Let the games begin. The Mind Games, that is.
Starting Thursday afternoon, April 30, and ending Sunday morning, hundreds of “judges” will play around the clock in Mission Valley, “breaking only for food, drink and sleep” at a national gathering of Mensa members, the high-IQ society.
Mensa Mind Games, touted as one of the leading board game showcase competitions in the United States, will bring 64 new titles for more than 300 judges to review at the Town and Country Resort Conference Center.
The event, hosted by the San Diego Mensa chapter, with nearly 1,000 members, invites game-makers to put their titles to the test. Mensans play and rate each title.
“This year has brought some very intriguing titles to the competition,” said chief judge Greg Webster. “With titles like Battle Sheep, Stinker, and Castles of Mad King Ludwig, if the games are half as interesting as the names we will have a great event!”
Games are judged on aesthetics, instructions, originality, play appeal and play value. The event is nearly 20 years old.
Five games receive the honor of bearing the Mensa Select seal. Past winners include Scattergories, Trivial Pursuit, Genus Edition, and Apples to Apples. 2015 Winners will be announced May 3 on mindgames.us.mensa.org.
American Mensa is an organization open to anyone who scores in the top 2 percent on an accepted, standardized intelligence test. Mensa has more than 56,000 members in the United States and more than 110,000 members globally.
Mensa says: “Board games, card games and other types of table and party games are eligible; games may be designed for one or more players. Games are judged on aesthetics, instructions, originality, play appeal and play value.
“Judges fill out comment cards for each game. After the competition, each manufacturer receives the comment cards, which show the age and gender of players and include their ratings and comments regarding the game.”
Video, electronic, computer games or any games that take an “inordinately long time to set up and play” aren’t allowed, Mensa says.
Judges often play for almost 40 straight hours, organizers say, breaking only to snack and sleep.
“While Hospitality may be available for extended hours during each event, it is intended only for quick noshing between games,” organizers say.
Each judge is required to play at least 30 of more than 50 games over the course of the weekend; if any one game takes too long to set up, players won’t have the opportunity to fairly evaluate all the games.
