Trekking the National Parks and Trekking the World Review

 As I'm sure you're already aware, I'm a HUGE fan of using games for educational purposes.  And while I firmly believe that ALL games have educational value of some sort, there are definitely games that are more educational than others.  And Underdog Games definitely fall in the "more educational" category. The fabulous folks at Underdog Games were kind enough to send me two of their games for review, and let me tell you, I am BLOWN AWAY!

So let's start with the one that started it all.  The original. Trekking the National Parks. 

As soon as these games arrived, my kids were intrigued - which is EXACTLY what you want from an educational game. So we opened Trekking the National Parks to play it first.  I was so impressed with this game!  The game is fantastic.  

All though it has a lot to set up, the instructions are laid out well and easy to follow, so it was set up quickly.  The kids loved moving across the USA and picking up the tokens from the different National Parks. I loved watching my kids make decisions. They have to choose how to use their cards, where to move, etc.  We all loved the National Parks cards and the facts about each park.  We learned quite a bit!  But most importantly, we enjoyed playing! (An educational game is of no use if it's not enjoyable to play.  You can learn from a game if no one wants to play it.  But these games are educational, beautiful, AND fun!)

The day after playing Trekking the National Parks with my kids, we decided to introduce Daddy to the games.  We chose to play the other game we received, Trekking the World.  

And I have to say, as impressed as I was with their National Parks game, Trekking the World BLEW ME AWAY!  To begin with, when I opened the box, the game came with an insert to keep all the playing pieces in place. Fantastic!  This makes setup and cleanup even quicker! And I love the organization! 

Also, the colors and the art in this game are both INCREDIBLE!  So vibrant and beautiful! The illustrations on the cards are just fantastic.  And again, we learned so much!  I even learned about a few places I'd never heard of before!  Plus, I love that each continent is a different color!  This gives us a chance to discuss world geography, what continent different countries are in, etc. The kids were learning lots of stuff, but they were having fun, so they didn't even notice!  And then they got in lots of math practice at the end while they added up their points!

Final thoughts:

Underdog Games make quality games!  They're beautiful, well made, educational, and fun. These are definitely games worth owning!  And best yet, they have a new title coming out soon - Trekking through History!  I absolutely cannot wait for this game to come out!  Based on the previews shown so far, its going to be incredibly beautiful as well!  And so educational! Stay tuned!  I'm sure you'll be hearing more about this one!

I received these games, free of charge from Underdog Games, in exchange for my honest review.