I’m in a bit of a quandary here, because Mark told me not to tell you what this episode is even about, but I want this description to be, well, descriptive but he’s glaring at me really hard, and making a throat slitting gesture so I daren’t risk it. It’s about … board games? Before we get ahead of ourselves, we talk about Binho, Stamp Swap, and First Rat.
More isn’t always better, but that’s sometimes a hard lesson to learn in the world of board games – we dig into an intriguing listener suggestion about how games (and gamers) can often fall into this trap. Also … I guess we’ve got to plan some games for our funerals? It’s a double hit of listener questions! Before we dress in black, we talk about Keydom’s Dragons, Sagrada Artisans, and Hegemony: Lead Your Class to Victory.
Sometimes a game has a conceit so good, that it’s the only description you need to sell someone on it. Let’s call it the hook. Do all games have them, or is it something that only a certain type of game can get away with – and why don’t they just print that on the box cover? Before we get the hook, we talk about Havalandi, Courtisans, 12 Chip Trick, and Dune Imperium: Uprising.
Oh man, oh man, I always love this one. It’s the latest edition of the Listener Top 20! We asked you all to submit your lists of your favourite board games, and we collected, collated, and compiled all of that beautiful beautiful data using a magical formula to get THIS: The definitive rankings of your collective taste in board games. Before we throw it to you, we talk about Shuffle and Swing, Mythwind, and Cat Blues: The Big Gig.
We made it! We’ve arrived at last at the final ten games, in fact, our TOP TEN favourite games of all time. Thanks for joining us again on this yearly pilgrimage, as always it’s the journey that’s the important thing – but that’s not to say that there isn’t some exciting moving and shaking to happen at the destination. That said, it’s time to pass out on the couch.
We’re veering into the dark roads of board game classification, but this time with a goal in mind – how to best highlight games that feature strong interaction. Shouldn’t BoardGameGeek have a scale for that somewhere? And while we’re at it, BGG … Before we put our thoughts in the suggestion box, we talk about Guatemala Café, and Ride the Rails.
I always love this one. It’s the time of the year where we look at what your favourite games are, and discover whether there are any exciting movers and shakers in what you’ve been playing! It’s the BGB Listener Top 20! Before we check in with all of you, we talk about Tower of Babel, Great Western Trail: Argentina, and Jump Drive.
Here it is, the one we’ve all been waiting for, the Board Game Barrage top ten games of all time! It’s been a long road and we’ll wrap it up by seeing some old favourites … and maybe a few new faces? Old or new, these are the thirty games we enjoy the most (at least, right now.) We loved sharing these lists with you and hope you’ve enjoyed listening to them!
I hope you all had a good holiday break, but it’s time to get back to business. The very serious business that is the top fifty greatest games of all time. We return to our heroes in what the enthusiasts call phase two, and boy are things heating up! Thirty more incredible games that we absolutely love are coming right at you.
While we tend to enjoy games across the whole spectrum, there’s something particular about sinking your teeth into a really heavy game. But it’s not always an easy prospect; conditions have to be just right. So what makes a heavy game worth it? Before things get heavy, we talk about Barony, Bausack, Whitehall Mystery, and Dead Reckoning.