Any board game fans round here?

[Warbodog]

Any favourite analogue games you play with friends, family or alone?

Topic

[Warbodog]

I wouldn’t know about the former, but they’re great to play with kids and to help curb their inevitable screen addiction. Some of our favourites at the moment are:

– Dixit (and spin-offs/rip-offs): guess which surreal picture I’m thinking of based on my unhelpful clues.

– Carcassonne: medieval landscaping jigsaw and my all-time number one. The stick it gets for its excessive and unnecessary expansions is justified, but most of them are fun to mix in for the variety. Just ignore farms to make it kid-friendly.

– Sea Salt & Paper: aquatic set collecting and powers, a six year old beats me most of the time.

– Tails of Equestria: simplifies RPGs so even I can understand them. After working through the proper adventures, I now mainly adapt and sanitise/desecrate old-school D&D one-shots.

Ticket to Ride: Europe looks set to be the best thing I’ve got “for her” for Christmas, whether she’ll realise it or not. Can’t wait!

In solo games, I played all of Shadi Torbey’s Oniverse series this year and loved most of them, especially Onirim, Cyberion and Aerion.

I like deck builders (Star Realms is my second-most gratuitously-expanded game), but don’t have anyone to play them with right now.

In 2026, I’m going to see if I can handle games that BoardGameGeek users rate harder than 2 out of 5.

[Rushy]

Reiner Knizia’s Lord of the Rings

[Technopeasant]

Not a board game but my wife is obsessed with the domino game Mexican Train.

Her cousin also got us to play Red Dragon Inn and her brother Settlers of Catan.

[Warbodog]

I didn’t care for (Settlers of) Catan when I tried the latest streamlined edition, but I replaced it with one from the 90s, with the full title and other ironed-out character, and it feels appropriately classic now, like a pre-1997 Cluedo. Re-released games are like digital remasters, they should only enhance so much.

I should have mentioned Atmosfear, the horror-comedy video board game that felt like the most decadent experience ever at 11 (£32 from the Argos catalogue!) and is still a hit today, even if we can’t physically play the tape any more and just have to pop it on YouTube. There’s some kind of app-based version now…

[Technopeasant]

I actually have a copy of Atmosfear from a second hand shop. Well, Nightmare.

[Warbodog]

I had Atmosfear: The Harbingers, which was some kind of amalgamation of the previous sets that included all their characters (so, the kind of re-release I said I don’t like, but is fine when it’s the one I grew up with).

When I bought it again a few years ago, I opted for The Ultimate Conflict edition that includes the Soul Rangers expansion/variant, one of the shittest expansions ever. I’ve tried it twice and we never got far into the tape before reconsidering what we were doing with our lives.

[Warbodog]

[Ben Saunders]

I’ve been playing a lot of Civilization, which is like a boaard game but on the computer. My favourite thing to do is get around 150 turns in, realise it’s boring and pointless, go do something else, and try again the next day.

[Ben Saunders]

Also I’ve been really into professional Scrabble for a year or so now, Will Anderson on YouTube makes terrific videos breaking down legendary plays and tournament games, it’s genuinely fascinating stuff.

[Warbodog]

Scrabble was my all-time number one until I got into Carcassonne, which is like illiterate (or language-independent) map Scrabble.

[Technopeasant]

I’ve been playing a lot of Civilization, which is like a boaard game but on the computer.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilization_%281980_board_game%29?wprov=sfla1

realise it’s boring and pointless, go do something else, and try again the next day.

Sorry, wrong thread…

[RunawayTrain]

Carcassonne: medieval landscaping jigsaw and my all-time number one. … Just ignore farms to make it kid-friendly. 

Okay I have to ask – why?

[Warbodog]

Carcassonne: medieval landscaping jigsaw and my all-time number one. … Just ignore farms to make it kid-friendly. 
Okay I have to ask – why?

Not because of the theme, just because farms aren’t scored until the end of the game, so need a bit more strategic thinking and delay gratification. The game’s only rated for age 8+ as it is, so not too hard, and I don’t think there’s any need for the Junior version that exists.

[Meteo]

This is what I do with my Post-Traumatic Bachelors Degree of Advanced Technology. ANd Role-Play Delirium Smegmabullfuck, or some DEBAUCHERY…

I took Mr. Robinson’s old STCS Game, and made an improved 2.07 Version with the mechanics fine-tuned, range/accuracy revised and expanded by 4-6 times, and with over 10,000 new ships, 1,000,000 new ship graphics for counters, 1,000 sound effects, and around 50 scenarios, some of them made by me.

In terms of Morose, PLEBIAN Atari 5200 games you non-genius smeggers play, I loved Pen the Pig, TTTE&F Engine Rescue, Land Ho! (A Christopher Columbus Game), Risk (Ed Note- I loved Rimmer’s beating Caldicutt at Risk at the beginning of Meltdown; <…> minus weirdness, Ass-Shitting-ness (…), and IP Crossover Bloodbath), and I had a nice Star Trek Board Game, even…

Yes, that had full 720-degree movement (1080 degree reasoning…); – trivia cards, and a pretty Damned lovely Hexgrid on a blue space image board with Green Starting Hexes at the corners, that I used, first for Brikwars in 2001, then in 2017, then we all can gosh-darn-tooting use it in any RPG/Wargames… Stuff! Yes!

…

And I had ST:TNG; the Game of the Galaxies, which had planets with names from the classic Trek (mostly TNG), depicted with 1, sometimes 2 adjacent moons. It was nice and fit the show (compared to cheap licensing camel shit).

[Rushy]

I’m partial to a bit of chess and checkers. Wish I knew how to play backgammon

[Technopeasant]

I’m partial to a bit of chess and checkers. Wish I knew how to play backgammon

[Technopeasant]

Carcassonne: medieval landscaping jigsaw and my all-time number one. … Just ignore farms to make it kid-friendly. 
Okay I have to ask – why?

Here I thought it was (un)like Stardew Valley and animal slaughter.

[Warbodog]

You can learn Backgammon by playing a computer. I’ve only played it IRL once, which was slightly spoiled by the other player (my dad) moaning about how boring it was throughout.

I bought a mahjong set from a charity shop years ago, but haven’t bothered learning the proper game, they’ve just been things to mess around with. I did actually bother to set up the solitaire turtle once or twice though.

[Rushy]

You can learn Backgammon by playing a computer. 

I’ve tried, the rules just won’t wriggle into my brain noodles

[RunawayTrain]

I’m partial to a bit of chess and checkers. Wish I knew how to play backgammon

Can I interest you in a spot of FrontHam?  http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jzqs0?start=2427&nbsp; (or the official version on YouTube for those outside of the UK – I just don’t think I can link to a specific time on All4)
https://taskmaster.info/task.php?id=4185

[Warbodog]

Tiddlywinks show jumping doesn’t even sound like a joke when you see some of the shit that actually exists.

[Warbodog]

I was a bit put off by the serious historical/Rimmer vibes, but it’s an ace game that’ll keep me busy with the bundled expansions.

I also had fun with 1 Survives, a cheesy slasher/survival movie in a deck. Best played with the full cast of 6, but so basic that you can split multiple characters between 2 or 3 players (or 1).

The best Christmas game I didn’t just buy for myself was Sushi Go!

The worst was Dos!, the sequel to Uno! that takes out all of the fun cards and replaces them with maths!!!

[Dave]

The best Christmas game I didn’t just buy for myself was Sushi Go!

We got this too. A fun game that’s straightforward enough to grasp quickly and which you can play a few rounds of without committing to a hugely long play session.

[Author]

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