Many American prisons disallow dice or other common components of board and tapletop games. Most place restrictions on the content of educational and entertainment materials available to inmates. As part of our committment to the idea that play and imagination are fundamental human rights, some of our games, including Shadows From Another World, are designed to be playable in prison environments, avoiding or minimizing references to drugs, firearms, or other topics that can trigger censorship, and relying on materials more likely to be both permitted and available. There is evidence that playing board games can be rehabilitative for inmates, but even were this not the case, it is important that everyone, everywhere have the opportunity to have fun playing games.
Play is a natural and critical aspect of learning for people of all ages. Even games that are not deliberately educational in their design can facilitate the develooment of math, literacy, and social-emotional skills. Games that are deliberately educational may also confer facts about their subject matter in a digestible and enjoyable way, making them easier to absorb. Games, deliberately educational or otherwise, that are created with deep knowledge of and sincere enthusiam for their subject matter might even teach the players something about the processes of that subject matter, or about the methods by which it is studied.
All Saccharine Sorrows games are made with consideration for what the player might learn from them. The finished versions of all games will include a list of the learning objectives they support.