard to remember where everything is and often whatever they reveal is quickly snatched up by an older player before they have the chance to make the match on their next turn.
Because of the limited movement of Noah and which matches you are able to make each turn, all players are pretty much guaranteed to make a match during the game. And since everyone is working towards the same goal, when someone makes a match, kids get to celebrate with them rather than feeling frustrated that they didn’t find it first.
Also important to note: While the box says you need two players to play, there is not reason that you can’t play this solo. My 5 year old loves to get this out for a solo game.
Summary
Critter Cruise is an adorable game for preschoolers! The cooperative nature of this memory game really encourages kids to work together and think through their decisions rather than just pulling tiles at random and hoping to make a match. Couple that with the roughly 10-15 minute game play start to finish and this is a real winner in my book. Critter Cruise gets thumbs up from me!
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A special thank you to our friends at HABA whom we worked with to capture images of Critter Cruise. As always, our thoughts and opinions are our own.
Game Info:
Title: Critter Cruise
1-4 Players Ages 3+
Designer: Antje Gleichmann
Artist: Benjamin Petzold
Publisher: HABA
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