Tag: Competitive Games

Top 5 Board Games of 2020 (Saturday Review)

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As is customary at the end of a calendar year, it's time for my top 5 board games of this, rather odd, year and for me to announce the winner of the Top Table Award 2020. Let me say that this year, I happily allowed games into the top 5 list that were published before 2020, as long as these games were new to me this year. There is a clear winner for me, not just based on the number of plays, the amount of enjoyment the game brought and the nostalgia factor that the game has for me, but because this game took a well-established genre and took it to the next step, making it more accessible to a wider range of people. However, let me not spoil it for you, but start at number 5 and work my way to the top slot.

Tinderblox (Saturday Review)

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It was getting dark, which meant it was time to light the campfire. We had already collected plenty of wood and tinder and someone had started to build the first layer of the fire. Now we were going to take turns and add more wood to it. After all, we were on a teambuilding camping trip, so we had to show we could work together. Of course, most of us were very competitive and soon people were starting to show off. The head of marketing decided that adding branches vertically, balancing them on the base, was the thing to do. IT, of course, went one further and decided to light the fire in a couple of places to add extra peril. It was quickly turning into a mad competition of Tinderblox by Alley Cat Games.

The Cost (Digital Eyes)

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"Asbestos and its use have a long history. A naturally occurring mineral, asbestos was once celebrated for its seemingly wondrous resistant and strengthening properties until it was declared a human carcinogen by the World Health Organization's International Agency for Research on Cancer in 1987. This odd dichotomy between the recognition of the harmful effects of the mineral and lure of the potential to make a profit on it is by no means new to industry or unique to asbestos. As game designers and game players, however, this is thought provoking." From the rulebook of The Cost by Spielworxx.

It’s tricky (Topic Discussion)

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As you can probably tell from my review of The Crew, I love trick-taking games. I grew up with them. I learned to shuffle cards when I was about six and started to play Skat with my family when I was about eight. In secondary school, I learned Doppelkopf. I didn't play them for many years after I left school and it was only when I played Vivaldi at Gaming Rules' evening during last year's Essen Spiel Messe that I rediscovered the genre. So I wanted to talk more about my fascination with these games.

Overruled (Topic Discussion)

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The old topic of "house rules" keeps cropping up. Some of us are purists and feel that you have to play games with the rules they came with, because otherwise you won't get the experience that the designer intended. Others feel that tweaking a few rules here and there can make a game more fun for you and the people you play with and that designers want us to enjoy their games. In this article, I want to speak for the latter group and show that house rules aren't a sacrilege.

Patchwork (Digital Eyes)

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We were sitting quietly at each end of the sofa in the living room, fully engrossed in our needlework. It was so relaxing to use our hands and make something. Arts and crafts. That was the way. We looked at each other for a moment, seeing the contentment in each other's eyes. I reached into the bag to pick out another piece of material to add to my quilt. It would look all higgledy-piggledy, but that was fine, because I was aiming to create a Patchwork by Lookout Games.

Micro City (Saturday Review)

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We had all the plans ready, planning permissions had been sought and approved, contractors had been signed up, the project manager was ready and a rough schedule had been put together. We also knew what building materials we needed and where to get them, so it was time to build our Micro City by Thistroy Games.

Q.E. (Saturday Review)

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"...crisis on Wall Street as Lehman totters towards..." - "...worries could wreak havoc on markets..." - "...banking giants rush to raise capital..." - "...markets in disarray as lending locks up..." - "...sweeping plan to fight crisis..." - "...vast bailout..." - I switched off the television. The news wasn't good and it was clear what we had to do to stop the world markets from collapse. It was time for some Q.E. by BoardGameTables.com.

On Tour (Saturday Review)

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It was going to be great. We were going to visit most of the USA and play to millions of people over a few months. It was going to be fun, but also a lot of hard work and the planning was the most difficult. In the end, we decided to roll the dice to decide what states we were going to visit in what order, but rather than making it completely random, we turned it into a little game. It would let us build an almost circular route, so we could finally go On Tour by BoardGameTables.com.

Jaws (Saturday Review)

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It was time to find the next victim. The beaches were full of swimmers, so it was going to be easy pickings. Yet, the sea around the island was patrolled by the Orca, a 42-foot former lobster boat, that was launching barrels into the sea to flush me out. A little speedboat was also making its rounds and using its fish finder to see if it could spot me. So far, I hadn't been found and already five people had lost their lives to my merciless attacks. I just needed four more victims to end up in my Jaws by Ravensburger.