Richard Hearn on board games depicting life

The Boy loves creatures. He’s not that keen on heights. Which makes his embracing of the philosophy of Snakes and Ladders: snakes equals bad, ladders equals good – all that more surprising. I recently played Snakes and Ladders with him and Youngest™ and I don’t know whether I’d had too much coffee but the game seemed to be Life and Life, this game. (And I don’t think it was originally based on life, unless it was invented by someone who lived opposite a retail park with Pets At Home next to Wickes.)

“Even if you had a strong ability to throw a six, you could still get your comeuppance”

The reason I felt, in my ‘moment of clarity’ that Snakes and Ladders was Life, was the total chance of it, the fact that you were always on shaky ground, and the fact that even if you had a strong ability to throw a six, you could still get your comeuppance. The fact that life sometimes feels like sliding down the very same snake ad infinitum. Especially when there’s someone, in this case, Youngest™, who provides a running commentary that ‘you losing’. This was after every turn. If that last one is not a metaphor for life’s ready critics, I don’t know what is.

Continuing the game theme, The Boy has recently got into Chess. Again, maybe I’m seeing insights that aren’t actually there (or maybe I’ve simply got a column to write with a theme to grab hold of) but Chess, too, is shining a torch on my very existence. I’m trying to impart my own wisdom but realise I’m recommending caution. The Boy, with a tuneful flourish is going gung-ho with his horses – as we call them – but somehow creating a speeded up, exciting game. He is the most emotional of players, the John McEnroe of chess. Who’s to say he’s not got the right idea, and with just a little bit of tweaking, his adventurous tactics will be a better answer than mine? Perhaps I’m trying to turn him from a bad into an average chess player, and, like his horses, he will make the leap over me into greatness?

Finally, Dominos, a game that’s been a favourite for a while. Our ones are animal Dominos: cow, chicken, duck, sheep, pig and rabbit. (We’ve made a rule that double-pig starts. I want this to be used if it makes it into the Olympics.) I’m not sure that I’ve had any ‘moment of clarity’ with these Dominos, I don’t see life reflected in its pieces. The only thing that it might represent is what I think the designer was subliminally affected by. The difficult decision that is Sunday lunch. Apart from the rabbit, of course. That would be ridiculous.

Illustration: Paul Lewis www.pointlessrhino.com