Around Christmas time a few years ago, I came across a three pack of games. The set included Ants in the Pants, Don’t Spill the Beans and Cootie for $5.99. What a find, three fun games that I knew my son would enjoy. I opened the pack and gave him one game at a time. We started with Milton Bradley’s Cootie. Cootie is a game that I had when I was younger. The body parts have changed some but the game is the same.

The object of Cootie is to be the first person to create a cootie.

The game comes with enough cootie parts to make four cooties, a game board, and a cootie die. The cootie parts consist of four heads, four sets of eyes, four bodies, twenty-four legs, antennas, hats, bows, teeth, lips and tongues. Each piece is made of durable colorful plastic. The pieces snap into each other. The updated versions of this game also come with parts such as roller blades.

Before playing for the first time, there is some assemble required. The cootie parts come attached to a runner and must be taken apart. The two halves of the same color cootie bodies need to be snapped together along with two halves of the same color cootie head. There are labels that need to be applied on the eyes also.

Put the game board on a flat surface. Lay each body part on the corresponding picture of that part. The dots on the cootie die stand for different body parts. One dot is the body, two dots is the head, three dots is the antennae, four dots is the eye piece, five dots is the tongue, teeth or lips and six dots is any leg. The game board also tells you what piece you place on your Cootie for each number rolled on the die.

Once the game board is set up, the first player rolls the die with hopes of rolling one dot. If one dot is rolled, they pick out their cootie body. If they do not roll one dot, the next player takes their turn. Before getting any other pieces you must get a body first and then the head (two dots). When you have both body and head, you can get any of the other parts in any order.

If you roll a number that you need, you get to pick out that part and roll again. If you roll a number for a part you already have, your turn ends and the next player goes.

Play continues until one person completes their Cootie. A completed cootie has a body, head, antennae, hat or bow, eyes, tongue, teeth or lips and six legs.

Once completed, the Cooties are fun to play with. I think my son enjoyed playing with the finished Cooties more then he did playing the game.

The game board that is included is not made of a sturdy cardboard. I don’t see the board lasting very long. The game also includes many small parts that can easily be log. We try and keep them all in a big Ziplock bag so not to lose anything.

Cootie is recommended for children three to six years old and requires two to four players. Actually my son has even played the game himself. Once finished, he had four cooties to play with. Cootie encourages counting skills, matching skills, association, taking turns, fine motor control and for my son, imaginative play.

Personally, I think Cootie is an OK game, it’s not the best but there are a lot worse also. My son enjoys getting the game out and putting the cooties together. He will then use them to attack his Pokemon and a battle ensues. This continues until Cootie parts are scattered all over his room and the Pokemon have won. (OK so he doesn’t use it as intended but it does get played with!)

Cootie is a quiet, no batteries required, relatively inexpensive game. On occasion, we still pull Milton Bradley’s Cootie and play it during family game night. My family and I recommend Cootie, if not for the game, it makes imaginative play fun! Just Get That Cootie Off My Bed!


Recommended: Yes

Amount Paid (US$): 5.99/3
Type of Toy: Game
Age Range of Child: 3 to 5 Years