Dingbats Illustrés (1987)

WHATZIT?™ are cunningly disguised names, phrases and sayings that are turned around, upside-down, sideways or jumbled up.

You need to work out the hidden word or phrase on each card. It could be the size, position or direction that will give you a clue. Sometimes, the pictures combined with a word or a number will give you your answer

1987 - BOARD GAME:

In ‘Whatzit?’ the object is to solve rebus-like puzzles. (PLAY PLAY might be “double play”) The roll of a die determines if you play solo, against everyone, or challenge a specific opponent. The winner moves the roll of a d6. Special spaces allow you to take a shortcut by solving a tougher “Wicked Whatzit”. First to the top of the board wins.

2001 - The Rose Art edition of the game has new puzzles. The puzzles are divided into three categories of difficulty. The more difficult the puzzle, the more points it is worth. Four puzzles from each category are placed randomly in a the three by four frame. Players must solve puzzles which are orthogonally to the previously solved puzzle. The first player to reach an agreed to number of points is the winner.

HISTORY:

Known as WHATZIT?™ in the USA and Canada, KATCH-ITS™ in Australia/NZ and DINGBATS® in the UK and rest of world, are syndicated internationally, in newspapers, best-selling books and TV shows. The family board game was voted ‘Game of the Year’ in the UK and ‘Toy of the Year’ in the USA. Since then, over 2 million DINGBATS and WHATZIT board games, travel games and best-selling books have been created.

2009/2010 - iPHONE & iPOD TOUCH VERSION OF BOARD GAME:

Celebrating the 30th Anniversary of ‘WHATZIT?’ (since the first ‘WHATZIT?’ were published in Newspapers in 1980), Paul Sellers, the inventor of ‘WHATZIT?’ has created a new version of the game for iPhone and iPod Touch.

You can play against the clock and see if you can achieve the fastest time in the world. This highly-addictive assortment contains 15 levels of ‘Sellers’ favourite 180 mind-boggling puzzles for the first release and will be adding more card packs in future releases.

‘WHATZIT?’ is available for download on the iTunes App Store now, and you can see the new website http://www.whatzit.com, which also has a link to the ‘WHATZIT?’ Boardgame for iPhone.