Top 7 Games to Play with your Significant Other

As Valentines Day approaches(it's next Tuesday as of the date of posting), our thoughts naturally turn to candlelight dinners, chocolate, and the one we love. Well, not so much in my case, but there is hope for the future.  Consider this my top 7 games I'd like to play with my wife someday.  I'm going to go with games that play well as 2 player, but not necessarily games that only play 2 player.

First off, some honorable mentions, but ones that didn't make it due to lack of a widely appealing theme, or me not knowing the game enough - Small World, Eminent Domain and Lost Cities.

#7 Mr. Jack
Mr. Jack is a back and forth puzzle and deduction game.   It's also a 2 player only game, so the game is balanced for that.  With game time around an hour, this isn't a brain burner, and it's pretty fun to pull out every so often.

#6 Carcassonne
Carc works really well as a 2 player game.  It's a simple matter of outscoring one opponent, and using tiles to either help yourself, or make life harder on your opponent.  If you take that to an extreme, you end up in trouble, but the occasional block should be fine.

#5 10 Days in _____ 
This is a full series of games in different locations.  I've yet to play it myself, but everything I've seen and read about it makes it fit this list perfectly.  It's all about planning a travel route in a manner similar to Rack-O.  You're dealt an opening set, but you have to draw new tiles to make adjacent countries connect, or use cars and airplanes to travel to non-adjacent countries.  It looks like a lot of fun, and who knows, you might just plan your next vacation this way.

#4 Agricola
Repeat after me, "This is not a weeknight game"  Now, some may disagree with me, but after a long day of work, I don't know anyone who wants to sit down and play a 1-2 hour game.  True, 2 player is the fastest way to play the game, but still, there's a lot of planning to this game, and every move has to matter. With that kind of cause and effect, it feels too much like work, and not the best way to relax on a weeknight.  That being said, it does make an excellent Friday night or Saturday game.  Lots of back and forth, tons of options, and you have the ability to take what you need and perhaps block your opponent from what they need.

#3 Dominion
This takes #3 in my book because it's has a lot of variety, and is quick to play.  If you or your partner don't care for the attack cards, don't play with them.  Don't like a certain card, change it out.  The goal is to make it fun for both players.  If you find that one of you wins all the time, try starting with 2 estates and a curse instead of 3 estates.  Dominion is all about cards and coming up with a good strategy.  There isn't a ton of thought required once you know the game and all the cards, but that can take awhile.  Still, for a 20-40 minute two player game, it's hard to go wrong.

#2 Ticket to Ride
I'm specifically thinking Nordic Countries since the board artwork is great, but any Ticket map would probably work well.  Depending on the map and the tickets, TtR can be a mostly friendly game or a brutal block-fest.  I think both ways can be fun, and as long as your sig-other remembers that this is just a game, I think it's a great game to play with 2 or more people.

#1 Forbidden Island
I excluded Pandemic since they are similar games as noted in my review of the two.  Forbidden Island is a great 2-player game.  The theme makes it accessible, and there's nothing better than teamwork for a relationship.  It's relatively quick, which makes it easy to play on a weeknight after dinner, and it doesn't require too much thought, which makes it the perfect game to play with your significant other.

I hope this list inspires you to sit down and play more games with your significant other.  It's a great way to bond, and a lot cheaper than dinner out and a movie!

Top 42 Part 5 (14-8)

Welcome to the top 14.  Now that the Super Bowl is over, it's time for some game talk.
Any of these 7 games could be anywhere on this list for me, but I tried to order them in terms of what would I like to play the most if I had the right group, right play time, etc.

#14 Catacombs

Catacombs is a dungeon crawl as the name suggests, but has a huge twist.  There are no dice, no combat charts, simply flicking.  That's right, you flick your hero at the monsters, or monsters at the heroes if your the game master.  Every hero has a special ability, which is further enhanced by artifacts available for purchase at your friendly neighborhood gift shop.   This game is highly innovative in the way it takes a dungeon crawl and simplifies it with the flicking mechanic.  Sure, it's hard to remember where pieces flew off the board, or to check if that piece really did hit that other piece, but that's what cameras are for, especially if they have slow motion or frame by frame replay. (You think I'm joking, but I'm not.  We've actually gone that far.)  I enjoy playing either side in Catacombs, and while the GM has a lot more to work with, the heroes generally have a fighting chance.  Sometimes it takes too long for what it is, but I enjoy playing and having a flicking good time.

 #13 Pandemic
My thoughts on Pandemic have been fairly well expressed on this blog.  If you haven't read the review on it, go take a look.  I really enjoy the puzzle aspect of Pandemic.  Now puzzle doesn't mean that there's only one right way to win the game, but rather that each piece gives a clue as to what's next.  It's a hard co-op where the board can beat you fairly easily, yet almost every game is winnable.  It's a great challenge, and a great way to see how people think and work together.  You simply have to make good use of the player abilities, else you are doomed to fail.  At this point, I never play without the expansion for the game because the additional powers make it more interesting, the new special event cards add variety, and the different ways to play the game add new challenges.  Pandemic would be ok without the expansion, probably in the 20s for me, but with the expansion it makes #13, with potential to climb.

 #12 Dixit
When I first heard about Dixit, I was skeptical at best.  I'm not a very creative person when it comes to words, as you may realize from reading my articles, but the artwork intrigued me.  There was so much depth to the pictures, and now so much variety due to ~250 cards.  This is perhaps a better Apples to Apples because it gives players freedom, and it has a better structure for scoring points.  Dixit shot up my list because of the people I played with. It's an experience game, made amazing or meh by the people who play.  At school I had many well read friends who could pull references that I knew nothing about.  Some people may get frustrated by that aspect, but I learned things, and eventually gained a good guessing instinct for the cards.  There's a very subtle line between realization and giving away the answer to other people, because the storyteller is trying to get someone but not everyone to guess their card, but if everyone or no one gets it right, the storyteller gets no points, and everyone else scores.  Dixit is a lot of fun, and if you have a group that likes Apples to Apples or storytelling, this is definitely worth a look.

#11 Forbidden Island
Here's another game that I've talked about a lot, and you'll notice the distinction between Forbidden Island and Pandemic isn't great.  Simply put, I've played Forbidden Island more frequently as of late, and had better success teaching new players the game.  I love the artwork and the near constant tension that everything has to be taken care of, else we could lose at any moment feeling.  Seriously, the best thing I can say about this game is that unless you absolutely hate co-op games, you won't be disappointed with this as compared to the money it costs you.  At worst you'll be able to give it as a gift to someone who will like it.

#10 Incan Gold
This is an intriguing press-your-luck game.  The goal is to get more treasure from the temple in 5 rounds than your opponents.  Now, you might think all you have to do is stay longer than them, but knowing when to stop is the key to this game.  Each round, a card is turned over, revealing either treasure or a trap.  A single trap acts a warning, but a duplicate triggers the trap sending everyone away empty handed.  There are 5 different traps, so it's possible that nothing will spring until the sixth trap.  The revealed treasure is split evenly between remaining players, with leftovers going on the card. The leftovers are given away to players when they run, so knowing when to run is a key aspect.  If you stay too long you may get nothing, but if you run too soon you'll be greatly outscored by your opponents.  I've had many good times with this game.  Everyone seems to understand it, though silly mistakes will be made, it's short enough, ~20 minutes, to play more than once.

#9 Rattus
Not to be confused with Ratatouille, the beloved Pixar film, this game features rats in the black plague timeframe.   Now, if you're skeptical of the theme, don't worry too much, the game doesn't really involve rats, just some rat tokens.  The goal of Rattus is to have the most cubes on the board at the end of the game, but this is easier said than done.  On your turn you can take a power card, each one has a symbol on it which will come into play later.  Then you place cubes in one region equal to the number of rat tokens there.  Then you move the plague piece into an adjacent region, place one or two rat tokens in adjacent regions, and finally you resolve the plague by looking at the total number of cubes in the area, comparing it with the token, then causing player powers, the majority owner or all players to lose a cube.  This goes on until there are either no rat tokens left, or one player gets all 20 of their cubes on the board.  It's a fun back-and-forth amongst powers, with players taking your power sometimes.  You want the powers to do extra things, but the powers also cause you to lose more cubes, so it's a tough balance.  If you can get past the theme, Rattus is an enjoyable strategy game with some luck mixed in.

#8 Shadows Over Camelot
Shadows is one of the earlier co-op games, but it took me awhile to get around to playing it.  I personally love the theme, come on, it's Arthurian Legend.  I think the knights of the round table was the first real fantasy that I enjoyed, plus the Stargate-SG1 use of things helped keep my interest in the mythos.  Each player plays a knight of Camelot, or King Arthur.  Every knight has a special power which helps good defeat evil, but the twist to the game is that one knight may be working against the others.  It took my 45 games to finally act as the traitor, though not all of those were games where a traitor was possible.  There are multiple quests that the knights have to work on together in order to succeed.  Knights can purse the Holy Grail or Excalibur, fight the Black Knight, the Picts or Saxons, the treacherous Lancelot or the fearsome dragon.  There are a lot of things to do, and the key to Shadows is managing what you can and can't do, letting things fail, and trying to win things at the right time.  I've spent many good hours trying to figure out and then defeat the traitors to Camelot, as well as direct the knights.  I've had more fun watching seemingly innocent people (MY SISTER!) play the deepest hidden traitor act, and completely bamboozle the knights.  The one thing I've yet to see is King Arthur turn traitor, but I know it will happen eventually.

Just one more week to get through this list.
I apologize for the lack of other articles, but without a digital camera I'm kinda stuck on reviews.  I've been writing a few, but other life events also slow things down.  I'm trying to keep things going, so a big thank-you to everyone sticking with me and here's to better things ahead!

Top 42 Part 4 (21-15)

Thanks for coming back again. You can find part 3 here, and links to previous ones from there.

Without further adieu,


#21 Werewolf/Mafia
It's hard to really count this as a board game, but with the ultimate werewolf edition, and thus role cards I'm going to go ahead and count this.  I've only played Werewolf a handful of times, but each time it has been a lot of fun.  It takes a large group to play well, and the best games I played were the 15-20 person ones.  You need at least 10 to make it worthwhile, so because of that, I don't get to play it much, but it's a lot of fun trying to figure out who's a werewolf.  The best moments are the ones where everything goes wrong, like when the werewolves get the last laugh, who then kills one of cupid's lovers which kills the other lover.  This game has a lot of good memories, and is a really fun way for a large group of people to play something together and have a lot of laughs.

#20 1960: The Making of the President

This is another game that I've only played a few times, but it was an interesting game.  Politics aren't of much interest to most people except in election years, but this game captures the tension of a close political race.  1960 was perhaps the most seesaw election process in recent history, and this game captures it perfectly.  Each player can play cards either for their affect or for action points, but they have to be careful because if they use them for action points, their opponent can try to use the action for himself.  I don't have much of the strategy to this game figured out, but it's a very well designed two player game, and it makes me want to try Twilight Struggle.  A great political game about a fascinating election, and my favorite 2 player only game.

#19 Carcassonne

This would be higher on my list, but it dropped down due to lack of recent plays. I think all the good things I have to say are in my review of Carc, but let me summarize why it's here on the list.  I can play it with just about anyone, it's easy to teach to new players.  Also, Meeples are just plain fun to play with, and the way they do different things gives players strategy opportunities.  You can't go all farmers early on, else you'll fall behind on points, and your farms won't do enough to catch up.  The downside is the numerous expansions and thus new rules, so it feels like I play the set of tiles every single time.  It's the only tile laying game I own, which gives it unique mechanics.  I really like the variety on tiles and the building aspect.  I've had a lot of fun with Carc, and I will continue playing it at least occasionally for a long time.

#18 Small World

First off, sorry Tahlia, it did fall this low, but really 19-8 were really had to decide between, and they each have their own merits and I like them all.  Small World is a fantasy combat game.  I won't call it a war game, since it's a bit too simple for that, but the game is all about combat.  You get a race, think Halflings, Elves, Giants, Sorcerers, etc. and a power, like Seafaring, Forest, Dragon Master, which give you a certain number of tokens which you use to conquer areas on the board. For each area you get a coin, and after a certain number of rounds, the high total wins.  Combat is really easy, you just need 2 tokens, plus how ever many things are currently on the region in order to take it over.  This leaves no surprises in bad die rolls which eliminates some of the frustration.  Somehow it just seems more fun when you die to Diplomat Ratmen or Flying Halflings as opposed to the rigorous and tedious combat system that is Risk.

#17 Space Hulk: Death Angel 

This is the hardest co-op game I've played.  The genestealers pursue you from room to room, and your space marines will rarely be exactly where you need them.  Nevertheless, it's a lot of fun to try to beat the game, and with player range going from 1-6 it works well for a lot of game groups.  Each player is put in control of one team of space marines (2 different marines) and given 3 options for actions.  On your first turn, you can choose from any of the three, but after that you only have access to the two you didn't just play, meaning you can't do the same thing back to back.  This means you have to be sure that what you're doing now isn't going to be necessary next turn, and you also have to communicate with teammates so not everyone attacks on the same turn.  It's all about balance and communication, yet the way in which enemies come out and the events that happen are anything but balanced, and the game limits the player's communication.  It doesn't matter though, because the game is still enjoyable and something I want to play frequently.

#16 Settlers of Catan

More specifically, Cities and Knights.  This was the first hobby game I ever played, and I, for lack of a better term, fell in love.  I started thinking about it, replaying games in my head, and wanting to play it all the time.  Perhaps I've romanticized Settlers, because when I play it now, some of the charm is gone, but I can't deny that I played it a lot of times, and it was the start of my gaming family, and the reason I have three amazing friends from college.  Catan is a game I will one day play with my girlfriend, and then fiancé, and then wife, and someday kids and nieces and nephews.  I can't deny that it is the reason I love boardgames, and it's an amazing blend of strategy and luck, resource management and player interaction.  It does a lot of things pretty well, no single thing great, but it's a great way to spend a few hours with people, and that's the mark of a great game.

#15 Roll Through the Ages

Consider this a civilization game boiled down to dice. Now, many elements had to be removed, but since I've never played a true civ game, I enjoy this for what it is.  You use workers to build cities, cities give you more dice, then you use workers to build monuments.  You have to get food to feed your cities, else your people starve and you lose points.  If you roll too many skulls, you lose points, but if you make 3, you attack your opponents.  Skulls give you goods which let you trade for coin which then allows you to buy developments.  Sure, there's luck in what you roll, it's dice for goodness sake, but there's a lot of strategy that can mitigate the luck.  I personally play with the expansion which adds more development and player to player trading, which adds to the civilization feel.  Overall, it's a well done dice game that I enjoy in ~45 minutes, which is great.

Just 14 more to go.  Sunday will be 14-7, then I will do 7-6-5-4 on Wednesday 2/7 and 3-2-1 on Sunday 2/11.

January 2012 Monthly Update and Contest Winner!

Welcome to February!

January was a great month of gaming for me.  I logged 36 game plays not counting expansions, so that's a great start towards 300.  I've also played games with 15 different people, so that's a great amount of variety.  My cousin started a Monday night gamenight which helped increase the play count.

I acquired two new games, Scary Tales and Star Trek: Fleet Captains.  Both have been fun to play so far, and both look to have earned keeper status.

My unplayed game count is now at 14, down from 16 to start the year, thanks to playing Birds on a Wire and Fauna. The unplayed list is as follows just to track it

• Tales of the Arabian Nights (soon)
• Descent (Summer hopefully)
• Coloretto (Soon)
• Scrabble Slam (eventually)
• Monopoly Express (no rush)
• Clue Express (no rush)
• Battleship Express (no rush)
• S'quarrels (soon)
• Zooloretto (want to play soon)
• Crappy Birthday (eventually)
• RoboRally (soon)
• Risk 2210 AD (probably will trade before ever playing, due to Risk Legacy)
• Settlers of Canaan (eventually)
• High Bid (eventually)

January saw the 1,000th page view for this blog which is incredible in under 2 months, thank-you all so much for that.

I posted 3 hobby game reviews, and 4 Not in Candyland articles, as well as the start of the top 42 list, plus my first ever board game video!  

February will probably see 3 or 4 more of each of those (provided I can get a replacement camera soon, else the main reviews will be awhile).  In honor of Valentines Day, I'm going to do a Top 7 list of 2 player games to play with your spouse/girl/boyfriend who may or may not be a boardgamer.

I got a cross promotion with the Games and Grub, as well as a great retweet by Tasty Minstrel Games on my Eminent Domain review.  Also, a huge boost to the viewership from www.dicetowernews.com with my playing to win the game article.  I think reaction to the work here has been mostly positive.  I can't thank each of you enough for reading, commenting and voting in the polls.  I hope you'll continue reading and commenting, and if you haven't commented, feel free.  

Now, without further adieu, the contest results!

I had 5 people enter, which is a good start, and I chose my favorite entry which was Tahlia's, which gets an extra roll.  I was surprised no one took advantage of the replayability offer for an extra chance to win, but that's how it goes.

So, I will now roll 3d6, high total wins, ties will be rerolled until we get a winner.

In no particular order

R [4,4,3]=11

C [6,4,3]=13

T [2,1,3]=6

J [3,2,3]=8

E [3,3,4]=10

T [4,5,2]=11

So congratulations to Carol! You won a copy of Say Anything!  Look out for an e-mail later today.

Thanks everyone for your time in entering this contest.  Probably another one sometime in the future, but not before summer I would imagine.

Top 42 Part 3 (28-22)

Thanks for coming back. Previous parts can be found Part 1 and Part 2

#28 This Game is Bonkers!

I did a larger review of Bonkers in my Mousetrap post for Not in Candyland, so I'll just talk briefly about it.  Bonkers is a fairly quick game all about dice rolling and then movement, but rather than have a preplanned board, the players set up what different spots do.  Some will involve advancing your piece, others going to Score, while others let you roll again or exchange tiles.  The players build the board, and this has appealed to me since the first time we played.  Sure, most moves are fairly obvious, and there's tons of luck, but Bonkers is a game that everyone has fun playing, and you don't really care if you win or lose.

#27 Kingsburg

Kingsburg is a Dice Management game, meaning that you roll dice, and use them to get different resources which in turn you use to build buildings.  These buildings give you points, and points are how you win the game.  The interesting part of the game is the advisor track.  Each advisor has a number - 1-18, and different things associated with them, anything from 1 victory point, to 4 stone, or one of each resource and a point.  Obviously, the higher the number the better the item, but you have to use your dice.  Each player rolls 3d6, and the low roll gets to place on one advisor with one or more of their dice.  That's the strategy to this game - how to make what you roll work best for you.  It isn't always as simple as taking the highest advisor possible, sometimes you have to break up your dice, but in breaking them up, you run the risk of someone else blocking you.  There are also a lot of different buildings you can go after, and with different ones doing unique things many strategies exist for building order.

#26 Race for the Galaxy

RftG is a card based empire building game.  At the start of a turn, each player selects a phase that will be played by all players this time, with the selector of the phase getting a bonus.  The neat part of the game is that the cards in your hand are the developments you can make, the planets you can settle or conquer and the way you pay for those things.  Games don't take all that long once you know how things work.  There are several different strategies which all seem to work well depending on your cards and what you opponents attempt.  I traded away my copy, since I don't play on my own, but my gaming family still has their copy, so we can play it if we want.  I do play a fair amount with the free download against an AI, and this program now supports online multiplayer.  It's a  well designed game, which gets it high on this list, but a long learning curve and a lack of interaction keep it down at 26.

#25 Wits and Wagers (and Family Version)

W&W is the better Trivia Pursuit in the sense that it's trivia, but you don't have to know all the answers.  One person takes a card and reads a question. Each person then writes down what they think the answer is on their card.  After everyone is done, the cards are revealed then organized from low to high.  Now, depending on the version, the betting rules change, but since no one has has answer right (most likely) players have to bet on where they think the answer is, as in between two different answers or higher than the highest, lower than the low, or on an exact answer.  Players then get points or chips (again, based on the version of the game).  After 7 questions in the base game, or until a certain point number in the family version, the game is over, and high score/chips wins.  Of course play can go longer depending on the players.  I've learned a lot of random facts from this game, and the great thing of W&W is that you don't have to know the answer to do well, and leads to things being more fun and less stress.  It's a great party game, and something I'd love to play in big teams.

#24 Tiki Topple

I was first introduced to Tiki Topple by an RD at college and her husband.  It was a great game to end the night, so I decided to pick up my own copy.  It's been a hit ever since.  I've given it as a wedding gift, and other game plays have lead to two people picking up their own copy.  The best use of Tiki Topple was in a Jr. High and HS game day that taught kids more about games.  In the game, there are 9 tikis which form a totem pole.  Your secret mission, is to get your 3 tikis to the top of the pole at the end of the game to score points. Each card has a tiki from each of the 3 groups of tikis on the board, meaning something starts in the top 3, something in the middle, and something in the bottom 3.  First place must end in 1st to get points, but 2nd can be 1st or 2nd, and 3rd just has to be in the top 3.  You play until you either have 3 tikis left, or all players have played their tiki toast cards.  A tiki toast card simply removes the low tiki from the round.  The rest of the game is about moving your tikis up, and trying to avoid them getting toasted.  It's really lighthearted, and rather out of your control.  It is fun to watch someone's face as you toast their Wikiwiki that they needed in 1st.  That satisfaction is short lived because your Hookipa that you need in 1st will then get toppled and toasted before you can do anything.  If you go in knowing it's a fun and random game, you'll have a good time with it, but if you want tons of control look elsewhere.  Tiki is a great random game for me, and something I love playing anytime someone suggests it.

#23 Risk Legacy

This is much more than Risk.  It's a modified campaign, and the goal isn't world domination, it's playing to a certain victory point count.  I've only played two games out of the recommended 15, but it made a great impression.  There are packets containing secret information which you open at specified times depending on game events, like eliminating a player, or playing a certain number of missiles.  The tagline of the game is "What has been done can never be undone."  Let me tell you, there are things that other players have done that I'd like to do differently, but that's the charm of the game.  We have a unique Risk board that plays differently than anyone else's, and that really cool to me.  Yes, the combat is still the same, but there are special faction powers and 'scars' which change some of that, and a lot of rules I've yet to get into, since each packet changes those rules as well.  I know I'll get 15 plays out of this eventually, since that's what the campaign is set-up to do.  That's more than most new games out there, so for the innovative ideas Risk Legacy comes in at #23.

#22 For Sale

For Sale is a pretty quick and easy to teach property game.  Each turn, you reveal one property for each person playing.  You can then bid or pass. If you pass at any time, you pay half your bid rounded up and take the lowest numbered property on the table.  The last person pays their full bid and gets the highest property.  There are only 30 properties in the game, so a 5 player game only takes 6 rounds, a 6 player game takes only 5 rounds.  After all the properties are distributed, players take their hand of cards and will use them to secretly bid on checks.  There are 30 checks valued at $0 to $15,000 with two copies of each and no $1,000.  There are checks turned up for the number of players, then each player chooses a property, places it face down.  Then all are revealed and the highest property gets the biggest check, the lowest property the lowest check and so on.  At the end, you total up your checks and any remaining bid tokens you have with the high score winning.  Overall, the game takes ~20 minutes, often less.  It works for 3-6 players, but I find it best for 5-6.  I'll play For Sale any time, and will probably play it for as long as I play boardgames.

Well, that's the first half of the list.  Hope you've enjoyed it so far.  Keep checking for more parts to the list on Wednesdays and Sundays, as well as other reviews throughout the week.

Life update

This is a post that no one wants to write nor read but here it is. This morning I was woken up by rummaging noises in my house. Turns out someone had broken in. I was the only one home at the time and I'm ok which is the most important thing. However the criminal did abscond with my laptop and digital camera. Fortunately they left the iPad so I still has some Internet connection. The downside is that my ability to take pictures is gone, so game reviews are on hold, as is the top 42 list until I can recreate it(I only wrote it down on the computer so the specifics are shot for now)
It will probably take me at least the weekend to get things sorted out and the pieces back together.

Your thoughts are appreciated in this jarring time. Hope you'll be back when I am. If you're newer to BOBG take a chance to read some of the early articles.

Thanks for your time and support. Wer're nearly to 1000 page views in under 2 months!

Top 42 Part 2 (35-29)

In an effort to not drag this list on for a month and a half, I'm going with two posts a week, meaning we'll be done before the end of February.

#35 The Game of Life: Jedi's Path

Alright, I know you're all going Life! Really?  Sure, this game still uses the same roll and move mechanic, but there are more options.  There are four different skill categories which all have tests throughout the game.  Your career and house have been replaced by a master and a lightsaber, a pretty good trade if you ask me.  You also have the choice to take different paths, but most require taking a dark side token.  These can cause you to go over to the Sith at the end of the game, or hurt you if you end up on the Jedi side.  At the end, the strongest Jedi and Sith have a final showdown, winner takes all.  This gives players some strategic choices in case they see a strong Jedi, they can go dark and try to win that way.  Overall, a nice variation on Life, a good use of the Star Wars theme, and a good game for Star Wars fans, but not something for the hardcore gamer.

#34 Fauna

Fauna is a game all about wildlife trivia.  Don't stop reading, it's actually a fun game.  See, the game isn't about knowing it all, though a good knowledge of animals will help you out, it's about having good ideas and estimates on things.  It's rather simple, an animal is revealed, you see a picture, get the scientific name, and how many areas it lives in. Based on that, you can place a cube in a region of the map, or take a guess as to how much it weighs, how tall/long it is, and how long its tail is.  If you're right you get points, but if you're adjacent to the right answer you get some points.  The game usually sees ~15 animals in play, so even if you have no clue on one, you can still win the game.  The wrinkle to the game is that you only get 6 cubes.  If a cube scores points, you get it back, but if it doesn't you lose it for a round.  You always get at least 3 cubes to play with, so you won't fall too far behind if you take a lot of chances.  I've only played twice, but both games have been close.  It's a game the entire family can play, and I'd also see some great uses in a classroom setting using teams as each player.

#33 The Adventurers (Temple of Chac)
I like to call this Indiana Jones, the board game.  As an adventurer, your job is to go into this temple, get  as much treasure as you can, and make it out before the boulder seals you inside.  Now, it would be easy to just get all the treasure you want, but the more you get, the less likely you are to get actions.  Meaning, there's a great balancing act.  Throughout the game you'll have to get through two walls closing in on you, then outrun the boulder while tiptoeing the lava pit, rushing down the river, and crossing the rickety old bridge.  If this sounds fun, just wait until you see the boulder right behind you while you're doing all of this. The production quality here is amazing.  You get 12 different adventurers, the walls, the boulder and the bridge, as well as lava tiles and all the treasure cards.  I've yet to come out alive, but the game is still a great deal of fun.  Also great for the young ones.

#32 Mr. Jack

A two player game of deduction and stealth.  In this game, one player takes the role of a Scotland Yard detective while the other player takes control of Jack the Ripper.  Each odd turn 4 of the 8 characters are revealed, and used by the players to learn or conceal information.  The inspector's goal is to figure out which character Jack is using to hide his identity, while Jack is trying to escape or last 8 turns with the inspector either not making an accusation, or making a false one.
Each of the 8 characters has a special ability.  Some are more helpful to the Inspector, others to Jack, but figuring out how to make best use of each of them is the fun part to the game.  I've played a lot more online than in real life which gives you more time to think, but I've come to realize that I much prefer playing Inspector rather than Jack.  Its two completely different ways to play the same game, which gives it some replayabilty.  The theme is great for someone who's a mystery fan, but as a game, I think there are better two player only games in existence.

#31 Power Grid
This is probably the first "euro" game I ever played, meaning it's all about the mechanics, and strategy, very little luck.  I enjoy Power Grid because it feels like a giant math puzzle.  It's all about figuring out when to expand, how much to bid in the auctions, and how many resources to keep stored versus waiting for that next turn.  I've only played a handful of times, and I ended up going overboard by buying most of the map expansions, which gave me options, but I realized that I really only needed the original map, and I think I have one more just for variety.  There's a lot of math here, but it's covered in money, so it seems to be more straightforward.  I haven't played this in almost two years, maybe three, but it's still one I enjoy, even if the theme is a bit bland.  Maybe it was me winning all the time, though I doubt that would hold up long term, or maybe it was that Power Grid felt too much like work, my gaming dad does work in the power industry, that caused PG to fall flat.  Nevertheless, it's still a great game design, and something I'm glad I've played, and something I hope to play more in the future.

#30 High Society
I have to admit that High Society's ranking shot up because of the IOS app.  It has allowed me to play a lot more games, and see the intrigue in the game.  Essentially the game is about using your money to acquire works of art, and avoid hazards like a thief, a fire and a forgery.  There are 10 paintings worth 1-10 points, 3 2x multipliers, and the 3 hazards (steals your lowest, cuts points in half and -5 points respectively.)  Each turn you flip a card over and have to bid on it with money cards in your hand.  You can only add in cards from your hand, never replacing, though if you pass you take your cards back.  As soon as the forth multiplier card is flipped (the 3 doubles and the half) the game is over and the high score wins.  Sounds pretty simple right? Well, before you figure out the high score, the person who has the least amount of remaining money (or people if there's a tie) are automatically eliminated.  This creates a balance between gaining paintings and having money left to spend.  Overall a fun, quick card game for 3-5 people.

#29 Formula D

Formula D is a racing game, Formula 1 racing to be specific.  If you're a fan of that, you'll love the game, but even if you aren't, you still might enjoy it.  I purchased Formula D for Father's Day a few years back, and we've played as a family.  Most of our races have come down to dad and myself, but sometimes my sister gets in there and steals the win.  We've yet to play the advanced rules, since we don't play this much, but we have a great time teasing mom when she crashes out, or dad when he rolls the worst possible number and takes 5 turns to get down the straight.  The great thing in Formula D are the different gears are represented by different sided dice. So when you're in first gear you roll a d4 and can only get a 1 or 2. 2nd gear gives you a d6 numbered 2-4 twice, and so on, all the way to 6th gear and a d30 numbered 21-30 3 times each.  It's really fun to have different dice represent the progression of gears, and really gives you a reason to move through the gears and have fun with it.  Sure the game has some funky maps, but there are so many of them between Formula D and Formula De, that you can pick and choose the best ones.  If you like racing at all, or like moving a car around a board, give this a try.  It's easier than you think it would be, and a lot of fun.


That's the first third of the list, coming up on Sunday night, 28-22, and next Wednesday I'll do 21-15.