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We did not wish to spend excessive time learning complex rules for a new game -- we wanted to focus on doing the exercise recipes right away. Initially a couple folks laughed and suggested a more age appropriate game might be better, but once we got into playing and doing the exercises, we found that this simple kid's game could become a challenge of it's own. The simplicity of the game proved to be ideal for our purposes.

Chutes and Ladders has a natural game cycle of 10-30 minutes. This created natural breaks perfect for our use, giving us periodic opportunities to debrief -- giving short reports of our experiences. In addition, it was good to begin the game again every now and then to remind ourselves that indeed we had intended to do an exercise.

Amazingly enough, at times we would get lost in the game itself, forgetting all about the excercies. There is something quite captivating about the simplicity and evolving nature of a Chutes and Ladders game.

By the way, we found that four (4) rounds of game play an evening worked well. We chose to stick with one recipe/exercise per evening and by repeating the game/exercise four times an evening this revealed the multilayered nature of an exercise and its effects.

We found it necessary to make one small modification to the Chutes and Ladders game in order to use the game for a larger group of players. The game, as purchased, has only four pieces. The pieces are large and not well balanced. We created smaller and better balanced player markers for our game. This allowed for a larger group of people and several markers on the same square at a time.

With above modofication, the game accomodates 2-12 players easily, which allows for flexibility in group size.

The game comes with a spinner. You may choose to work with the spinner or elect to use a single die (as our group unanimously decided). This is partically a matter of taste.

Interestingly, unbeknownst to any of us at the time, the origin of Chutes and Ladders is found in documents from India around 2nd century BC under the name of Snakes and Ladders. It's an ancient chance race game designed to teach morals and the karmic implications of one's actions. The squares of virtue on the original game are faith (12), reliability (51), generosity (57), knowledge (76), asceticism (78); the squares of evil are disobedience (41), vanity (44), vulgarity (49), theft (52), lying (58), drunkenness (62), debt (69), rage (84), greed (92), pride (95), murder (73) and lust (99). The British took it to England in 1890s and from there, it spread to the rest of Europe and the world. The game play is pretty much the same but the vices and virtues were renamed, and the number of ladders and snakes were equalised.

All is all, chutes and ladders is a great game for an evening of noncomplicated fun and for use in conjunction with the excercises in the Any Game Cookbook.