Tuesday, September 10, 2024
Okay, game gourmands, here’s the challenge: pick ten games (or fewer!) which, as a group, encompass as many themes, mechanics, and genres as you could possibly want, so that if you were marooned with your favorite gaming group on a desert island and had only these games to play, you would have as manysatisfying possibilities as possible.Some ground rules to make things more challenging: (1) base games only, no expansions; (2) no open-source modular systems allowed. Here I’m specifically thinking of things like a deck of regular playing cards, Piecepack, Decktet, and (sadly, since otherwise I’d include it) Mü & Mehr.So then here’s my list of ten, in no particular order:
(1) Neue Heimat (Euro, bidding, push your luck, negotiation)
(2) Dixit (party, language independent)
(3) Boggle (word, party)
(4) Cuba Libre (consim, scalable 1-4)
(5) Star Realms (s.f. theme, deckbuilding, multiple modes of play)
(6) Nations (civ building theme, card drafting, variable player powers)
(7) Keyflower (Euro, worker placement, pick up & deliver, tile placement, bidding)
(8) Space Alert (real-time, scalable, multiple scenarios)
(9) Imperial (rondel, stock-holding, area-control, area-movement)
(10)The Resistance: Avalon (medieval theme, hidden teams, traitor, simultaneous action selection)
By no means is this my all-time top ten! Nor am I claiming this list encompasses everything modern boardgames have to offer. What I am saying is that this bundle offers a solid selection of themes, genres, and mechanics, with a good range from light party fare all the way up to some pretty heavy gaming goodness.I’d be interested in seeing other people’s attempts.
[…] first article for The Daily Worker Placement, a short piece entitled The Desert Island Collection, was posted on January 1, 2015. And now, almost exactly nine years and 284 pieces later, you are […]