What are your favorite board games? Me and my friends love playing board games, but I get the feeling their tired of playing the same things. What do you guys usually play? My favorite board game of all time is HeroQuest. I never get tired of playing it. Also love Catan, Arkham Horror, Betrayal House on the Hill, Spyfall (great at parties)
There is a board game I played years ago at a comic shop, and I can never remember the name of it. I only played it once but it was super fun. Kind of like if Freelancer were a board game. You had a huge game board with a bunch of planets and you picked up missions. I dont remember what the win conditions were, but I remember I had a lot of fun with it.
I vaguely remember totalbiscuit and the gang play some games that would fit the description. Maybe worth a shot digging through his old stuff
Yeah, I’ll have to go and check some of those out, thanks for the suggestion!
You had me at “Freelancer the board game”. I love that game, and what you’re describing sounds fun as hell
It was years ago, so my memory may be a bit foggy on it lol. I looked up the names someone else suggested and it was Xia: Legends of a Drift System. I remember it was a lot of fun, even if I was totally out of my depth the first time playing it
That could have been:
• Xia, legends of a drift system
• Star Wars, outer rim
• Firefly
• Merchant of VenusThose are probably the most well-known games along that line 💁🏻♀️
Maybe it’s Xia or Merchant of Venus, those are activating something in my brain…
Hive is a modern, fun take on chess with a dynamic board. Its super fun and unlike chess its not figured out and people just don’t bother to throw a “book” at it. Every board game convention I try to find someone wirh Hive and it’d awesome!
We have a wider circle of friends who are boardgame enthusiasts, so we go through a rather lot of them. Some stick, some don’t. These we play regularly and have a lot of fun:
There are more that made an impression on me, I remember playing them a few times, but do not want to play them again (Do you know that feeling? :D ), eg. Eclipse (the galaxy-wide battle 4X preparation-takes-as-long-as-playing-and-playing-takes-a-whole-day strategy), Agricola, Mice and Mystics…
Brass Birmingham is a masterpiece. I absolutely love that game. It’s and absolutely heartbreak that my SO dislikes it.
Have you tried Lost Ruins of Arnak? It’s great!
I do not know it and I don’t remember seeing it in the board game club. But I will propose to play it, if it’s there.
Thank you fo the tip!
I really like board games that don’t take that long to play. It’s a lot easier to rope your friends into a game that takes 30-40 minutes to play and is easy to learn rather than a game that takes 4+ hours.
Some that I’ve found
- Azul
- Sheriff of Nottingham
- Splendor
Azul is such a beautiful game too. That’s usually my intro for people new to board games.
It might be Marrakech now that I think about it. It’s not too time taking and friendly to casual players yet not completely luck based. Also placing the rugs just feel so good. Are there other board games that comes with neat little items like Marrakech?
My city is an astoundingly good game. My wife and I are playing it basically every weekend at the moment. Super easy to learn, tactically rich, the art is lovely and you make your own city story to some extent. It’s just wonderful.
I like the ones that platform socialisation and banter - things like hidden role games, party games, etc. Less focus on the game’s strategy and more on the people you’re playing with.
Codenames (and Codenames Duel) is slower-paced but an engaging word-based game.
Just One is a simple word game that even drunk people can play (and likely have more fun in).
Detective Club is a bluffing hidden role game, where all of you are using weird art cards to match a prompt, but one of you didn’t have the prompt and is spinning bullshit - guess who!
Concept is Pictionary for people who can’t draw.
And my all time favourite*:
Telestrations, a blend of ‘the telephone game’ and illustrations. If you’re familiar with Gartic Phone, you already understand the gist. Every event that I’ve brought it out, it has been a good time.
Gloomhaven came out at the perfect time in my life- after my party days but before my marriage/kid days. I had a friend group that would play at least one scenario per week, and sometimes we’d just spend an entire Sunday playing. That’s been my best experience so far.
I wish I could play Frosthaven with them but we’ve all moved away and I don’t have a group that would ever be consistent enough right now.
The Red Dragon Inn is fun, especially when you drink real alcohol when you “drink” in game
I’ve been getting into Go/Baduk lately, it’s a shame how few people there are playing it in the US! Would love to play in-person instead of always online
Go is the most amazing game I know. I often regret not sticking with it as a kid. And IRL games are wonderful. The feeling of the stones on fingertips, the rattle of prisoners, the clicks and clacks when placing stones on the goban…
My partner and I love playing Wingspan. A game about bird may not sound great but it’s full of strategy without being too hard to pick up. It’s competitive, but just total points at the end, you can’t screw each other up during play.
You can definitely screw people over via “hate drafting.” My group usually plays casually but sometimes we’ll agree beforehand to tryhard and then this happens somewhat often.
I came here to say Wingspan. I have gotten my friends and family to play it, and everyone likes it.
My second favorite game might be Scythe, another one of their games. They just make good stuff.
Some of my favourites right now:
-Wingspan: 1-5 player game about birds from all over the world (with the European, Oceania and Asia expansions). Build up your board of birds and make future actions you take have more effects. There’s a solo mode and Asia expansion introduces a special 2 player and 6-7 player mode. As a birder myself, can’t recommend this game enough.
-Parks: Small but in depth 1-5 player game about exploring US national parks. You buy gear and set your hikers off on a trail that changes every round, to collect tokens and visit national parks. Games last up to an hour that feels like it flies by. Box design is the best I’ve seen, everything just fits together perfectly in a tiny box, making it much easier for travel.
-Terraforming Mars: Most complex game I own, for 1-5 players. Games can take 2-4 hours sometimes. You play as a corporation and compete with others to terraform mars the fastest. You raise the three global parameters (temperature, oxygen level and water) and increase your terraforming rating, all while managing your resources by playing various project cards. Has a challenging 1 player mode where you’re racing against the generation counter to terraform mars in under 14 generations. Expansions are a bit expensive but I can recommend Prelude and Hellas & Elysium, for extra cards that can be played at the start of game to kickstart your resource generation, and a double sided map you can use as a replacement for the base game board.
Other notable mentions are 7 Wonders, Tokaido, Mystic Vale and Ticket to Ride
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I realise this doesn’t really count (well, it does but you know), but chess. The rules are straightforward and it has infinite replayability. And you can play a game online any time you want in an instant.
Other boardgames I enjoy are Arkham Horror and Twilight Imperium, though I haven’t played either in a while.
Jeez, when you play a board game you really decided it’s an all day event. Both Arkham Horror and Twilight Imperium take forever every time I’ve played them
Try the Arkahm Horror Card Game. It moves quite a bit faster but shares much of the difficulty and has great stories.
Was into the tabletop simulator version of TI4 for a while. But even with automated set up and digital streamlining, the games are still 6-8 hours.
Love the game, but just don’t have time to play anymore.
My group isn’t really into board games, so we like 5 Minute Dungeon. The 5 minutes is a limit using a timer, and it’s co-op so it’s everyone against the clock.
