I have to tell you what has transformed this game for us.  Instead of using the spinner, we use 2 dice.  On your turn, you get to roll both dice, and choose which one you want to use for your piece.  This has made the game SO MUCH more fun.  If you've played it before, you know the game can be painfully slow, and painfully frustrating as you work your way slowly up the squares, only to hit a major slide and lose 20 or more spaces.  WIth our method, the game zooms by and there is still an element of "bad luck".  Occasionally your two options will both end up on slides, or as in my case, I rolled two of the same number and ended up on the biggest slide down on the game board.  But instead of being frustrating, it was funny, because the pace of the game is so much faster that I didn't feel defeated.  (As proof of the speed, my 5 year old son and I played 6 times in a row this morning, which would never happen using the spinner!)  I highly recommend this game using the dice alternative!