*AD-Gifted: We were gifted The Good Life board game in exchange for this post.
As you may know, I grew up on a smallholding. We had various animals – cows, chickens, geese, goats, and ponies. My dad was an amazing farmer all his life. He instilled the love of the countryside, growing and farm life in me. I will always treasure this.
Of course, I would love to have my own smallholding, but this isn’t possible. However, I’m grateful for the outside garden space I do have to keep chickens, grow flowers, fruit, and veg. My garden is my sanctuary and during this challenging time even more so.
To keep us occupied during lockdown, we were kindly sent The Good Life board game. It’s right up my street! A fun, easy to play family game where you are in charge of your own garden and allotment.
Aim of The Good Life
The aim of the game is to move around the board with the shake of a dice, collecting fruit, vegetables, pigs and chicken.
You must become 100% self-sufficient in food by collecting the following:
- 3 chickens
- 3 pigs
- 3 different kinds of fruit
- 6 different kinds of vegetable
- A wind turbine
- A greenhouse
- A beehive
- An allotment
But beware of the “Green Fingers” cards. They turn up many twists to the game keeping you on your toes. For example, you might experience drought, or the chickens need to be protected from a fox. Cider from your orchard is a hit with your neighbours so they give you a hay bale. There are many different cards with scenarios on.
If you pick up a natural selection card, you will be tested on your knowledge of sustainability. With over 50 questions it’s a learning exercise as well!.
The winner is the first player to fill both their garden and allotment with the above.
For 2 – 4 Players, Age 7+
What’s in the box?
- 15 Pigs,
- 15 Chickens,
- 50 Hay Bales,
- 4 Wheelbarrows,
- 24 Fruit Tokens,
- 48 Vegetable Tokens,
- 60 Green Fingers Cards,
- 60 Natural Selection Cards,
- 4 Allotment Plots,
- Game Board
- 1 Dice
Game Prep
There is some game prep to do before you start the game. I won’t go fully into that here as you can read it on the instruction booklet included with the game. Or head over to the rules online at thegoodlifegame.co.uk
What We Thought
What a lovely game! It reminds of a nicer Monopoly, with all the prep you have to do first then off you go around the board buying and collecting things. As kids, we played Monopoly but it used to end in fights and tears! What’s different about The Good Life is that it’s about growing your own veg plots, learning to live sustainably, and trying to be self-sufficient.
I’m in awe of the detail gone into the game board. It’s visually stunning. From the outset, it may seem a little complicated with the game set up, but playing it is easy. L, at 4 years old, loved to set up the pieces and throw the dice. She still a little young to understand the concept of the rules, so I can see why it’s a 7 years plus game. But it’s still been a lesson teaching her about the veg plots. I would say the average game takes around an hour to play, which is much quicker than Monopoly.
The game pieces are cute. I would have loved to have seen little wooden wheelbarrows just like the wooden pigs and chickens instead of plastic, but they are brightly coloured.
I can see why The Good Life is award winning – even Prince Charles is a fan!
A firm favourite in our games collection. I’m looking forward to teaching the girls to play when they get older. It’s a game you can play over and over again, and it doesn’t lose its novelty.
Where Can I Buy The Good Life Game?
The Good Life board game is available direct from the website for £29.95
Use code Rachel at the checkout for a 10% discount*
*Discount code valid until 31st May 2020
Giveaway
I have a copy of The Good Life for you to win. All you have to do is fill in the Gleam widget below.
Good Luck!
Win The Good Life Board GameCOMPETITION T&C’S
The giveaway ends 23:59 30th April 2020
The prize is non-transferable and no cash alternative will be offered. The winner will be selected at random via gleam from all valid entries and be notified by email within 7 days. The winner will have 28 days to respond with a name and delivery address before a new winner is selected. Open to all UK entrants aged 18 or over only. Facebook and Twitter are in no way associated with the giveaways. Any personal data given as part of the competition entry’s is used for this purpose only and will not be shared with third parties. Please allow at least 28 days for delivery of the prize as a minimum due to current conditions.
By entering the competition you agree to your first name and surname initial published on the competition widget if you are the winner.
You can find more info here on my privacy policies
You can check out my other competitions here.
Thanks for stopping by today, I hope you’ve enjoyed this post.
We love growing sunflowers 🙂
I love growing trees, we’ve got lots of saplings that we are growing on and will later give them away!
I love growing all kinds of veggies in the garden, as well as strawberries!
I love to grown strawberries. Delicious
We love our fruit trees and bushes. Gorgeous flowers, then tasty fruit afterwards.
I’d looooove to “grow” chickens and quails! haha
A more achievable goal would be strawberries and courgettes 😀 yummy!
We love to grow courgettes because they are so easy to grow. I also enjoy growing cucumbers because they wouldn’t grow where we used to live
Rhubarb
I love growing mint and sweet peas
Any vegetables that will grow in our soil and lots of annual flowers . Love my tomatoes , strawberries and fruit bushes
Tomatoes and strawberries, home grown tastes so much better than what you can buy in the shops
Lovely giveaway
Tulips, marigolds and vegetables- potatoes, carrots
My daughters love to grow strawberries
Sunflowers 🙂
Love to grow sunflowers and sweet peas
We love growing strawberries, peas & beans.
Vegetables, sweet peas and sunflowers
strawberrys! love them
Love cottage garden flowers – stocks, snapdragons and phlox
I love to grow flowers in the garden.
Tomatoes and spring onions, although this year i have gone for beetroot and potatoes
Tomatoes and runner beans.
Herbs, my girls and I have made a lovely little herb garden!
Runner beans are a favourite but really a mixture of herbe, veg, fruit and flowers!
I grow fruit and vegetables and i also love growing bee loving plants.
At the moment rhubarb but I would like to grow more in the future
Currently growing some peas :0
Tomatoes – so easy to grow and delicious to eat – though I do tend to grow too many
We love to grow sunflowers
I love to grow potatoes, they are so easy & taste superb
Used to grow strawberries when i was a child, these were the times
We mainly just grow flowers, but occasionally potatoes and carrots.
We try and grow flowers , but seem to get weeds
We love to grow sunflowers
Sunflowers, tomatoes and lettuce
I love to grow cherry tomatoes. They are great to just pick and eat like sweets, add to salads and make pasta sauces. I freeze some pasta sauces so that in the depths of winter I can enjoy the summer sunshine!
This looks like a great game! We are currently growing carrots, beetroot and peppers!
I planted a tiny crown of rhubarb last year & am hoping that next year I will have a decent harvest
Carrots, potatoes, strawberries, onions, herbs & tomatoes
We don’t have a vegetable patch in our garden as our Husky likes to dig, I only have a few pots with herbs and shrubs and some hanging baskets
At the moment im trying to get to grips with Clematis, to have some draping flowers in the future….
Potatoes as they are easy to grow!
We are new to growing our own but we have grown herbs and have tried tomatoes
Carrots & potatoes in pots with the children
Herbs like rosemary and sage
I love growing tomatoes especially the picking and eating part!
A variety of root vegetables, but my favourite is strawberries – not my most successful though, every year I get less than a dozen – but I persevere!
Tomatoes,herbs,courgettes,french beans,peppers,pumpkins,and bee and butterfly friendly flowers.Mostly in pots and tubs x
We grow a lot of veg but my favourite is courgettes as I love to spiralize them!
Love to grow tomatoes – had varying success over the years!
I don’t have a garden at the moment but when I did have one, I used to love growing veggies, especially broad beans.
Love to grow vegetables and currently have runner beans, peas and carrots on the go.
we would love to grow tomatoes! x
Bee and butterfly-friendly plants
my son loves growing carrots and I love growing raspberries
We were very lucky to inherit some raspberry canes from the previous owners and we’ve managed to keep them alive!
I don’t have a garden at the moment but when I did have one, I used to enjoy growing veggies, especially broad beans.
We love growing sunflowers as well as tomatoes!
I enjoy trying to grow sunflowers in the garden
Sweet peas for their fragrance and tomato’s and strawberries. Definitely want to expand into more soon!
gooseberries and raspberries
We love to grow Roses
We grow all sorts of veg and salad – runner beans, broad beans, carrots, parsnips, beetroot, leeks, cucumbers, tomatoes, broccoli, brussels sprouts, tomatoes, potatoes, endive, lettuce, blueberries, apples, pears and lots of herbs.
we grow a lot of weeds :/ also we have a nice wild flower patch for the bees, birds, butterflies and all the other critters to enjoy
Strawberries and Tomatoes
Potatoes & Carrots
We love to plant plants that attract butterflies. We also love having fruit trees in the garden because we can watch the bees buzzing from one bit of blossom to another
We have a pear tree, a plum tree, a hazelnut tree, strawberries, raspberries, blackcurrant and gooseberry bushes and them we grow tomatoes, garlic, carrots and onions yearly
Acer Trees, they look beautiful 🙂
Flowers
We are trying to grow tomatoes, cucumbers & spring onions this year
TOMATOES
I love growing peas, they taste so good just eating them fresh straight from the pod.
Strawberries are my favourite
Rhubarb, tomatoes and herbs
I have a tiny garden but I grow herbs, strewberries and I have a fig tree but it has born any fruit.
Peas in pods! They taste great!
Only flowers but especially tulips
We love to grow lovely apples in ours
Tulips
Anything edible. Tomatoes or peas are probably my favourite – you just can’t beat picking them and eating them then and there! The flavour is like nothing else.
We enjoy growing (and eating!) strawberries in our garden.
New for this year are potatoes, carrots and runner beans – we’re newbies to this growing lark!
I only have a patio but I’ve bought lots of big pots and filled them with shrubs plus a couple of small trees and a few flowers for insects. If I had a proper garden, I would grow a few veggies, too.
Carrots and Orchids xx
I knew that it is a game that my son would love. i like growing lettuce, potatoes and strawberry.
Everything – we have quite a large garden area as we took the decision to attempt our own version of ‘the good life’
We love growing strawberries
I grow apples, plums, damsons, quince, pears, redcurrants, white currants, gooseberries, mint, lemon balm and rosemary.
Great Giveaway Rachel!
we like to grow strawberries!
We love growing potatoes and green beans.
I have got 4 fruit trees and loads of flowers especially roses!
RASPBERRIES ….. the only plants I’ve ever grown successfully … and great fun to pick!
This looks different and fun!
All kinds of vegetables
I love to grow bedding plants as picking the right varieties means colourful flowers for the longest time
Anything tasty fruit is great.
Basic salad produce and carrots onions and peppers
Grow our own flowers too ( not this year )
I love to grow strawberries in my garden.
I love to grow fruit, especially raspberreis.
Perfect for the kids in lockdown, thank you for the oportunity
Pretty flowers.
I love to grow vegetables. It’s so satisfying and home grown produce has so much flavour
Awesome giveaway 😍
We love to grow sunflowers
Tomatoes, peas and apples.
When I was young my dad used to let me help grow marigolds
My granddaughters would love this
I love growing roses and lilies – any highly-scented flowers. But this year I am also trying my hand at onions, lettuce and tomatoes.
We are just getting ready to plant our Courgettes and some herbs but we always do Runner Beans!
i like growing lettuce, potatoes and carrots
I have tried growing most veg and fresh sweetcorn was the best, but we seem to have been blighted now and can only grow runner beans and garlic mmmmmm
I love to grow tomatoes and peppers in my greenhouse and runner beans in the garden
I’d love to win this for my sister! I’m growing different herbs at the moment. Coriander, basil and parsley.
Helen
I love growing different herbs so it smells nice
We only really have flowers and shrubs in the garden but we do try some tomatoes in pots each year.
Pretty flowers
sweetcorn is beautiful straight from the garden!
We grow an abundance of different plants and flowers in our communal garden, I’m upstairs, but help where I can xx
I love to grow runner beans
lavendar and salad vegetables
Hemp.
I love growing fruit and veg so we can eat what grows, they have so much more flavour than any you can buy
Always looking for new and interesting board games.
potatoes and tomatoes