Monkey has been a fan of The Gruffalo for a long time now. When we spotted some Christmas stocking fillers from University Games recently, I noticed The Gruffalo Hide and Seek Mini Game.

Monkey, who is 4 in a couple of days was intrigued to see what The Gruffalo Hide and Seek Mini Game had in store for us as soon as he saw the box.

The Gruffalo Hide and Seek Mini Game is aimed at children over the age of 3 years  and is for 2-4 players.  It’s compact, so great to take away over the Christmas holidays if you are visiting family.

The game consists of a thick play board, a spinner, 4 coloured mouse figures with plastic bases, 7 hiding character counters and 18 character cards.

To play the game you unfold the board and place the character counters upside down on each of the ‘wood’ circles on the board.  No-one should know where each character is located!  Shuffle the cards and deal 3 out to each player Gruffalo face up – each player should look at their cards without showing their hand.

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Each player puts a mouse character on the start/finish circle and you are ready to begin.

The youngest player starts, spins the spinner and moves around the board according to the number spun.  We’re doing a lot of work with number recognition at the moment, so this game has helped with that, as well as counting.  If you land on a yellow circle, play passes to the player on the left.  If you land on a tree trunk circle the player picks up the counter and quickly looks at the character before returning it to the board trunk side up.  The skill of this game is remembering where the characters are – so great to work on concentration and memory.

When you’ve discovered where your 3 characters are located and the Gruffalo, you head back to the Start/Finish Circle to make a guess.  So again, you need to remember where you spotted your characters – testing the memory.  Once back in the centre you can make your declaration and check your guesses.  If you are correct then you’ve won the game.

Monkey still needs to work on his memory skills so we’ve mostly played this game working together.  When he visited his Auntie and Uncle’s recently, he took this game with him to play as it’s so compact.

So if you’re looking for some games this Christmas don’t forget the Christmas stocking fillers from University Games.  This game has a RRP of £8.99 but is currently on special offer at Amazon for £6.00.

disclaimer: we were sent this item for the purpose of review, our comments remain our own honest opinions.