The wife and I didn’t have any ideas for Christmas presents for each other, as we had just dumped a bunch of money buying that 10 acres and house behind us for the in-laws. We were talking through the state of our preps, and came to entertainment. We had a couple board games and a bunch of puzzles, but decided to get each other a board game to add to the electricity-free entertainment preps. Since these were going to be our Christmas gifts, we dug deep and tried to outdo each other.
Holy cow, has the world of board games changed in the last 20 years. There is so much out there that most of us have never heard of. We’ve since picked up a couple more, but these are the ones we started with.
I got her Ticket to Ride and Pandemic. It turns out that the base models of both of these can be found at Walmart, but I got them on the recommendation of the owner of the board game store (yes, that’s apparently a thing) in the city. He even set me up with a couple expansion packs for both of them.
Ticket to Ride is kind of like a game of solitaire rummy, where you have to collect hands of cards to build rail lines across one of a dozen or so maps. The routes sometimes interact with other players, and you’re competing for the best score at the end. You could totally play this with the kids, but there’s enough strategy for an adult to enjoy.
I was originally put off on Pandemic, thinking it was a Covid money-grab, but it’s been out since 2008. The hook is that it’s a cooperative game, so you don’t have to be in a competitive mood to play it. All of the players are on the same team, and you’re working out a strategy to defeat four simultaneous pandemics going on around the world. It’s kind of hard, and the game beats you about half the time. Again, this one is sold at Walmart, and I cant recommend it highly enough if you’re looking for something with more depth than the old Milton Bradley stand-bys.
The one she got me was a deep-dig, Night of the Living Dead, my single favorite movie of all time. A lot of these modern games are small printings, and come out as Kickstarter campaigns. She found out about the game, and then found someone who had the Kickstarter exclusive add-on on eBay.
This one has a modular map that depicts the house and the area around it. The players are on the same team and play against zombies who have an AI system built into the rules. You play through various scenarios that are scenes from the movie, and ones that the fan base has since written and posted online. It has miniatures for the zombies, and every character down to the sheriff from the TV broadcast and the militia man who shoots Ben at the end. I spent a couple snowy days this winter painting the miniatures, and it totally brings out my inner 12 year-old when we play through the movie- most of the time dying and being eaten by the zombies.
This scene is a made-up one where, after having the truck blown up at the gas pump, you have to try to break out of the house and return to the cemetery from the beginning of the movie to get Johnny’s car.
Anyone here play board games at home? If so, I highly recommend digging past the old standards and looking into some of these newer boutique games. There’s some crazy fun games out there now that you’d never know existed if you don’t look for them.
Holy cow, has the world of board games changed in the last 20 years. There is so much out there that most of us have never heard of. We’ve since picked up a couple more, but these are the ones we started with.
I got her Ticket to Ride and Pandemic. It turns out that the base models of both of these can be found at Walmart, but I got them on the recommendation of the owner of the board game store (yes, that’s apparently a thing) in the city. He even set me up with a couple expansion packs for both of them.
Ticket to Ride is kind of like a game of solitaire rummy, where you have to collect hands of cards to build rail lines across one of a dozen or so maps. The routes sometimes interact with other players, and you’re competing for the best score at the end. You could totally play this with the kids, but there’s enough strategy for an adult to enjoy.
I was originally put off on Pandemic, thinking it was a Covid money-grab, but it’s been out since 2008. The hook is that it’s a cooperative game, so you don’t have to be in a competitive mood to play it. All of the players are on the same team, and you’re working out a strategy to defeat four simultaneous pandemics going on around the world. It’s kind of hard, and the game beats you about half the time. Again, this one is sold at Walmart, and I cant recommend it highly enough if you’re looking for something with more depth than the old Milton Bradley stand-bys.
The one she got me was a deep-dig, Night of the Living Dead, my single favorite movie of all time. A lot of these modern games are small printings, and come out as Kickstarter campaigns. She found out about the game, and then found someone who had the Kickstarter exclusive add-on on eBay.
This one has a modular map that depicts the house and the area around it. The players are on the same team and play against zombies who have an AI system built into the rules. You play through various scenarios that are scenes from the movie, and ones that the fan base has since written and posted online. It has miniatures for the zombies, and every character down to the sheriff from the TV broadcast and the militia man who shoots Ben at the end. I spent a couple snowy days this winter painting the miniatures, and it totally brings out my inner 12 year-old when we play through the movie- most of the time dying and being eaten by the zombies.
This scene is a made-up one where, after having the truck blown up at the gas pump, you have to try to break out of the house and return to the cemetery from the beginning of the movie to get Johnny’s car.
Anyone here play board games at home? If so, I highly recommend digging past the old standards and looking into some of these newer boutique games. There’s some crazy fun games out there now that you’d never know existed if you don’t look for them.