Family Pastimes

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Family Pastimes is a boardgame publisher based out of Perth, Ontario, Canada. [1] [2] Hailed as the original "inventor" of cooperative boardgaming, [3] [4] from 1973 to 1990, it was the only publisher of exclusively cooperative games. [5]

In 1973, Jim and Ruth Deacove left their careers as high school teachers in Boissevain, Manitoba [6] to form a boardgame company focused exclusively on cooperative games with themes such as mountain climbing, harvesting a crop, building a community or exploring space while overcoming obstacles in collaboration with other players rather than against them. [7] By 1986 they were doing $200,000 of sales annually. [8] The company was started with their savings, and a $1000 loan from a friend - purchasing a printing press, paper cutter, table saw and sander. [9]

Born into a Doukhobor family, [10] [11] Deacove has also written manuals on cooperative sports and party games. [12] [13]

Harvest Time is one of their most popular boardgames, and was one of five whose license was purchased by Playtoy Industries when Deacove declined to sell the entire company. [8] Two other popular games are Zen Blocks and Community which is a Monopoly-style game. [6] Eagle Eye Agency sees players work together to solve various crimes. [14] By 1982 they had 38 games, including Sleeping Grump, [15] Beautiful Place, [15] Warp N Woof, [15] Space Future, [15] [16] Pin N Ball, [15] Max the Cat, [17] Caves and Claws, [17] Mountaineering, [17] and Amazing Illusions. [1]

Lynn Johnston, the creator of For Better or For Worse comics wrote enthusiastically about the games, which were advertised in the New Yorker, Saturday Night and Psychology Today [8] Dr. Terry Orlick, who wrote about the role of cooperation in sports and game psychology, also applauded the Family Pastimes innovative games which were also featured in the Canadian Toy Testing Council's 1983 recommendations for parents. [8] [4]

References

  1. 1 2 Glenn, Joshua; Larsen, Elizabeth Foy (14 October 2014). UNBORED Games: Serious Fun for Everyone. Bloomsbury Publishing USA. ISBN   978-1-63286-046-0.
  2. ↑ Haessly, Jacqueline (28 October 2011). Peacemaking: Family Activities for Justice and Peace, Vol. 2. Lulu.com. ISBN   978-1-257-94716-4.
  3. ↑ Arnaudo, Marco (15 December 2023). The Tabletop Revolution: Gaming Reimagined in the 21st Century. McFarland. ISBN   978-1-4766-5193-4.
  4. 1 2 Lyons, Suzanne (2022). Cooperative Games in Education: Building Community Without Competition, Pre-K–12. Teachers College Press. ISBN   978-0-8077-8088-6.
  5. ↑ "The Daily Gazette".
  6. 1 2 "The Leader-Post".
  7. ↑ "Games A Family Can Play Together", https://books.google.ca/books?id=jcEyAAAAIBAJ&pg=PA69
  8. 1 2 3 4 "Ottawa Citizen".
  9. ↑ "The Financial Post".
  10. ↑ https://www.spirit-wrestlers.com/excerpts/1999-Voices_Deacoves.pdf [ bare URL PDF ]
  11. ↑ https://nonkilling.org/pdf/nkbalkans.pdf [ bare URL PDF ]
  12. ↑ Luhrs, Janet (3 November 1997). The Simple Living Guide: A Sourcebook for Less Stressful, More Joyful Living. Harmony/Rodale/Convergent. ISBN   978-0-553-06796-5.
  13. ↑ Abrami, Philip C. (1995). Classroom Connections: Understanding and Using Cooperative Learning. Harcourt Brace. ISBN   978-0-7747-3370-0.
  14. ↑ "Ottawa Citizen".
  15. 1 2 3 4 5 "The Vancouver Sun".
  16. ↑ "Space Gamer".
  17. 1 2 3 Schaefer, Charles E.; Cangelosi, Donna (January 28, 2016). Essential Play Therapy Techniques: Time-tested Approaches. Guilford Publications. ISBN   978-1-4625-2449-5 – via Google Books.
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