Allow me to reintroduce myself. My name is Jake.

I joined the board game hobby in December of 2015. I started writing articles right away. Shortly thereafter, I found myself writing articles for Miniature Market’s review corner, but I never really meshed with the editorial policy. Around the same time, one of my posts to r/boardgames, reddit’s board game community, was deleted for violating the self-promotion guidelines. I was frustrated and stepped away from content creation. I never stopped playing games.

When KeyForge came out in November of 2018, I was instantly taken by it. It was the game I always wanted Magic to be as a kid. I started attending local events. I couldn’t tear myself away from the KeyForge strategy discussions taking place on discord. I decided to write a few articles testing my theories about the game. The strategy articles were well received, so I took a leap and created a podcast, something I had wanted to do for a long time. Sanctumonius: a KeyForge Pocast is now on its 37th episode, and I’m incredibly proud of the community that has formed around the show.

The podcast is ongoing, but KeyForge no longer occupies all of my gaming time. Over the past few weeks, the impulse to create general board game content again has become more and more pronounced. Clearly, I’m giving in to that desire. But it has been a while since I’ve done this. The last non-KeyForge related post on this blog is a review of 7 Wonders Duel from April 2017. Since then I have experienced more of the board game hobby and my tastes and sensibilities as a reviewer have changed. That is why I decided to start here with a personal top 10 list, to let you know who I am through the games I love.

Honorable Mentions

Reef

Tagline: The best Azul game.

I don’t often like games where meaningful decisions take a back seat to an optimization puzzle, and that is exactly what happens in the coral stacking game of reef. Despite this fact, Reef sings because the rules are dead simple, the game ends exactly when it should, which is to say one round before you want it to, and because the verticality of the puzzle gives the spatial reasoning an extra dimension that really fires on all cylinders. It’s my favorite puzzle/abstract game.

I recommend reef to anyone who enjoys interactive puzzles.

The Mind

Tagline: Board game group therapy.

The Mind provides more moments of authentic tension in five minutes than a typical three hour session of most strategy board games. I love the dynamic volume range in The Mind. The oscillation of the group between pure silence (stress) and a cacophony of noise (genuine relief) is a beautiful shared experience that builds instant connection between players.

I recommend The Mind to literally anyone.

Terraforming Mars with Prelude Expansion

Tagline: A beautiful mess.

Terraforming Mars is a bit of a mess. It is a bit too long, making the Prelude expansion as necessary an expansion as any I’m aware of. Still, I keep coming back to Terraforming Mars because of the tactical race for milestones, the strategic planning for awards, the shared goal endgame conditions, and the fact that all of the combination of these mechanics come together to create a truly rich decision space around the central decision in the game: deciding which project cards to keep. It may be a mess, but it is a mess made from all my favorite elements in strategy board games.

I recommend Terraforming Mars to anyone who enjoys strategy board games, and is willing to tolerate a fairly high level of complexity.

Pandemic Legacy: Season One

Tagline: Worth the effort.

This is a bit of a tricky one because it is the only game on this list that I have no interest in playing again. It is a flawed game in many ways. I think the complexity of the rules at times are out of balance with the weight of decisions in the game. It definitely can suffer from quarterbacking, where one player can try to take over the game. Nonetheless, playing through Pandemic Legacy: Season One with my partner and two friends was one of my best tabletop experiences to date. It created the opportunity to get together regularly, strengthened our friendship with two wonderful people, and provided plenty of fun throughout the campaign. That justifies Pandemic Legacy: Season One’s spot on this list.

I recommend Pandemic Legacy: Season One to anyone who has a consistent, scheduled game night.

Top 10

#10 Spirit Island

Tagline: A solo experience that competes with your favorite video game.

If I have a free evening, then I’m much more likely to play a video game than a board game by myself. Spirit Island is one of two games that has pried me away from Super Smash Brothers (no small feat) and into repeated solo plays.

In my first game of Spirit Island, the colonists invading the island quickly wiped out the native Dahan population. Realizing I would need to leverage the Dahan to win the game, I searched through the rulebook to see how I could get more Dahan out. I couldn’t find anything. That’s when it hit me. Of course, the Dahan don’t repopulate. I don’t want to make this moment into something bigger than it was, but it was the first time I can remember a board game teaching me to understand something in a new way. Yes, it is just a game. Also, there is something quite different about reading about the genocide of indigenous people in a textbook and then seeing it played out (in an incredibly small way) when you are making decisions and moving tactile components in a board game.

I recommend Spirit Island to anyone who thinks playing a board game by themself could be a fulfilling way to spend time.

#9 Res Arcana

Tagline: Board game design at its best.

Out of all the games on this list, this is the one most likely to move into my top five games in the future. In only a modest number of plays, Res Arcana has proven to be an absolute masterclass in game design. The ruleset is shockingly brief, and this is important because Res Arcana feels like the kind of game that could have easily gone the other way. In Res Arcana, players will use mage, artifact, monument, places of power, and magical item cards and tiles in a slapdash race to 10 victory points. Despite all this nonsense, the gameplay glides around the table without a hitch of special cases, caveats, or any other rules grit. The impression I’m left with is a game that has been refined down to the core of the idea and then refined some more. All that is left in the box is fun decisions.

I recommend Res Arcana to anyone who likes strategy games and can look past the tired theme.

#8 Isle of Skye: From Chieftain To King

Tagline: If you could only own one game.

Isle of Skye: From Chieftain to King does variability my favorite way. Every game, you will randomly draw four of 20 something scoring tiles. Over the course of the game, you will score each condition differently in each round. This means that even if you drew the same four tiles twice but placed them in a different order, it will still create a fundamentally different game. This mechanic makes every game completely different, with very little extra rules overhead, and without risk game balance via variable player powers or some other form of asymmetry.

Like many of the strategy games on this list (hmm, I think I’m learning something about my preferences) Isle of Skye is easy to learn but has an enormous ceiling for improving and mastering the system. While this high ceiling does at times lead to unbalanced games when a new player is playing with a more experienced group, it also means that a group of players with a couple games of Isle of Skye already under their belt is about as much fun and fulfilling a board game experience you can have in an hour. This is also my favorite game at the five-player count.

I recommend Isle of Skye to anyone who likes to play board games with three to five people.

#7 Codenames

Tagline: A game for any place, any time.

Use a single word to link two or more words on the board. It is such a simple premise and it is difficult to overstate how good it is in practice. This simple framework creates moments where your friends will surprise you with their brilliance, which is satisfying, and their idiocy, which is hilarious. you with moments of pure genius, the comedy gold of sheer idiocy. At the same time, Codenames provides real tension. When guessing clues there is the chance that you will instead guess the opposing team’s clue, advancing them towards victory, or the singular assassin card, resulting in an instant loss. Codenames has been a hit every time I’ve played it, with a wide variety of people in a wide variety of situations. It’s my favorite party game in mixed company and 7th favorite game of all time.

I recommend Codenames to anyone.

#6 Five Tribes

Tagline: A competitive knot untying experience.

Most board games begin with a pristine board that players then fill in over the course of the game. There is a good reason for this. With this format, the game can begin with relatively few rules and then complexity is added in over the course of the game. Five Tribes reverses this formula. In Five Tribes the board begins fully seeded. Players are presented with a gordian knot of information that they will then unpick over the course of the game. As the game progresses, players remove components from the board with a mancala-esque mechanic, decreasing the complexity of the game state.

This game format is decidedly not for everyone, but I love the mental bandwidth testing puzzle Five Tribes provides. I love how easy it is to take the action you want in the early game, and then experiencing the decision space restrict over the course of the game.

I love how Five Tribes makes you put your money where your mouth is by making players bid money (victory points) for turn order. If there is one superior move on the board, do you bid high, reducing the net gain in points or bid low, hoping others don’t see it? At the end of the day, Five Tribes is not the first game I’m drawn to when looking at my shelf, but every time I play it, I’m reminded just how great it is and wonder why I don’t play it more.

I recommend Five Tribes to more experienced board gamers unafraid of front loading lots of information.

#5 Arkham Horror: The Living Card Game (AH:LCG)

Tagline: Reaching into a bag has never felt so gut-wrenching.

AH:LCG is a card-based cooperative adventure game for 1-4 players (though I prefer two players max) that revolves around, like so many other adventure games, skill checks to see if an action was successful. However, in AH:LCG, instead of rolling dice, you reach into a bag and pull out a token. The deck construction elements between campaign games scratch my Magic: the Gathering deck building itch in a really satisfying way. The card play and action selection decision space is robust and meaningful. However, it is the design choice of resolving skill checks by pulling a token out of a bag that puts this game over the top for me.

Every time I reach into the bag, I feel like I’m on the precipice of a roller coaster. That unmistakable sense that your stomach is about to leave you is there. And that is an incredibly evocative feeling to get out of a bag full of cardboard. I honestly believe that, while it would accomplish the same result from a game mechanic perspective, a shuffled deck of cards just wouldn’t feel the same. I know that reaching into a jumbled bag is random. Still, my brain can’t help but ascribe a certain level of agency to the decision when I reach into the bag and select (unseen) a piece of cardboard. That little psychological trick of the brain makes all the difference in the world when playing AH:LCG.

I should also add that Arkham Horror: the Living Card Game has provided my most enjoyable solo gaming experience to date.

I recommend AH:LCG to anyone who enjoys fairly complex cooperative or solo board games and isn’t put off by a morbid theme.

#4 Resistance

Tagline: The fun party game with insidious, sinister social dynamics

The Resistance is a classic, stripped-down social deduction game. There are no special roles or abilities like in One Night Ultimate Werewolf and Secret Hitler. It is just resistance members and spies lying to each other trying to pass or fail three out of five missions.

In one game, I was the leader in the final round. It was my job to pick the people I wanted on the mission, and then the group would vote on it. I had to pick the three other resistance members, in addition to myself, in order to win. Fortunately, through deduction based on votes and comments made throughout the game, I had a pretty good idea who I needed on the team. I passed out the tokens, and the group voted. The vote passed. It was the moment of truth. Everyone handed me their mission vote card (pass mission, or fail mission), and I revealed them one at a time. Pass. Fail. Fail. Fail. Despite my confidence, I had failed spectacularly, deducing each player in the game’s role exactly wrong. It was more than a little humiliating and one of my most memorable gaming losses. I was shook. How was I duped so badly?

This is what I find so spectacular about The Resistance. Not only is it a raucous good time (this game is extremely fun to play), but it also leads to moments of genuine self-reflection if you so choose. Mob mentality is a huge thing in this game and often leads to a team’s downfall. It is genuinely frustrating how everything you say makes when falsely accused of being a spy makes you sound more guilty. As a spy, you see how easy (and delightful in the context of the game) it is for a couple bad actors to send well-intentioned people after their own. These are hugely important social dynamics that make The Resistance truly amazing and memorable in ways that feel important. This is also the reason I sometimes feel like I need to go take a shower and check-in with my friends after a particularly heated session.

The Resistance is my favorite large group game/party game.

I recommend The Resistance to anyone who can lean into lying to their friends and tolerate a bit of raised voices.

#3 KeyForge

Tagline: The future of collectible card games is great.

I have talked a lot about KeyForge. Any game that can stand up to 37 hour-long podcast episodes without boring the audience or co-hosts to death is something special. KeyForge is special from the innovative distribution model down to the accessible, sleek gameplay. The accessibility makes it the game that I wish magic was as a kid traveling to tournaments without the budget to play top tier decks. The sleek design makes it the game I enjoy playing more as an adult, even if money was no consideration. The belief that we are still only scratching the surface of the interesting things game design can do with algorithmically generated decks and procedurally generated cards that only exist (at present) in KeyForge makes me incredibly excited about this game’s future.

Some people may be surprised or even disappointed to see this at number three on this list, rather than number one. KeyForge is an incredible game, but like all the games on this list, it has flaws. In KeyForge, sometimes these flaws are in full display. KeyForge is much more accessible, both to learn the game and to join the competitive scene than Magic: the Gathering. However, balance is frankly a concern. If you buy a starter set, it’s possible that your decks won’t be competitive in even local play. Frequently, games will play out without meaningful decisions because of bad draws or unbalanced decks. These factors can certainly cause players to bounce off the game or feel like it is too random. However, over the long hall, the brilliance of KeyForge absolutely wins out. It just may take a few games for that emergent strategic depth to really grab hold with new players.

I recommend KeyForge to anyone who has engaged with Magic: the Gathering at any level, even with just a passing interest.

#2 Broom Service

Tagline: The covert, killer board game.

Broom Service is my most played board game with an actual board (Sorry, every card game on this list). It is an undeniably appealing package. It looks sweet as candy, but the hardest of hardcore board gamers will enjoy cutting their teeth on the mixture of tactical and strategic depth in this game. Broom Service is relatively light, so I can use the base game as the next step for people who I may have previously introduced to Carcassonne or Ticket to Ride and have a great time. On the flip side, I can break out the advance board and extra modules (all included in the base game) for super satisfying solid mid-weight experience for more veteran gamers. Either way, I always, always have a great time playing.

I recommend Broom Service to new and experienced gamers who can laugh when their best-laid plans turn into a pumpkin.

#1 The Castles of Burgundy

Tagline: The goldilocks game.

I have been telling people The Castles of Burgundy is my favorite game for a while now, but I’ve only played it a handful of times, and most of those plays came in 2016 when I first acquired the game. I started to question if that was still true or if it was more of a cultivated part of my identity. Hi, my name is Jake and I appreciate Stefan Feld’s classic game The Castles of Burgundy.

Recently, I played it with my partner. As you can probably guess, It turned out that I still love it. But I have to say, now five years into the board game hobby, I experienced the game totally different than the way I remember it. When I first unboxed Castles of Burgundy it was the heaviest game I owned and that really influenced my perception of it. Playing it now as a two-player game with the rules internalized, I was shocked by how breezy this game is. At 45 minutes to play and pack back up, The Castles of Burgundy is not exactly the bear of a game I remembered adoring. It is even better.

The Castles of Burgundy has everything I love in board games (besides drawing cards) in just the right amounts. There is pressure in the race to fill areas of your board early in the game and tension in the race for bonus tiles. There are tactics of maximizing points via tile placement in the short term balanced with how this tile placement informs the long term strategy of winning bonus tiles. Best of all, the decision space on your turn is tuned for perfection. Every turn is a new puzzle satisfying without being overwhelming and quick to parse while being anything but easy. You look at your dice, estate board, available tiles, and within those constraints take two actions out of four possible choices. Everything about the game feels just right.

I will say, today I enjoy The Castles of Burgundy most at two players and probably would play something else at four, as the extra player count doesn’t really add anything besides extra playtime. Nonetheless, in the right situation, I’d never turn down a game of Castles of Burgundy, my favorite game.

I recommend The Castles of Burgundy to anyone who loves board games.

Thanks for reading. My name is Jacob Frydman. I’m on twitter @jakefryd. I’d love to hear any feedback you have and chat with you about this article.