Shake Up Your Monday: Make A Game From Thingiverse
Kids on break from school have hit the summer doldrums. Vacations are winding down and going to the pool every day is getting a little old. So why not #make a game? Thingiverse has a bunch of cool games that you can find under Browse>>Toys & Games>>Games. There you’ll see several game sets that you can download (for free!) and make on your MakerBot. Here are five awesome games to fill your day with.
Abalone
This is Thingiverse user blacki’s version of the game Abalone, a two-player strategy game. You move your color, one piece and one space at a time, to try to push your opponent off the board.
To make this set, you’ll need at least two colors of plastic filament (we got your back: there are 35 in the store right now). Blacki used three colors here, but that’s not totally necessary; one set of pieces can be the same color as the board.
Make the game board and the 28 marbles (two sets of 14).
Liar’s Dice
Make two of these cups and ten dice — you can use use Lunpa’s Six Sided Die – and you’ve got Thingiverse user cibomahto’s Liar’s Dice set all ready to go.
The Wikipedia page for this game explains that it’s basically poker with dice. Call your opponent’s bluff.
Peg solitaire
Don’t have anyone to play a game with, or just need something to distract yourself at work?
Make this simple game by Thingiverse user mread, which includes the base and 32 pegs.
Hours of fun for pennies of plastic. Enjoy!
Travel Baseball
We’re more than half way through the Major League Baseball season here in the US, so it’s starting to feel like all these games…actually matter.
If you can’t get enough, play this simplified baseball game with a friend or with your little brother in the car. Here’s how:
“To play. Without showing your opponent, the pitcher and batter each select a pitch. When ready, show what you selected. If the batter guesses the pitch correctly they may spin the spinner to see if they got a hit or an out. If they guess wrong, it is a strike. 3 strikes and your out.”
Quantum
Cymon brings us his take on this strategy game from 1975.
The game pieces here have different markings to tell you what they can do. The goal is to be the first to claim three towers with six pieces each. Read here for more details.
Bonus! This set includes a lid, so when you’re finished, just throw the pieces in the bottom of the board and snap it shut.
Want to make your own game? The designers of a couple of these include little notes on their Thingiverse pages indicating that they used either simple boolean operations to shape the game pieces. For example, in Tinkercad, it’s super easy to put shapes next to each other, put a box around them and press “group”. If your pieces are touching, that’s a union. To subtract one thing from another just click on “hole” and then group your shapes. Tinkercad even has a whole tutorial on making a die.
Note: I know I’m leaving out the 3D printing game sensation that’s sweeping the world: Seej from the master Zheng! More on that soon. Now go get your game on.
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One Comment so far
mrbug
My files for the Looney Labs pyramids can be used for many many games…
http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:27394
Check out http://www.icehousegames.org/wiki/ for game rules and descriptions. You’ll need to have clear (but colored) filament in many cases, though.
I’ve also made some other games. Check out my other contributions!