CooCoo the Rocking Clown looks like a game you’d want to buy for your preschoolers. Which, of course, you most definitely would. It’s colorful. It’s wooden. It’s self explanatory. But what you might not discover until you manage to get it away from the kids is how much fun you could have with it, too. With the whole family, or all by yourself, without the kids, or with your friends at your next game night.
CooCoo comes with 24 wooden cylinders. There are 4 different colors. Each set of colors comes with one large cylinder, two smaller, and three smaller than that. There is no significance assigned to color or size, except, of course, that the larger cylinders weigh more, and can consequently have more impact on CooCoo’s balance.
You can play any way you want. Just place as many cylinders as you can without making CooCoo drop anything. Generally, when playing with a group, the idea is to put any cylinder anywhere you want, as long as all the cylinders stay on CooCoo when your turn is over. CooCoo’s feet are curved like a rocker. The curve isn’t as smooth as you think, so it’s possible to make CooCoo lean a little more or a little longer than you think she should.
CooCoo is recommended for kids 3 and over. Younger kids can play with it too, they just might not be able to get CooCoo to hold as many cylinders, or remember to put everything back into the box when they’re finished playing. As kids get a little older, they can use CooCoo the way they’d use any other building toy. By the time they’re school age, they’ll have the dexterity and conceptual skills to get CooCoo to hold all the cylinders.
As they get older, they’ll probably try, not only to see if they can get to hold ALL the cylinders, but also to see if they can make CooCoo lean. They’ll play cooperatively. Maybe they’ll try together to see how high they can build all the cylinders. They’ll play competitively. They’ll make up rules, so that a player who makes CooCoo drop a cylinder or more gets a negative point for every cylinder dropped. Maybe some colors and sizes are worth more. Maybe you can only use CooCoo’s head and arms.
Or, maybe they’ll make it the goal to see if it’s possible to get CooCoo to drop all the cylinders without falling completely over, or, on the other hand, maybe it’ll be a more interesting challenge to try to make CooCoo fall over, too.
These are the things that make CooCoo such a good party game. You can make your own rules. You can make it as difficult or as silly as you want. You can get a bunch of people to play. And, because the game is so dramatic, and attractive, you can get a bigger bunch of people to cheer you on.
CooCoo the Rocking Clown was designed by Thierry Denoual, and published by Blue Orange Games. Even if you don’t have children yet, CooCoo’s an investment in fun.