A few years ago I opened a Christmas present to get the Chronology card game from my Mom’s boyfriend and he said, “I know you like games and history, so I thought you might like this.” I was a bit skeptical because he doesn’t particularly play games, but I thought, “Why not give it a try.” Then it became a favorite of gameschooling for the next several months that we pulled out when friends came over for a party, and just generally was pulled out all the time. So here is our Chronology Game Review.
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What is Chronology?
Chronology is a card game similar to the popular Timeline and Cardline Geography game (my review of Cardline). Oh no! It looks like Cardline is discontinued (Rainbow Resource is still carrying it though), and it was such a wonderful game. If you can find a used copy grab it up. It’s a great geography game.
You each start with a single event card. The person next to you tells you an event and you have to figure out if it is before or after your date. If you guess incorrectly the play continues on to the next person who attempts the same guess. All the way around until someone either gets it correct, or it gets back to the person who started and then the card is discarded.
Play continues until someone gets 10 cards in their own personal timeline.
Very similar play style to Timeline/Cardline, but not quite the same.
And you can also see why I took so long to write a Chronology review, it’s nice and simple. There isn’t super a lot to say.
But, I realized if I want my blog to be a place where you get lots of homeschool resources for your kids, then I needed to get this review written. So, here I am with the Chronology card game review.
Why I like Chronology
It’s not super competitive
I’ve mentioned before The Artist is not a big fan of games. But this is a rare game that isn’t super competitive, as you can be super knowledgeable about history (like me) and still get those events you know nothing about.
Really this game is relying on your general idea of when something MIGHT have happened. I can reason all I like about when zippers were invented, and it does not change my ability to guess correctly if I’m looking to guess between 1900-1910 and there are already 5 events happening in that time.
No lie, I had that happen one game. Everyone else has a span of hundreds of years and all of my events were within 50 years of each other. It murdered me.
It’s adaptable to a wide range of players
Obviously, the more players you have for a game, the longer you have to wait for it to be your turn. But it’s fun to listen to other players turn and try and guess where you would put it on your timeline.
We’ve played with around 12 people at one point.
It’s easy to explain
You saw how long it took me to explain the play. It was literally just a paragraph.
A modern paragraph, not a Charles Dickens page-long paragraph. My paragraph was three sentences long.
This means if you’re having a game night, you don’t have to take a long time to explain how to play. You just give a quick recommendation and start playing.
Games like that are perfect for a game night with large crowds, or impatient 8-year-olds.
The 8-year-old might win the game
No seriously, there I was sitting with 3 cards in my timeline and the 8-year-old won the game. We all congratulated him and laughed.
All it takes is the ability to read and an ability to make a guess.
I like that.
Some more good party games
All of these games are quick and easy to play, perfect for a game night with friends (though some of these only play 4 people)
- Dominion game– deck building, fairly simple to explain, more complicated to play
- Tiki Topple– 4 players, so only good for a couple coming over
- Killing Doctor Lucky– great for a crowd
- The Captain is Dead– slightly longer to explain, but great if you’re a sci-fi fan, also good with 4-8 people
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