We try to have Game Night at least once a month, but we are always open for more (and devastated when we have to miss a month). We begin at 4:00 on Saturdays. We alternate between houses, and we always have dinner!
Two years ago we started keeping a Game Night Ledger because disputes arose over how frequently Scotty wins (45% of the time).
The other night, Scotty and I referred to the Ledger to see what our top ten board games were in 2019, based on number of times played. There were a lot of ties, but here are the games we played the most in 2019:
#10: Qwirkle, Hacienda, Agricola, Risk, & Princes of Florence
(See what I mean by 'a lot of ties?')
Qwirkle is a pretty simple tile-building game (a little like dominoes with a twist of Uno in that you can either match the color or the shape). This is a game we reserve for the end of the night when we still feel like playing, but our brains are fried and we don't know how long our children will last.
In Hacienda you use your resources to acquire land and animals. As you control more space on the board, and take your animals to market, you accumulate more money or points.
(And if you're wondering, yes! There are pigs, so you can take your little piggies to market!)
Risk is an old classic, and we love it, but there are a lot of holes in the rules that we end up researching on forums. Scotty and Chad have different versions of Risk, so it varies depending on whose house we are playing at. We have done world domination, but we usually opt for mission Risk so we can get more games in. Scotty's version is single-mission, while in Chad's version, we have four missions. It's the four-mission version that raises the most questions.
Agricola is a fun and stressful tableau-building game where you are a farmer, and you have all sorts of things to accomplish - plant your crops, raise your animals, build your house, and heck! On top of all that, you have to feed your family. I'm stressed just thinking about it! And yet, I love this game so much!
We have played with the Farmers of the Moor expansion, but we prefer the original game. In the expansion, you have to have fuel to heat your home, and we can barely feed our families, let alone keep them warm and cozy!
Princes of Florence is another tableau-building game (that's a game where each player has components that they build their board with in front of them, and what you have in front of you usually manipulates the game by controlling what actions you can take or how many points you acquire - does your brain hurt right now? Yeah, so does mine). In this game, you are artists trying to complete your work to get points.
#9: Karma
Karma is a card game wherein there is a single loser declared. According to the Ledger, I am that loser more often than not. So I vote that we never play Karma again!
(Just kidding)
(Kind of)
#8: Bohnanza
Bohnanza is a bit of a tableau-building/card game combination. In this game, you grow fields of beans and harvest them for points. You can trade beans with other players, which begs the question - do you scratch my back, and I scratch yours? Or should we try to sabotage each other by being stingy and keeping our resources from one another?
Side note: I recently tried a round of Bohnanza with the "What Would Jesus Do" approach. I lost.
#7, 6, 5: Dead Man's Draw, Coup, & Ticket to Ride: Europe
Dead Man's Draw is a pirate-themed card game with a bit of gambling involved. On your turn, you flip over cards. You can take risks and continue to flip cards, or you can play it safe and quit while you're ahead. Each card dictates what actions you must take next, and if you flip over doubles, you get nothing!
Coup is a role-playing card game where each player has two roles. If you catch a player lying, you knock out one of their roles. But if you think they're lying, and they're not, oops! It's your character that dies!
Ticket to Ride has been a hit for quite some time. We have played several versions of it, but Europe is our favorite. In this game, you build railroad systems to get to certain destinations. You also anger your friends by blocking their routes (not that we know from experience - ahem).
#4: Cover Your Assets
Cover Your Assets is a card game where you try to hang on to your assets before someone else steals them. This is a good one to play with kids because it's pretty easy to learn and simple enough for them to understand.
#3, 2: Splendor & Love Letter
Splendor is an engine-building game where you acquire jewels. As your personal stash of jewels grows, the cost of buying more jewels decreases. As with many games of this variety, you have to decide between various strategies, and there is no one strategy that's guaranteed every time. You have to adapt to how the game goes.
Love Letter is really easy to learn. It's a quick card game where you use process of elimination to try and figure out who holds the Princess card. This is another game we play at the end of game night when our brains are fried.
#1: 7 Wonders
This has been our favorite board game for the past three years. In fact, 7 Wonders was also our most-played game of 2018! It's a tableau-building game where everyone has their own board in front of them and the board determines how the game is manipulated. This game is unique in that everyone takes their actions at once (i.e. you don't take turns).
We have the "Leaders" expansion and the "Wonder Pack" expansion. I enjoy the Leaders, but I don't really care for the wonder boards that came in the Wonder Pack (though laughing at Manneken Pis every time it's chosen for play will never get old).
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We've already had our first Game Night of 2020 with a second one scheduled (that's two for January! We are off to a great start!) We're hoping to try out my birthday board game:
This game has great reviews and was hard to get my hands on! The scarcity made me want it even more! And I don't even like birds!
Also, it was designed by a woman, which is pretty cool.
Do you have a top 10 list of games your kids like to play? :o)
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