Blogs Recommend Me A Board Game

http://www.bit-tech.net/blog/2009/11/27/recommend-me-a-board-game/

 

Munchkin
http://www.worldofmunchkin.com/

 

Space Hulk, if you can find one.

 

Munchkin looks good, but it says that a single move by a single player can take as long as 20 minutes? I'd want to move a little faster than that...

 

Was also going to say Space Hulk. I have never played it myself, but would love to grab a set. Any input on which revision to go for? I hear different things.

 

ghettopoly is a great laugh, only problem is it usually ends in fighting.

 

I've only played the original version of Space Hulk and it was insane amounts of fun. Apparently the new version is equally as good though and somewhat more readily available.

 

You should try Formula D - it's a terrific F1 racing boardgame. Everyone who I've played it with has loved it, even if they're not into the sport. Very tactical and involving.

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/37904

 

This video tells you pretty much all you need to know about Space Hulk.

I'd also recommend having a go on the third edition of Talisman - it's a fun, expandable fantasy board game for 1-6 players. It doesn't take too long to play and (unlike many Games Workshop games) doesn't require you to spend ridiculous amounts of money on overpriced lumps of lead. I don't think you can buy it new any more, but you can pick it up on eBay for around £40.

 

Settlers of Catan.

 

I'm a huge fan of Settlers of Catan. Space Hulk is like chickens teeth to find these days - sold out everyware and being scalped online...

 

If it's no problem that it's not storyboard driven:
Torres siple but very replayable.

Munchkin, does it get better with more card sets? I just have the starterset and it's...just not fun. You spend ages beeing rediculessly weak then finish the game immediately when strength is gained.

 

POP UP PIRATE

 

Now this is my area.

Glad to see you're discovering board games, LNoE is one of my favourites too (I think at it's height we must have played at least 2 games every day), I recommend the Growing Hunger expansion if you don't already have it, it does really add to the game.



Arkham Horror is a very good game, but it can be very long. My first game literally took all day, the main problem with this is I hadn't the chance to figure out the rules before hand so it was learning as we were going. It's best with 2-4 players IMO (with 2 players, each person controlling 2 investigators). You can play with more but 4 investigators is the sweet spot for balancing the difficulty. Expect your first game or two to be quite confusing, but given it's really bad start for me and my friends, at one point it was my friend and I's favourite. Great thing is there's lots of expansions out there too for when you're starting to find the base game too easy.

Pandemic 2-4 players (2-5 w/ expansion)

Pandemic is a great little game, it's a co-op game where you and your friends have to save the world from 4 diseases that are threatening to take over and wipe out humanity. It's quite a quick game, only takes 30-45 min, but it's pretty intense. You it looks like you've got things under control and then Bad Things happen and a disease surges and infects several cities at once. There's also an expansion available for this now which is very good once you've cracked the base game.

Galaxy Trucker - 2-4 players (2-5 w/ expansion)

Everyone I've played this with loves the game, even people who aren't really into board gaming. In this game you're basically a red-neck space trucker, except your ship is made out of the cargo and you build it yourself.

There are two parts to the game, building the ship, and flying the ship.

Each player has a board which has an empty ship-shape grid, and in the middle you have a big pile of the ship building blocks, square cardboard bits that fit onto the grid. There are several different types, engines, guns, crew compartments, storage bays, shields, generators, etc. When the game starts everyone scrambles, picking up a piece at a time and deciding whether to put it on the ship or put it back down face up (where you or another player can take it later). This is quite frantic as you're trying to make a ship well made but also quickly, because the order you finish in is the order you start off in. There is a timing rule to this but we don't particularly like it and just say when the first person finishes it starts a timer for the other people to finish in. Usually in your first few games the ships will be horribly built which makes the next part funny.

In the flying the ship section you have a pile of cards, in the first round you have about 8 I believe. The person in the lead draws the card and then does whatever it says. Some examples are:

Open space: you count up your engines and move that many spaces forward, starting with the first player
Planet cards: Starting with the first player, you can choose to land or not on several pictured planets, if you land you have a time delay (move back some spaces on the board) and then can take the goods pictured on the planets into your cargo bays (these are worth money at the end of the round)
Asteroids: Several asteroids fly at everyone's ships, the leader rolls a dice to determine where they hit, then every player checks to see what happens. For instance, small asteroids bounce off the hull, but if you've made your ship badly and it hits an open connector, that piece will be destroyed. Then you've got big asteroids that can only be blocked by shooting a laser at it.

Losing pieces is where the game gets really fun, if the piece you lost is holding other pieces to the ship, you'll lose those pieces too. The first time my friend played he made a really wide thin ship that was utterly destroyed, and I have one game where an asteroid hit a really weak point in my ship and half of it came away.

Then when no more cards remain whoever is in first gets the most money, last place gets the least. There's also a prize for the person with the prettiest ship (the person with the least open connectors). After that you flip your board over for the next round. You now have a bigger ship and the deck becomes bigger with nastier cards in there. There are 3 round in total, plus an advanced version of round 3 where you're trying to build on a starship enterprise looking grid which can be pretty challenging.

I've not played the expansion but it adds an extra player, advanced boards for rounds 1 and 2, and several new components and cards.

Battlestar Galactica Board game - 3-6 players (3-7 w/ expansion)

This is a fantastic game, but it can unfortunately be a bit inconsistent with it's awesome factor. Some games are utterly amazing, some games can be a bit ****.

This is a board game based on the new BSG series, made by the same guys as Arkham Horror. It's a co-op game but with a twist. Each person plays a character on Galactica and you're trying to get to Kobol. One player is the Admiral, and one is the President, but this can change. You're all working together to fend off cylon attacks and work out problems that arrive on the ship and the fleet. However, one or more people (depending on how many players there are) are actually cylons. They're trying to stop Galactica reaching Kobol. So in every game, you'll have at least one person who is trying to make it look like they're helping but at the same time, they're actually not. It's almost like combining Arkham Horror with poker and it can be a glorious combination.

As I said, it's a bit inconsistent sometimes, in some games, you might not get any combat for ages which can make it a bit dull, and the excitement of figuring out who the cylon player is really depends on how good they are at doing it. Usually the game really kicks in at the halfway point, usually people are willing to trust each other near the beginning, but at about the halfway point, you get games where you just have no idea who the cylon is and several people think you're the cylon. It can get pretty intense.

Although this game is 3-6 players, I would only play it with a minimum of 4 players, 5 or 6 is best, that way you're guaranteed 2 cylons. Makes things really fun when you have cylons trying to figure out who the other cylon is so they can work together.

While there is obviously a lot of BSG theme in here, my friend who has only heard of the series still really enjoyed the game, so don't worry about playing this one if you've never seen the series.

There is an expansion out, I haven't managed to play it yet, but it looks to be a really awesome expansion that could fix some of the consistency problems of the base game and add in lots of extra cool mechanics.

Fluxx

Lastly Fluxx, a short but sweet card game. It is a marmite game, some love it, some hate it, I and my friends love it. It just boils down to whether you can deal with chaos and if you can see the pattern in chaos. I think the main problem people have with it is they see it as being completely random, there is a big random element to it, but it's sort of like that random friend who's really weird but also really funny.

It's a game that the rules change constantly, it starts off where each player draws 1 card and plays one card. You can play cards that mean people draw more cards, play more cards, have a hand limit, introduce goals to win, give you items that might be what you need to win, or just play an action like take another turn or wipe out the rules.

It's great fun, possible to win in the first hand, but sometimes can go on for several reshuffles of the draw deck. I took it round to my aunt and uncles this summer and we played it at the BBQ the day after my cousin's wedding. We didn't manage to finish the game before I left but they were enjoying it so much I had to leave without it (there was a new version out anyway so I was looking for an excuse to buy it ).

There are several themed decks of Fluxx too, which can be added together into one monster game. So far the ones that spring to mind are:

Regular Fluxx, now in it's 4th edition
Zombie Fluxx
Monty Python Fluxx
Stoner Fluxx
Martian Fluxx (I believe this isn't out yet)

Actually thinking about it, wasn't Fluxx in one of you're on our desks once?

Those games and LNoE are the groups favourites, I have a few more, A Touch of Evil (an Arkham crossed with Talisman game, themed like Sleepy Hollow, made by the same people as LNoE), Race for the Galaxy, Puerto Rico (this is sort of the thinking mans game, LNoE is the CoD of the board game world, PR is the Civ), Carcassonne, Fire and Axe, Revenge of the B-movie. Plus there are so many others I want to play but simply can't afford.

 

As SlowMotionSuicide sugest, try Space Hulk. Its 3rd limited edition is still on sale in GW website (At least in Spain).

I would like to sugest you original Battletech boardgame, but could be hard to find (try eBay).

 

Bloodbowl.

Have been playing it (PC version) again recently, lack of sleep due to it is killing me.

Can't think why the board version would be any less fun either

 

Got it already. It's in the cycle.

Also have Fluxx, but it gets a bit samey.

 

any version of Space Hulk is good. I beleive the newest one is pretty much an amalgamation of all the expansions for the original. The figures in the original one are pretty rubbish but the newest one's are fantastic. however you will have a very difficult time getting a hold of it. i've yet to a play a game but am looking forward to it. space hulk has always been a fun game and pretty quick to play for games workshop games. it is however only 2 player.

i think i might give that Last Night on Earth a go - might even be a handy christmas pressy for me wife...

 

Me and my friends enjoy a bunch of Avalon Hill Games (now owned by hasbro).
We play almost the entire Axis and Allies series plus the Diplomacy game.
These are highly strategic games, that are somewhat complicated (especially some of the Axis and Allies versions) but we like it that way. You have to fight multiple fronts at once, predict moves of enemy armies and make/brake alliances. It is great fun if you like strategy, and they are very well balanced, but can take some time to learn.

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=ah/products

 

Robo rally! its a great fun game that fulfils almost all of your criteria:

Randomness: Check, there is skill here but you never know if your brilliant plans will pan out as you intend. You also set out the checkpoints your self so no two games will use the exact same course.

Humor and social interaction: Definitely! Iv never played a game that gives rise to more hilarity. It even works as a good party game (as long as everyone is on about the same level of intoxication).

Playing time: Check, You can adjust the course to match your needs and most games end within the specified time.

Players and scalability: This is the only point that isnt a perfect fit, it doesnt scale well below 4 players without houserules (such as each player controling 2 robots or some such) but works perfectly with many players (you can play 8 players out of the box)

Theme and learning curve: You will have to decide if bored robots who decide to turn the factory to a racecourse qualifies as geek-theme or not but its great fun and easy to learn and teach (just take it step by step and all situations are easy to resolve).

Hope you enjoy it =)