Crossbows and Catapults
A Blast Carrom-ing from the Past
One Christmas Morning saw my brother and I crawling across the floor, building castles and then taking turns flicking disks with rubber-band-powered catapults and ballistas. Our goal was to knock down the flags on the castle, either with a perfectly placed shot or (more likely), simply by knocking the bricks down entirely. Or you could use your discs to flick the opponents discs away. Not only did we maneuver our discs around, we also paused to see if we could double up our rubber bands (or triple them, or quadruple them …) to increase our firepower.
Reader, we could.
At the time it was great fun, but like many Christmas presents, we probably only played it for a few days or weeks.
I keep a list of “articles to write” and each week I pull from it. It’s divided into “Articles I must write” (Games that are contenders to make the 100 Most Influential Games) and “Articles I should consider writing” (Games that I think are longshots to make the list). The latter set includes many games that are personal favorites, and I put Ray Frigard’s and Henri Sala’s Crossbows and Catapults on the “probably not” list. After all, it was a child hood flash in the pan that was probably a minor Christmas craze around a few trees.
I mean, I do remember seeing expansion boxes for a few months later, more bricks and more things, but I don’t remember longing for them.
But last year I saw new copies of Crossbows and Catapults at my local game store, nestled between the hot new thing, so it went back on the list. While researching this article, I discovered other editions. Many countries and many reprintings.
Which makes sense, flinging things around is a classic game: Crokinole or Carrom. Crossbows and Catapults took that and made it kid-friendly and somewhat trendy (tying into the Dungeons and Dragons craze).
The game also had units you could move towards your castle to infiltrate them. (Right there in the picture! Between the catapult and the crossbow). I have zero memory of them. Just the discs smashing into walls.
Catch, but more “take that” than friendly day of tossing the ball.
Apparently “My childhood memory” was a big enough seller that it kept popping back into print. So, back onto the list and … this article. I still think its a long shot to make The 100 Most Influential Games of the 20th Century, but what do I know? It made one “Top 100 Family Games1” which might count for something.
How many children opened up a copy one Christmas or Birthday or because their parents had played it decades ago and now wanted to share the experience with their kids?
More than I would have guessed. And now some of them are ensuring that their 8 year old will be crawling across the floor come Christmas morning.
James Lowder’s “Family Games: The 100 Best” (according to Wikipedia).
Oh dear - another one I don't know.