…isn’t here. Suckers. However, there have been a few sites that have opened up recently that are invaluable for board game lovers. Check these out if you’re interested in them, or if a certain gamer in your life needs a new board game for the holidays (or has a birthday 6 days before Christmas and wants boardgames.)
The first is not a news site, but the results of a poll taken of a number of “Euro-style” game enthusiasts. They collected the results and compiled it as The Top 100 Board Games of All Time. The main site has a lot of analysis, but you can skip to the results or read descriptions of each one along with a picture and comments. (Scroll about halfway down, look for where the pictures start.) I’ve played half the games in the top 10, and 40 of those in the top 100. Still many more that I’d like to try!
For actual news and updates, Boardgamenews launched yesterday. After Gamefest stopped doing its news features, Chief Reporter Rick Thornquist (who once mistook me for a Canadian) put together the new site with all sorts of board game enthusiasts all over the world. He also maintains the “Gone Cardboard” page there, the best source for upcoming games there is. Aside from news stories (which are focused on just board games unlike other good overal gaming sites like RPGnet, Ogrecave, and GamingReport) Only live for a few days now, Boardgamenews already has commentary, reviews, audio reviews, and podcasts. Definitely worth checking out.
If you have questions about a boardgame, you’ll want to check out Boardgamegeek (most often referred to as “the geek.”) Think IMDB for the board game set, you’ll find plenty of reviews, errata, and variants for any board or card game worth playing. An invaluable resource to the point where it’s tough to imagine life without it.
And of course there’s critical-hits.com, which, well, isn’t a good source for news but we’ll definitely tell you what we like when not arguing about video games.
Interesting list, but I’m actually surprised by their number 1 game. Their choice actually puts me in a real mental pickle. While I did really enjoy playing Puerto Rico (and beating the jerk demo guy at Balticon) and would like to play it again to see if I can agree with that list, that would mean coming back from undefeated retirement. Maintaining my retirement has its benefits lying in the whole “Spite The Game” aspect. On a different note, I enjoyed how Ticket to Ride was in the top 10. However, I strongly feel that both poker and Go should have been higher on the list than 49 and 51 respectively.
Oh, and before I forget…..I get a huge kick out of how not a single Games Workshop board game product is on there……..satisfying.
The methodology of the survey is more to blame for Go and Poker being so far down. They picked people within a certain group (eurogame enthusiasts) who play Eurogames more than anything else and would be hard pressed to put such classic games higher on their list. It’s definitely not an “accurate” list (though criteria for such a list would be hard even for me to define) but is still great for finding good games.
And yeah, no GW games because A. they haven’t made board games in a while, and 2. they don’t make good games. 🙂
The exclusion of Dave: The Game is attrocious, everyone plays this game, all the time, it’s like we’re inside of Dave: TG the MMORPG….right now. When will the muchly anticipated expansion for Dave: The Game, ‘Burning Regions’, be coming out?
Oh, and cock-blocking shall now be referred to as Ninja-looting, as it pertains to D:TG.
I veto the terminology change, Cock Blocking is just too perfect.