Playfair: Everybody's Guide to Noncompetitive Play [Paperback]

Matt Weinstein (Author), Joel Goodman (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 247 pages
• Publisher: Impact Pub (May 1980)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 091516650X
• ISBN-13: 978-0915166503
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 7.3 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #596,165 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Simply the best, funniest and most fun book of energizers and icebreakers ever!, September 15, 2005

By 

Hanoch McCarty "The Energizer!" (Northern California) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Playfair: Everybody's Guide to Noncompetitive Play (Paperback)

I've been using the ideas in this book since it first came out. It has brilliant and hysterically funny ideas taken from Matt Weinstein and Joel Goodman's work with groups of people all over the world.

Matt Weinstein has a company, also named Playfair, which conducts ice-breaking events for incoming freshmen at colleges (and that measurably reduces dropouts from college!) and for corporate work-teams. They've worked with some of the biggest Fortune 500 companies and get people to shed some of their stand-off-ishness and become more able to relate to/with each other and to communicate more effectively.

Frankly, I've never seen anything as joyous as a "Playfair" conducted by Matt Weinstein or a conference conducted by Joel Goodman. And my groups in workshops and my audiences in the many keynote addresses I do have all benefited from the activities in this book which I've used over the years. If you can get your hands on a copy of this book, you'll be amply rewarded!

3 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Non-competitive game design, July 14, 2003

By 

Duane Alan Hahn "Random Terrain" (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Playfair: Everybody's Guide to Noncompetitive Play (Paperback)

I like "Playfair," but not for the reasons it was written. I don't need to create touchy-feely, "shiny happy people" bonding activities for white-collar employees. I'm interested in computer game design and this book is great for learning about a concept that most people don't even know exists. I believe that non-competitive computer and console games will breathe new life into the game industry in the future. It may be more important than "Controlled Randomness" which also increases the value and importance of a game. Anyone interested in discovering how to make original games that alleviate instead of aggravate should buy a copy of this book as soon as possible.

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars good resource, yet outdated., March 13, 2010

By 

Michelle Woycitzky "Humanity Advocate" (Berea, Ohio USA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Playfair: Everybody's Guide to Noncompetitive Play (Paperback)

This was purchased for a college class, I feel there are more up to date materials that can be used in place of this book.