For some context: I am a gamer. Video games, card games, board games, all kinds of games, I like to play! So, while I may not get as much time as I want to play card games or board games, given that I don’t regularly see my gaming friends as much as I would like, I still have spent plenty of time playing them! And of the ones that I have played, these are some of the ones that have made a pretty big impact on me because of their design, their presentation, their fun factor, or some combination of all of them. The games listed here are not going to be your standard Monopoly, Sorry, etc. Some of those games can still be enjoyable, but these are games that are definitely lean more “gaming as a hobby” instead of “casual gaming.” Also note that the listed games do not include Tabletop RPGs (as in Dungeons and Dragons) or collectible card games (as in Magic: the Gathering). I love D&D, and I enjoy M:TG, but those games definitely fall outside of the intended parameters. I will speak of what the game is about, what I like about it, and, in some cases where things might seem to be a little confusing, I might post a video about how to play the game if Watch It Played has done one, mostly because I like Rodney Smith and am okay with giving him a few extra hits! If anything else seems kind of interesting, I recommend just YouTube searching “how to play (game title)” and you should find something that will help you! Also, they’re not “really” in any type of order, although the last game I mention is undoubtedly my favorite game to break out at game nights.
Flamecraft
This is a game where you have cards that represent adorably illustrated miniature dragons. Each dragon is one type of color (I think there are 7 colors, but I could be wrong), and all dragons of a certain type of color perform the same function. You trigger your dragons by moving them to shops that are on a board that have different effects, many of which have pun-centric names, like Critical Rolls for a bakery. Dragons trigger resources, which you use to pay for enchantments or fulfill individual goals that are unique to each player and are randomized. Although the game is competitive in nature, it does not have an overly competitive theme, and, beyond paying for an enchantment, which removes it from play, or moving to a specific open slot in a store (as each store has a limited amount of available slots), there really aren’t many ways to impact what another player is doing. While the gameplay is very appealing, it really is the art that makes this game appealing. The dragons are very cute and the whole presentation gives off a quasi-Kiki’s Delivery Service vibe, with watercolor looking art and if Kiki leaned more into the fantasy.
Canvas
In Canvas, each player acts as an artist, trying to create the most points while creating three individual paintings. If you’re like me and you have no artistic talent, worry not! In Canvas, game pieces are represented with artwork on each of the game pieces. When you the game pieces together in a sleeve (3 pieces in a sleeve creates one finished painting), all of the art on the individual pieces comes together to create a full piece of art (although some of the art might overlap and be covered, depending on placement of the art), complete with a title that is also printed on each individual game piece! At the bottom of each game piece is a limited selection of values that assist with scoring. The scoring criteria is established at the beginning of the game from a variety of different scoring methods. The designers of this game made sure to include scoring examples on the back of the card to help clarify any scoring questions that players may have. Like Flamecraft, there isn’t a lot of direct player interaction, although there is a market of game pieces to pick from at any given time, and moving further and further down that line costs more resources, which are replenished by selecting earlier pieces down the line. Sometimes, what I like to do with my gaming group is have people who weren’t playing act as judges who pick one of the finished painting as the most appealing painting, although this is only done for bragging rights. Some of the paintings can be very, very appealing, and the art itself is very nice.
Anomia
For my trivia loving gaming jackals! Anomia is a pure card game, and most cards have a category and a symbol. Each player takes a turn drawing a single card and placing it in front of them. A face-off is determined by waiting for a player to draw a card with a symbol that matches the symbol of a card that is already in front of another player. Each player has to try and say a correct answer to the OTHER player’s card before their opponent does the same. So if your card says boy band member and your opponent’s card says girl band member, you have to say BoA (because she’s in Got the Beat now!) before they can say U-Know, or something to that effect. Sounds pretty simple, right? Well, if a player has more than one card in their stack and they lose the round, their card is removed from their pile and that could trigger a cascading effect that could result in another immediate face-off! And there are wild cards that have two symbols on them, creating an extra combination pattern that is in play. Each time a new wild is drawn, it gets put in the pile with all the other wilds, and if there is more than one wild in the stack, removing a wild after a round has triggered the face-off can have the same effect as removing a card from a player’s pile! It can get very chaotic, very quickly! This is a very fun game to play with a larger group (the player count goes up to 6), because it means that there are lots of piles of cards that can stack up and trigger cascading face-offs! Each deck (the base game that I got had six different decks) has, I believe, two blank cards that you can use to create your own categories. I would advise caution, though, because I did that and my friends were pissed. Partially because my handwriting is trash, but mostly because I picked “horrible” categories. Because asking someone to think of a Disney Prince is apparently too difficult or something. Whatever. At least I’m not bitter.
Dice Throne
Do you like Yahtzee? Well, then you might like Dice Throne! Even if you don’t like Yahtzee, you might like Dice Throne! In Dice Throne, each player takes a character which acts as their representative in battle. Up to 6 players can play in a single round. Each player takes a turn, rolling dice and looking at the value. Some combinations can trigger effects, such as a large straight, a small straight or three of a kind. Each character has a board that tells you what the effect of the appropriate combination is, and while the combinations are mostly the same, the effects vary from character to character. So four of a kind does something different for the Ninja than it does the Vampire. To help assist players, either in influencing their own plays or screwing over the plays of others, each character has a deck of cards, using accumulated resource points to enact the specific condition on the card. Some of the cards in the deck can be placed on that player’s board to power up the combination the next time that it is rolled! Players continue playing, attacking other players and reducing their health to zero, until they are the character who stands atop the Dice Throne! In addition to your standard stock character types, Paladin, Ninja, Vampire, etc, some of the characters are more unique, like Santa Claus and Krampus! There is also currently a set that is entirely themed to Marvel characters, and an X-Men specific set is in production. There is also a campaign focused cooperative variant, called Dice Throne Adventure, although the Adventure variant lowers the player count to 4 instead of 6, and I do not believe that the Marvel characters are intended to be used with the Adventure variant. However, addressing that particular issue is that there a variant of the Adventure type system that is designed to use the Marvel characters.
Citadels
A card based game with some round to round hidden identity shenanigans! Up to 8 players are given a hand of cards with one role on them, with roles like the Assassin, the Priest, the Magician, etc. They take that role and they place it face down. In order to ensure that there is a degree of secrecy, a game of eight players includes a ninth role, and one card is taken out of the hand of cards at the beginning, then the final player takes that excluded card and the last card in their hand to hopefully help keep them from having their role deduced by the second to last player. Each role has a unique effect. Each role is called out in numeric order, and when a number is called out, the player who took that role performs their unique role action, such as the Assassin calling out a number and if that number corresponds with a role that a player selected, they lose their turn. During a turn, a player can take a few actions, like taking income or playing a card. Each card represents a building in a fantasy themed medieval city. Some of those buildings also have special effects that take effect when played, or at the end of the game. Citadels ends when the first player places a building that hits a specific threshold (I think it’s eight). I can’t recall off the top of my head if that means that the rest of the players finish out that round and the game is over or if there’s one final round after that threshold has been reached, although I think it’s the first. Players tally their scores, with the cost of each building representing a point, and the player with the highest score winning. The variety of roles, with their powers, and the way that a player can impact the entire tempo of the round and beyond, makes this an extremely fun game.
Codenames
A game of deduction. Each round, a number of cards are placed out, either 20 or 25 is the standard number (25 by my recollection). Each one of those cards has a single keyword, like “Snake” or “Ice.” This game is intended to be played in teams, with one team representing the blue team and the other representing the red team. One member of the team is designated as the spymaster, and both spymasters have access to a card which represents the board. That card also identifies which of the keyword cards belongs to either of the teams. The blue team spymaster tries to give clues to the members of their team that will lead them to identify the words that are associated with their color, while the red team will do the same for their team. Each spymaster says a single word, followed by a number. For example, a spymaster could say “Viper” and “3.” Then their team members would talk amongst themselves and try to decipher what the spymaster meant. Viper would likely denote Snake, but, as most Jackals know, Viper linking to Snake could also link to the white demon queen herself, and if “Swift” and “Milkshake” were also keyword cards, then a savvy team might also select Swift because of her surname, and select Milkshake because of how close it is to Shake It Off. Spymasters must do their best to not give clues that lead their team to select a keyword card that belongs to the other team, as that would end the round and give the other team a point. More importantly, however, is that they have to do their best to make sure that the team doesn’t select the keyword card that is linked to the assassin on the board, because that results in their team losing immediately! Definitely not the greatest game to play with complete strangers, as it requires a bit of knowledge between the team and their associated spymaster. Given that the spymaster isn’t allowed to partake in discussions, and is expected to try and remain a visually neutral as possible, that can be quite the challenge. Still, it can be fun to see the teams scramble to try and figure out some of the clues.
Machi Koro / Machi Koro 2
Machi Koro 2 is the more recent version and have been streamlined a bit, so I would recommend that version be purchased instead of the original version, but either one of them are great, so you can’t really go wrong! In Machi Koro, players attempt to build their own perfect little city that includes some universal landmarks. The first player who builds the final landmark wins the game. So, how does one build a landmark? Why, with money, of course! Each player has some starting cards in their village, and each one of those cards has a number, a color and an effect. The number represents a number that can be rolled on a dice, or a pair of dice. If that number is rolled, then the effect takes place. And the color represents when it takes effect. Blue cards take effect whenever any player on the board rolls the associated number, while red cards take effect only when any player other than the rolling player rolls the associated number. Effects vary from card to card. Most have an active effect, like “earn 1 coin whenever this number is rolled,” but some do have passive effects. When a player takes their turn, they roll the dice, resolve the roll and then choose to build or choose to pass. If they choose to build, they can build a landmark if they can afford it, or they can build one of the establishments in the universal market that is available to all players, moving that card into the player’s village and giving them the chance to have more things happen when any given number is rolled. If you have more than one of a specific building and that number is rolled, then you can have the effect trigger as many times as you have cards! So, if you have 4 cards that are triggered whenever a 1 is rolled, that means that any time a 1 is rolled, you get that effect 4 times, whereas someone who only has 2 cards with the 1 trigger will only get that effect 2 times! It’s a very fun and easy game, but still has a nice level of complexity.
Ready Set Bet
The newest game that I own to make my pantheon of top tier games, Ready Set Bet is a must have if you ever find yourself in a situation where you have a decently sized group that you game with somewhat regularly. The game plays up to 9 players, with the 9th player only playing when acting as both the game runner and a player. I haven’t played as the 9th player yet, and I don’t anticipate ever needing to. This is such a fun game that simply being the person who runs the game brings me enough joy that I don’t need to feel like I “can” win in order to enjoy myself! Ready Set Bet simulates a horse race with dice rolls. There are 8 horses on the track, and each horse represents a number (one horse gets 2/3 and the other horse gets 11/12). Players are given chips that have numbers on them (2, 3, 4 and 5, with I believe two chips of the 3 denomination), and they are all placed near a board. On the board are lines that link with one of the 8 horses and values with denominations, like 5x, etc. The moment that the game runner rolls the first dice, the race is on! The game runner calls out each number, while also moving the associated horse on a track. If they roll an 8, they move the 8 horse up. If they roll a 7 after, the 7 horse goes next! All the while, the players with the chips are playing in real time, attempting to guess what horse will win based off of the information that changes from moment to moment, placing their chips on the game board and trying to ensure that they place their chip in their desired location before another player can place it, as there can only be one chip per placement. This real time chaos continues until either the 3rd horse has crossed the red line on the board, wherein the game runner states that all bets are off and any unspent chips are left out until the race is over, or until the first horse crosses the finish line! If a horse, other than the 7 horse, is activated twice in a row, then they get a boost that moves them up that many more additional spots. The more common numbers, like 10 or 5, only get 1 extra spot as a boost, but those 2/3 and 11/12 horses? They get, like, a 5 spot boost! After the first race (each full game has 4 races), players are given two cards and they select one card that give them some sort of power for the rest of the full game. Some of them include extra betting tokens, one of them allows a player to make bets up to the last moment, and so on and so forth! After each race, the payouts are, well, paid out. If you have a 5 chip on the 5x slot, and your horse performed well enough? Guess what, you get 25 points! But what if that same 5x slot didn’t pay out? Well, you might have to pay back 2 coins (if you have them, you can’t go in the negative in Ready Set Bet). It’s so much fun, with engaged players commonly screaming “COME ON, 9!!!!” or whatever number they want to be rolled if the race is coming close to an end. There’s also an app that you can download that completely eliminates the need for a game runner, but, for me, the greatest joy of this game is being the one with the dice. I love all of the games listed in this post, but Ready Set Bet is the first game that I have listed that I would truly consider a “must own,” with the caveat that you should only own it if you somewhat regularly find yourself in a situation where you’re hanging out with at least 5 people, counting yourself. To be fair, I don’t regularly find myself hanging out with that many people, but when I am, I love playing the game so very much.
Love Letter
Love Letter is deceptive in its simplicity, and ingenious in its design. There are two versions of Love Letter. The first version is intended to be played with 2 – 4 players, while the second version is intended to be played with 5 – 8. In Love Letter, there are cards. Each card has a role, and the role has an effect. Each player starts out with 1 card in hand, which they look at and then keep secret. On their turn, they draw a card. They pick one of their two cards and play one of the cards, performing the effect. Generally speaking, there are 3 ways to win a round of Love Letter. The first method is to eliminate every other player in the round before the final card has been drawn, which happens more often than not in my experience. The second way is to have the highest value card as the last card in your hand after the player who drew the last card has played their last card and resolved their effect. The third way is to have the Princess card in their hand after the last card has been played and resolved, as the Princess card trumps all other cards, even the card(s) that have a higher numerical value. It’s so easy to teach, so easy to run, and it’s over so quickly and you can just play as many times as you want if you don’t set a goal of how many rounds a player has to win. Once again, I think Love Letter is a must own game, provided you find yourself in a situation where you can meet one of the player counts. I like the 5 – 8 version more, because it has more cards with more effects and that increases the strategy, but the smaller version is only slightly less excellent.
Everdell / Farshore
My favorite board game of all time, at least as of this moment. Everdell is a game that seemingly has everything that I want. Amazing, whimsical art of woodland critters doing human things like running markets and playing Scribbleball, which is basically their Rugby or something? Yes! City building? Yes! A fabulous production value? Yes! In Everdell, players take the roll of critters preparing for the upcoming winter by building the best city that they can and gaining the most points. Rounds are denoted by a season. On the game board are locations which have different effects. Players, in turn, either place a worker on a game board location or play a card in their village, representing either a critter or a building. The locations are generally how you get your resources to play your cards, but some of those cards can provide resources of their own! Additionally, each building has a specific critter that they are linked with (barring a few buildings which have a wild link), and if that critter is in your hand or in the marketplace, you can play that critter for free on the next turn! Everdell and Farshore are games that are primarily about building an engine and letting that engine start to go, hopefully giving you the most points by the time the last player has made their final move that allows you to claim victory. Everdell has a whole slew of expansions that add more things to the board, increasing the complexity and the run time. My friends and I have been known to run games that we have dubbed “Foreverdell” because they last a looooong time. But they’re always so much fun!
Farshore is not an expansion for Everdell, though it is set in the same world. Instead, Farshore kind of acts as a revised Everdell, with a few modifications that make the process faster. I’ve only played Farshore once, but it definitely seems to have gone faster than Everdell. I don’t doubt for a second that Farshore will get some expansions, but, roughly a year into its release, that hasn’t happened yet. While Everdell is my favorite game of all time, I don’t necessarily think that it’s a “must have” simply because the level of complexity might be too much for some people. If you’re interested, I really would recommend going and getting Farshore as it is a bit simpler and faster, but you really can’t go wrong with Everdell either. The art is fabulous, and Everdell’s 3D Tree, or Farshore’s 3D Lighthouse certainly make statements for uninformed passerby.
