"The Biking Game" by Education Outdoors Inc. for Schwinn looks pretty good and sounds even better. The promotion on the box promises, "This game is a must have for anyone who has ever ridden, or plans to ride a bike."
Not true.
The game is a simple board layout whereby the cardboard bike tokens move along the path and either ask a question or read a Fun Fact. (Fun Fact example: "The major groupset manufacturers are Campagnolo, Shimano and SRAM for both road and mountain bikes" or "May is National Bike-to-Work Month."
It's like Candyland in that there's no real challenge for older kids or adults except for the brief, painful thrill of sliding back down to the start.
The answers to the questions can be read through the "magic" reader card, so that's something.
The path is trod by rolling this great big dice and cutting through the forest if you have the off-road tire card.
But this game needs something more; maybe little bike plastic tokens with moving tires, things to earn like helmets and water bottles, hazard cards featuring flat tires or maybe a gear complication or a couple of danger cards like a patch of weeds with tiny bullheads waiting to strike.
There are things that could be done to make this into a challenging game.
Sharon Haddock is a professional writer with more than 35 years experience, 17 at the Deseret News. Her personal blog is at sharonhaddock.blogspot.com.
Email: haddoc@deseretnews.com