Amazon are selling this different Trivial Pursuit Bet You Know It game for £12.98, rather than the full £33.99 retail price.

• Click HERE to take a look at Trivial Pursuit Bet You Know It

I haven't played Trivial Pursuit Bet You Know It version though and having read the blurb, I have to say, it looks rather fun.

There is a rather fabulous twist to this version in that you don't need to know the answers to win, you need to know what your friends know and bet they know it or bet they don't.

How cool is that!  There's nothing more infuriating than playing Triv' with a know-it-all that just speeds their way round the board, collecting wedges left right and centre, whilst you keep getting the answers wrong - well, now you can play with that person AND win as a result of their know-it-all-ness!

There are 1,800 questions and Trivial Pursuit Bet You Know It can be played with between two and six players - and whilst it says it's suitable for players aged 16 years and over, there's no reason why you can't have family teams with younger members joining in and guessing who's going to 'know it'.

Happy not needing to know the answers!

John Lewis are selling Guess Who Extra for £12.99 - so are Toys R Us (in case John Lewis run out of stock) - the next cheapest price I can find is over at Amazon for £15.99, then £17.99 at Play.

• Click HERE to take a look at Guess Who Extra

Guess Who Extra is an electronic version of the original flippy-over game.  I used to play the original version with my cousin when we were small and I loved everything about it - trying to figure out the best questions to get rid of the maximum number of people as possible before she guessed who I had.

This extra twist on Guess Who - which is why it's called 'Guess Who Extra' (genius of board game naming in action there!) - is  that it comes with sounds, a timer (to add suspense and excitement apparently) along with six different themes to play with

One of the new themes is 'animals' - so instead of asking whether your opponent's person wears a hat, you'd ask something like, "Does your animal live in water?"  then, instead of answering yes or no, they'll press the yes or no button which will make an appropriate 'CORRECT!' or ' INCORRECT!' sound.

Reivews for Guess Who Extra are great and you can collect yours in -store at, both, John Lewis and Toys R Us for free; home delivery with John Lewis is £3 and £4.95 with Toys R Us.

Thanks to tizerg at HUKD

Tesco have reduced this Trivial Pursuit Bet You Know It board game down to £14.97 from £34.97.

• Click HERE to go over to Tesco

I'm rather fond of most versions of Trivial Pursuit and have played most of them too, the only one I'm not so keen on is the Baby Boomer edition that my mum has, but then I'm not really the target age group for that one and I didn't know many of the answers.

I haven't played Trivial Pursuit Bet You Know It version though and having read the blurb, I have to say, it looks rather fun.

There is a rather fabulous twist to this version in that you don't need to know the answers to win, you need to know what your friends know and bet they know it or bet they don't.

There are 1,800 questions and Trivial Pursuit Bet You Know It can be played with between two and six players - there's a note attached to the official blurb which states that this game is  suitable for people aged 16 years and over.

Thanks to redrhino at HUKD

Now look, I've done all the Christmas present buying for my youngest, I don't need things like this Lego Champion game to tempt me into buying him any more!

• Click HERE to take a look at this Lego Champion game

My youngest loves playing with Lego, he has tons of the stuff in most of the various genres; I love playing with his Lego and we could have such fun playing the Lego Champion game but I'm going to stay strong, I'm NOT going to buy it for Christmas.

Maybe I could buy it now, as it's been reduced down to £14.99 from £24.99 (which really is too much of a bargain to let slip by), and stash it away in the cupboard and give to him for his birthday in July; I bought his first Christmas pressie back in July, so it's just a bit of a role reversal.

The Lego Champion game is for between three and eight players aged seven years and older; there are 216 puzzle pieces and the object of the game is get your micro figure around the board before anyone else.

You move ahead by performing tasks which are determined by the colour you roll on the Lego dice; each color corresponds to a particular Lego related task and in the Lego Champion game each task is based on the most familiar of all Lego pieces - the 2 x 4 rectangular block.

Thanks to spenner999 at HUKD 

Creative sets, kids games and board games always make for great Christmas presents but, with so many new ones to choose from, how do you know which ones are going to be good and which ones are going to be flops?

Paul Lamond sent me three games covering the age and gender spectrum to test out on your behalf.

Makeover Friends Craft Set - for girls aged 3+

I don't have a girl aged three plus, or know any, so I sat down, spoke ever so nicely to my five-and-a-half year old son and asked him to help me with some work - it's a good job he's up for most things that's all I can say!

The Makeover Friends Craft Set retails for £9.95 and everything you need is included in the box which opens out to become 'Rose Cottage'.  Inside are three flat dolls for you to decorate and display, along with a rug to put on the floor of your cottage, some plain paper, two patterns and a cardboard scene to colour in, some beads and various coloured strands of wool

Do you know what toy category came in third place last year at Christmas? Board games. Yup. Good, old fashioned board games OUTSOLD video games.

It isn't really a surprise. There's not usually any batteries involved for one thing. You can stash board games away in the cupboard and pull them out once a year and they still work. The graphics look good, and the game play hasn't been outmoded.

And they're a present for the whole family. OK, so conceivably is a Wii BUT a board game isn't quite so expensive. And you don't need a console. Or controllers. Or any other accessories.

So here we are, in the run up to Christmas, yet again. Blimey you'd think it happened every year! I received two board games to try out from University Games. These are games suitable for older children (and adults). The Five Second Rule (£17.99 on Amazon) and The Really Nasty Horse Racing Game (£15.99 on Amazon).

Click here to read more...

I have a slight confession to make. Now, please don't think less of me but... I have never read any of the Harry Potter books, and I have only seen one of the movies. Shocking I know, and I should probably have to give up my UK citizenship as a result. But it is true.

So when it came to playing the Harry Potter Scene It The Complete Cinematic Journey game (£17.99 at Sainsburys), I wasn't just bad. I was spectacularly awful. But in the process I learnt a lot about the Harry Potter universe, and I had a lot of fun.

I don't want to put anyone off though. This is a game that those with just a passing knowledge of the movies can still do well in. It is just that I was playing a 12 year old boy who is a lifetime Harry Potter fan, and has amazing powers of observation.

If you're not familiar with the Scene It games, the premise is fairly simple. The game comes with a DVD and you answer questions and solve puzzles based on a variety of movie clips.

I've been on the hunt for reasonably priced Scrabble for a while - I found it at Amazon for £11.99 instead of £21.99; fabulous.

• Click HERE to scrabble over to Amazon

I've written about various letter and word games here at PlayPennies - Bananagrams and Toy Story Scrabble - but I've never written about original Scrabble.

Amazing really; I've been playing Scrabble for as long as I can remember.

If you look at my Grandma and Gramps you'd see two people white-haired people in their late 80s (my Grandma will be 86 next month).  They're not old and doddery but they do look kind and gentle; they are your stereotypical mild-mannered grandparents.

Put them in front of a Scrabble board, however, and they turn into ruthless wordsmiths who will make your high hundred score look pathetic; they'll think nothing of smashing you with amazing words on triple word scores.

They taught me everything I know *grin*

I've been playing Scrabble with my kids ever since they could sort Scrabble tiles and make simple three-letter words; my eldest son is now a worthy opponent.

I found it a great way to help children with every aspect of word formation, increasing their vocabulary, helping with spellings and generally spending some quality time with them.

Adults and younger children can make up two-man teams, or you can just jump between each child as the 'letter advisor' when they get a little older and want to start trying to work out more for themselves.

Telling you about this Scrabble deal has brought back some great memories for me, I hope you make some fabulous ones of your own if you decide to play Scrabble with your own children.

Happy Scrabbling!

This Guess Who Extra game, from Hasbro, looks like lots of fun; it's on sale at Amazon for £12.99 instead of £19.99.

• Click HERE to go over to Amazon

I first remember playing the original Guess Who with my cousin, we must have been about six and seven and it was a firm favourite.

I just loved everything about it; trying to figure out the best questions to get rid of the maximum number of people as possible before she guessed who I had.

This extra twist on Guess Who - hence being called 'Guess Who Extra' (it must have taken HOURS in a boardroom to come up with that) - is the same but with the modern necessity of sounds.

Your opponent asks you a question, "Does your person wear a hat?" and instead of saying yes or no out loud...you press the yes or no button (that emit appropriate noises) to respond

There are also different sets of character cards that can be used - there's an animal set which would require a whole new set of questions to be asked, such as, "Does your animal live in water?"

If you like the original Guess Who then you'll probably like this one too.

Happy Guessing!

Amazon are currently selling Connect Four for £4.90, instead of £9.99.

• Click HERE to connect with this deal

There are only two weeks left until the end of the school year; parents across the land with young kiddies are facing the terrible prospect of having to entertain their little loved ones for at least six weeks until it's back to school time (this is where it's much easier having teenagers, they just sleep all day and then go out).

Board games were the saviour of my parental sanity when my kids were younger, especially when the school terms seemed to be shorter than the holiday times.

I loved playing Connect Four as a kid - I still like playing it now if I'm honest, there's nothing quite like a few quick-fire games with the teenagers - and would always be devestated when I missed a really obvious space I should have blocked, allowing my opponent to win.

This version of Connect Four has had some additional game play elements added to it:

• PopOut: PopOut feature helps you get 4-in-a-row by popping a checker out instead of dropping one in
• Pop 10: Start with the grid full of checkers and pop them out. If it’s part of a 4-in-a-row, you get to keep it. First to keep 10 wins
• Power Up: Use the Power Checkers to pop out one of your opponent’s checkers or an entire row. Use the ‘Go Again’ checker to give yourself another turn
• 5-in-a-Row: For an added challenge use the wings to be the first player to get 5-in-a-row.

Five in a row? Then it wouldn’t be Connect Four would it; honestly, isn't anything sacred?!

Thanks to nhskbhatia003 at HUKD

I love classic games like chess, which is just one of the games included in this World Wildlife Fund 4 in 1 game set that Argos are selling for half price; £2.99 instead of £5.99.

• Click HERE to go over to Argos

I really enjoy playing board games, I always have done.

Chess is a really big favourite in my family and we're rather competitive when we play; we have to decide whether we're going to set a time limit on moves otherwise we can play entire games in our heads each time it's our own respective turns!

Dominoes is another classic game that makes up the four games in this World Wildlife Fund game set; my nan used to have a dominoes set or two and I loved playing the proper game with her, or setting up domino courses in her lounge a'la Record Breakers - although mine weren't anywhere near as huge as the Record Breaking ones, they were still great to watch topple over in sequence.

Ludo and Pick up Sticks are the other two games that you and your child can play if you become the proud owners of this World Wildlife Fund 4 in 1 game set.

Not only that but you'll learn all about various species and animals as you play and approximately 5% from the sale of the game set to you will be donated to support WWFs global conservation efforts.

Fabulous; fun, educational and conservation friendly too.

Thanks to ellesmum at HUKD

Amazon are selling this Snakes & Ladders and Ludo game set for £5.00; you'll only be saving £1.66 as the rrp is £6.99, but just think what else you could do with that £1.99...buy a box of three Magnum Classics in Tescos, AND get change, as they're on sale for half price at the moment (WOW, I'm just a walking money saving deal library today!).

• Click HERE to slither over to Amazon

I loved playing both these games when I was little, I still enjoy playing them now if I'm honest.

Snakes and Ladders is just awesome; the joy of going up the ladders, the mild peril and adrenalin as you get closer and closer to a snake whilst BEGGING the dice turn up numbers high enough to get you past them - especially that big dude right at the top that takes you almost a-l-l the way back to the bottom of the board again.

I mean, seriously, how can SO much fun be had from such a simple board game?!

Ludo is pretty great too although it doesn't have the same 'danger' element that Snakes and Ladders has.

Aside from being lots of fun, these board games will help to develop your child's basic numeracy skills - learning AND fun all for a fiver; what a bargain.

Thanks to cath1510 at HUKD

A great game for older kids, or something for father's day, you decide! Top Gear Ultimate Car Challenge Game is on offer for £6 at Sainsbury's, down from £19.99. The cheapest I could find it in stock elsewhere was at Amazon, for £11.74.

• Click here for Top Gear Game at Sainsburys

Delivery is free if you can click and collect. Otherwise it is £3.95 for their standard delivery of three to five working days. For me, this is definitely going into the father's day present pile.

My other half is just nuts about Top Gear, and while I love the show myself, I can't watch it over and over. There are times when I just have to say no, not another Top Gear repeat (I do curse that cable channel Dave that plays them almost 24 hours a day!).

In Top Gear the Game, 2 - 4 players race around the board collecting points to make up their ultimate car.

You get to answer Top Gear trivia, do a spot of guesswork on the 'Cool Wall', challenge opponents to a game of Caravan Conkers, beat the Stig's lap time and negotiate various hazards.

It is recommended for ages 8 and upwards.

Play are selling the classic Connect Four game for £4.99 instead of £9.99

• Click HERE to connect with this deal

Connect Four is one of the GREAT classic kids games; I still enjoy playing the odd quick-fire game with the kids now and again.

Did you know that there are only two school weeks left before it’s half term already?

Board games were the saviour of my parental sanity when my kids were younger, especially when the school terms seemed to be shorter than the holiday times; what sort of game IS Connect Four anyway? Is it actually a board game...it doesn’t have a board *muse*

Whatever it is, I loved playing it as a kid and would always be devestated when I missed a really obvious space I should have blocked, allowing my opponent to win.

This version of Connect Four has had some additional game play elements added to it:

• PopOut: PopOut feature helps you get 4-in-a-row by popping a checker out instead of dropping one in
• Pop 10: Start with the grid full of checkers and pop them out. If it's part of a 4-in-a-row, you get to keep it. First to keep 10 wins
• Power Up: Use the Power Checkers to pop out one of your opponent's checkers or an entire row. Use the 'Go Again' checker to give yourself another turn
• 5-in-a-Row: For an added challenge use the wings to be the first player to get 5-in-a-row.

Five in a row? Then it wouldn't be Connect Four would it; honestly...some things just aren't sacred.

Thanks to jak19 at HUKD

Amazon are selling this Very Hungry Caterpillar board game for £4.12 instead of £8.98.

• Click HERE to go over to Amazon

I don't mind single-handedly leading the way on PlayPennies with anything Very Hungry Caterpillar; he's a necessary childhood institution and I feel it's my public responsibility to ensure he gets into as many households as possible.

I've actually played this Very Hungry Caterpillar board game, it's in the games drawer in my youngest's classroom and every Thursday parents can go in for half an hour at the end of the day to share games and play with the kids.

It's interesting trying to get almost five-year-old's to play properly by the rules! They seem to prefer just rolling the dice and moving their counter as many places as they like to ensure they don't land on a 'bad' spot.

They were just happy to be playing something Very Hungry Caterpillar and even though they weren't playing properly, they WERE counting and recognising colours and images - so they were still learning things and have a great time in the process.

This is a nice little price for this Very Hungry Caterpillar board game as it's being sold for the full rrp pretty much everywhere else.

Thanks to Twinx at HUKD

Debenhams have a nice deal on the Monopoly U-Build board game at the moment.

• Click HERE to go over to Debenhams

I refuse to play Monopoly. I'm a very bad loser when it comes to money and property, even if I'm allowed to be the boot.

It doesn't matter what strategy I employ - go for lots of the cheaper properties, or save up and stick a load of hotels on Park Lane and Mayfair - I always end up losing!

However, if YOU are a Monopoly fan then you might like this new version and you'll definitely like the price - it's at least £15 everywhere else at the moment.

I have no idea how you play it, so here's what the official blurb says:

Monopoly U-Build has flexible game play, where you choose which track to build and how long you want to play! With all the great sabotage of Monopoly City-build a prison or a dump on your opponents property!

My not-so-nice side is rather liking the sound of being able to build prisons or rubbish dumps on opponents properties...but not enough to make me want to play Monopoly again.

The published price on the Debenhams website for Monopoly U-Build is £7.50 - to get the price down to £6.75, and get free delivery too, you'll need to add the following codes to your basket before you checkout: PX8P and SHD1

Thanks to bitsnbobsbuyer at HUKD

Do not pass GO! And do not collect £200, until you check out this deal on the Monopoly Championship Edition at Tesco.

• Click HERE to dash on over to Tesco

I loved playing Monopoly as a kid; I always liked being the boot but there was one slight problem...I hated losing!

This carried on with me into my adult Monopoly days, so much so that I daren't play it anymore. I'm not usually a bad loser but there's something about losing at Monopoly that makes my blood boil!

It doesn't seem to matter which strategy I employ - buy up lots of cheap properties like Whitechapel and Co, the Stations and the Utility Companies, or go for the higher end of the market with Park Lane and Mayfair - I invariable end up being beaten and in a very bad mood.

If you can play Monopoly without my losers rage then this deal might be for you.

Tesco have reduced the price of the Monopoly Championship Edition by half, selling it for £10 instead of £20.

All of the elements of classic Monopoly are still there but this edition comes with a TROPHY!  Not even a trophy can tempt me back to Monopoly...in fact, it would just make it worse when I lost, again!

Collect for free instore or pay silly prices for home delivery (£5).

Thanks to ramnee over at HUKD!

Well this could be my mum's birthday or Crimbo pressie sorted out...

• Click HERE and get clued(o) up over at Play

...not only is she an avid fan of the classic whodunnit game but she's a HUGE Harry Potter fan too - we had a Harry Potter themed Christmas once, she made us all these amazing wizard hats and everything!

I liked Cluedo as a kid but how much fun is it going to be playing the Harry Potter version! I think it was Professor Snape in the restricted section with the Avada Kedavra spell!" utter genius!  Actually it's not quite that - the object of this game is to figure out which Hogwarts student cast which forbidden spell in which part of the school; it's close enough.

The board comes with all the usual bits and pieces you'd expect but with an HP twist there are:

• 2 special dice
• 6 wizard hat pawns
• 1 ghost pawn
• 10 Hogwarts event cards
• 6 character cards
• 6 magic cards
• 9 room cards
• 2 summary cards
• Check list pad

and a 'Fluffy' holder for storing the cards that reveal the who, the what and the where (he was the three-headed dog in the Philosopher's Stone remember?).

Play have reduced this from £19.99 to £9.99 and it's a GREAT price,  it's selling for a fair bit more everywhere else, and delivery as usual them is FREEEEEE.

Thanks to andywedge over at HUKD!

I bet when Julia Donaldson first penned the Gruffalo she had NO idea how massive he'd become!

• Click HERE for this giant Gruffalo deal

I mean, is there NOTHING sacred from the Gruffalo branding machine?!  Next there'll be jars and bottles of 'Gruffalo Fresh Air' straight from the deep dark wood - I actually looked up 'buy fresh air' and you CAN from the National Trust (if you're remotely interested you can read about it here) how bonkers is THAT!

But back to giant Gruffalo snakes and ladders - SO, it's for two to four players from ages three and upwards and having read some reviews it seems that every member of the families who own this game LOVE playing it.

The playmat dimensions are 1010mm x 910mm and is tough and hard-wearing, it can be used indoors AND outdoors (summer fun in the garden playing Gruffalo snakes and ladders...very cool, well if you're a Gruffalo fan it is!) and can be wiped clean too; perfect!  The game also comes with a jumbo dice which kids will just love chucking around to find out how many spaces they can move for their turn.

Delivery is free and for just £7.49 it would make for a great addition to the 'pressie drawer' if you have no desire to own this Gruffalo game yourself.

Thanks to andywedge over at HUKD!

They seem to have gone vintage mad over at dotcomgiftshop! This delightfully retro set of dominoes is a bargain at just £3.95.

• Click here to bag yourself a game

This looks like a really beautiful set of dominoes with vintage-style pictures on each domino card. The game comes in a retro box containing 28 dominoes plus an easy-to-follow instruction booklet and rules-of -the-game guide.

This item is suitable for  children between the ages of 4 and 8 years and I can definitely vouch for dominoes as an inspired way of entertaining little people. My lads adore dominoes and are building up quite a repertoire of different games that they know how to play, and they absolutely love explaining the rules and counting the cards out among players. It's great for everything from helping them learn how to co-operate to building numeracy skills.

What I love about this item is the classic, nostalgic design. Often these days the most affordable toys and games for children are also the most tacky but dotcomgiftshop certainly seem to have a knack for tracking down items that are both easy on your pocket and lovely to look at too.