Features:

  • Trusted by families worldwide - with over 50 million sold, ThinkFun is the world's leader in brain and logic games.
  • Innovative and unique – it's a fun board game for kids and adults that operates like flashlight tag in the forest; play as the Seeker (controlling a lantern) or on a team that controls the ‘shadowing’ – Forest creatures who hide from the light. The Seeker wants to freeze the shadowing, and the shadowing want to all make it to the same tree. The unique experience makes this one of the best gifts you can find for boys and girls age 8 and up.
  • What you get – Shadows in the forest has high quality components including a game board, mini lantern (with batteries included), a glow-in-the-dark die, 10 hiding places, 6 shadowing, and 6 shadowling masks. For 2-7 players aged 8 to adult.
  • Clear instructions – easy to learn with a clear, high quality instruction manual. You can start playing immediately!
  • Develops critical skills – playing Shadows in the forest helps kids develop cooperation skills and imparts a basic understanding of how lights and shadows work.
Christmas Success!

I bought this game and a group of 6 others for three nieces aged 9, 11 and 15 that I don't see more than twice a year. Shadows in the Forest was given specifically to the youngest. My husband and I celebrated early Christmas with them Thursday night Dec 20th with their parents blessings on our way through their town to spend Christmas with our daughter. After all of the presents were opened, the little one asked to play her game first before they went to bed. The game was a TOTAL HIT with ALL three of them, their mother included! Husband was the "rules reader" and teacher, and all 6 of us played this game about five times before kids reluctantly went to bed. My one initial concern when gifting this game was whether the cooperation would devolve into squabbling and unhappy people, but the game concept looked like so much fun that I bought it anyway. Not so, normally bickering siblings came together in the most wonderful and heart-warming way. The game itself is lovely. The board is pretty, and has stone paths meandering around the outside edge of the board and the nine hollows where the slotted heavy cardboard trees are placed in the set up. One player is the seeker, and closes their eyes while the other players hide their pawns behind the trees IN A TOTALLY DARK ROOM! The only light comes from an adorable little watch-battery powered plastic lantern and a glow in the dark die. The goal is for all of the pawns to collect as soon as they can behind one tree without getting caught in the lantern's light, either by the seeker, or by the honor method while moving amongst the trees. If that happens, then the entire group of pawns wins! If a pawn IS caught, then any player removes the white plastic mask that pegs into each tiny black pawn and passes it to a spot in front of the seeker. If the seeker can find all of the pawns and collect their masks while moving around the board, then the seeker wins. Discovered pawns are immediately frozen in place, but can win back their masks if another pawn can sneak back undiscovered and stay with the frozen pawn one full turn, but they usually had to stay longer to avoid the moving lantern light. Everyone loved it, including the 15 yr old who wants to work a deal with her littlest sister to take it to a future slumber party. I hear that this game is a lot like an outdoor game called freeze tag, which I never played, but I do remember playing hide and seek, where if you were caught you were out. I enjoyed the game myself because the board game graphics + the lantern light reminded me of playing outside at night in the mysterious tree-shadows out in the yard. Just the experience of watching the shadows change amongst the trees on the board was nostalgic and captivating. I think that the girls loved the game because they won together. Cooperative play is unusual for them, and they seemed to relish that as well as the exaggerated finger-pointing and stage whispers they used to communicate to herd the pawns together. You think as a seeker that YOU are clever enough to hear the pawns tap or slide along the board (you CANNOT fly them over trees), but NO, it is not so easy. As a seeker I heard clues, kept the game going for a long time and found a few pawns, but they were able to buddy-up and re-mask, but finally everyone had to go to bed, so we all called the game a draw. I'm not sure if this is a rule, but we decided to play that on the first turn each pawn had to hide behind a different tree, because we beat the seeker in two turns grouping up like that, and the girls themselves seemed to like to prolong the game play/cooperation OVER WINNING. What a great game! We all had a wonderful time, and to me it seemed especially poetic to play it yesterday (yet again) on the shortest day of the year.

Favorite family game!

Such a fun game! I know it says ages 8 and up but got this to play with my 5 year old and she loves it. We like add some light spooky sound effects turned down in the background to add a little more atmosphere to the play.

Fun and cute game! Led to a lot of whispering and pointing and also trying to confuse the light keeper

This was a lot of fun. We were confused on how to move the shadowlings but once we started the game we realized that their movement was entirely based on avoiding any of the light from the lantern. This made it very challenging to sign language to team mates about movements without giving things away to the person in control of the lantern. Basically, they roll the die and move in one direction and only change at moss covered rocks. They cover their eyes and the shadowlings [everyone else starts pointing and trying to move shadowlings] take their turn. Any light on the board blocks them. When no movements are possible, we let the light keeper role the die and move and look for frozen shadowlings. It's straightforward once you start playing and looking for light streaks. I recommend making sure you have something level and flat under it. We used a bed in a dark room and the board was somewhat uneven because of that. Lumpy blankets affect lighting! Use a flat item under the board to keep the shadows right on target!

Making the dark a little less scary.

We had so much fun! We played as a family with kids ages 3-9. Everyone had a great time.

Awesome game!

This game is very well made and unique. Our whole family loves it! (I have a 7 and 9 yr old) It does need to be fairly dark to play. We played during a thunderstorm and it was pretty exciting lol I would def recommend it!

Good family game for cooperation

We are looking forward to playing. However, upon opening the box and removing the plastic battery protector, the lantern would not work. I tried removing the batteries and even bought replacements to no avail. Can I get a replacement? **will amend stars once we are able to play** The company was great about getting a replacement sent. We played with 2 adults and 3 kids (10, 14, 15) and everyone had a lot of fun. We will take this camping too. Play in the tent with 2 people after lights out.

Fun game to play in the dark!

I have been waiting for this game to be reprinted (it's an older German game) and was very happy to be able to get a copy. The trees are nice thick cardboard and are easy to assemble. The lantern is nice and bright for a small led. We enjoyed playing the game, though it was a little hard for my five year old to understand how the nightlings move. I wasn't sure how I would feel about the nightlings compared to the gnomes from the original game, but I found them to be very cute and the removing the mask worked very well for remembering which nightlings were frozen. A clever game mechanism that I think we will enjoy this game for years to come. I do also like the upgraded coloring on the board.

Shadows in the Forest

Beautifully made, a great product. A good way to get the family off the internet.

Fun in the dark!

This reminds me of the night games we used to play as kids. This can be a pretty long game depending on who the lantern holder is and the strategy they decide to use. We take the light's impact to the creatures literally.. no matter who's turn it is. Which means, even if you are moving your creatures during your turn, they are freeze if they touch light. So the lantern person may come back to the game finding that there are creatures that have moved into the light. (definitely an honor system) we use a vertical palm to determine light path before moving anything. Few tips we've discovered: Turn the little creatures towards the trees so that the masks do not capture the lantern light when it gets close. Use a sleep mask for the lantern person, just to keep the honest, honest. We keep the lantern person in the room with us. Even if we do not move any creatures, we still whisper and pretend we move them so the lantern person thinks we did. Keep the dice close to the lantern to keep the 'glow in the dark' active. the dice can get pretty dull after a bit. Use a vertical palm to determine if there is a light line between trees prior to moving the creature. If we have a light light on our hands, we don't move them, or choose a different route. lots of fun! we played with 5,6yr olds on the creature team. It was hilarious and hard to keep them from giving away the creatures position because they'd get so intense the close the lantern got to them... I little like the game "hot and cold".

Fun Family Board Game!

We got our kids several new board games and finally got a chance to play this one. SUPER fun for the kids and my husband and I alike! Totally different than any games we own!! Fun for all ages our youngest is 4, middle 6 and oldest is almost 11—my husband and I usually play on teams with the littles. Game was pretty easy to “learn”. Good directions. The kids LOVED playing this game in the dark! We had an additional lantern we used during turns so the kids could see what was going on!

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