As a native Oregonian, it took me a while to learn to appreciate desert beauty. The colors of this game were the first thing I came to love about the desert – the reds and oranges and the sunsets!!!
The desert truly is a “place of vast beauty: technicolor sunsets, deep canyons, trickling tributaries, and ancient pueblo cliff-dwellings,” and all of that beauty is part of playing Sonora!
Sonora has some great gameschool jumping-off-points that could easily be used to create an entire unit study as each of the four scoring zones pairs a desert landscape with a desert animal:
- Cliff Dweller/Lizard
- Canyon/Fox
- Creek Bed/Owl
- Mudcracks/Rabbit
But back to the game…each player gets 5 discs to flick. The goal is to strategically place the discs into the scoring zones to maximize points.
Each player can flick 2 discs per turn until the discs are gone, so players go around flicking 2, 2 more, and then 1.
Discs can be moved by other discs, inside the desert it’s a free-for-all!
There are some special bonus zones in the playing area (smaller circle cut-outs showing the representative animal of a different zone) that count ONLY toward the bonus zone, not the scoring zone that the bonus zone is within. Bonus zones count for double points. They’re hard to land in, but the payout is awesome!
If a player’s disc happens to land in the center hole, he gets to place it in any zone he wants. .
Each zone has a different scoring mechanism:
- Cliff-Dweller Zone: fill in hexes in various groups, completed hex-groups earn points
- Canyon Zone: outline shapes matching the value of the disc in the zone to enclose sets of unique catci
- Creek Bed Zone: build paths down the creek bed using the values on each disc, the space landed on is circled and scored
- Mudcrack Zone: cross off nodes to enclose cacti
The “Flick & Write” phases are repeated 5-7 times depending on how long you want the game to be. Each round designates a new first player to flick and score first. The player with the most points at the end of the game wins!
There are a few extras to give this game some complexity and competition. Each zone has bonus icons that allow players to get extra points in a chosen scoring zone, re-flick discs during the Flick Phase, sswap any two discs on the board, and use animals as additional values in the corresponding score zone.
This is a great math game as there are lots of different things going on in the various scoring zones. Each is calculated differently and then added up at the end.
It’s also a fun tactile/dexterity challenge so can be used as part of a unit study or as a break from regular studies. I’d use it for both at the same time, that’s why I love gameschooling!!!
The score sheets are dry erase so they can be reused an unlimited number of times.
This game has a SOLO mode too, which we always love! Sometimes you just want to play by yourself…
The bright colors and different designs in this game are so cool and such an interesting way to visually describe desert landscapes and wildlife activity. The desert-y color scheme of this game makes it all pop and really brings out the beauty of the desert!
Sonora is a great educational resource for a hands-on learning study of the desert biome and lots of fun to play anytime!
Thanks to Pandasaurus Games for sharing with us!
