Last updated 28/09/22

When I was young, I played a few board games. Monopoly, chess, snakes and ladders. I enjoyed playing weird guessing and word games as well.

During primary school, we played with our high bounce balls a lot. This included two square, four square, eight square, with the classic King, Queen, Jack, Dunce ordering. We also played down ball against a wall. We also played games in PE such as rounders, continuous cricket.

For ‘educational’ purposes, we also played mathletics, did Reading Eggs and Skoodle. Mathletics dressing up was the funnest thing. There used to be 5 stages including: Raging Rookie, ?, Speed Demon, Almost Einstein and Human Calculator, as well as 5 different levels of maths difficulty.

I won an iPad3 at the end of Year 4, my first electronic device (apart from TV, fridge, computers) conveniently just in time for BYOD beginning in Year 5. I would use that iPad until 1st year of uni. I had a couple of games on that iPad, including Chinese Writer, Subway Surfers and Minecraft PE. I bought the paid version of Minecraft PE towards the end of Year 5, and played on servers such as Lifeboat Skywars and Hunger Games in Year 6. I also played Plants Vs Zombies 2 on my iPad outside of school.

During primary school on school computers, I also played Fireboy and Watergirl including its many variants and Johnny Upgrade on coolmathsgames. I also loved the Google Doodle game Pacman anniversary game. I continue to play this at the Chemist today. Occasionally I’d play the Chrome Dinosaur Game when there’s no internet.

Outside of school, we also of course played UNO, Jenga and other classic physical games.

Outside of school, I would go to a friend’s house sometimes and play New Super Mario Bros Wii, Mario Kart Wii and Wii Sports. I played Super Smash Bros around 5 times but it was really boring.

During high school, we played games on unblocked websites on the computer in the morning before school, including The Impossible Game, Vex 1, Vex 2 and Vex 3. We also played two square and its variations during lunchtime. On my iPad I downloaded simple games such as Geometry Dash and Stick Hero.For a very brief period I’d play games I downloaded onto my laptop - Asphalt 8 and that disturbing bike game Happy Wheels.

Occassionally I’d also play Mahjong, contract bridge and other card games such as Cheat and Big Two. But I’ve never really been into card games.

The game I played the most after Minecraft was probably Clash Royale, which I played from Year 9 until Year 10 when my iPad could no longer run it. Tank trouble also grew in popularity, as did Head Soccer. I played The Sims Freeplay for a couple of months in the middle secondary years.

After I got Facebook, I also played Words with Friends 2 over Facebook messenger. During this period I also played James Bond at an annual New Year dinner at a friend’s house.

During Year 11, I played Just Dance a few times and once in 2022, Mario Kart Wii once during Year 11, but I don’t think I’ve played a console or computer game since before the pandemic. At the friend’s house where I played Just Dance and Mario Kart Wii I also was introduced to and fell in love with Codenames.

However, as I’ve gotten older, I have enjoyed party games such as Mafia, Werewolf, Codenames a little more.

Finally, in 2022, I started playing Wordle and Heardle daily. I play Waffle occasionally. On a retreat in June I also played Overcooked on the Switch.

On placement in Bendigo, in 2022, I was introduced to a new range of board games: Settlers of Catan and Secret Hitler, war and social deception games which required a bit more thinking, cooperation and negotiation. Then there was Photo Roulette, a fun game to see how well you know your friends and which prompted much laughter. Finally, Werewolf, run on the phone, which is a simple, one night death form of Mafia, and Spyfall, a simple all-ages game which is also about social deception and group cohesive thinking, entertained.