Ranking My Sci-Fi Games

16. Star Wars: Destiny

I don’t dislike Star Wars: Destiny, I just find that I have room for one collectible game in my life. And right now that is Magic: The Gathering. Destiny is fun, though, because it is cheaper to play. And I know someone who has a bunch of cards (they bought all of mine) so I can play it if I want that way. But it’s a good head to head game.

15: Firefly: The Game

This is a game that I really need to give another chance. Again, I don’t dislike this game, it’s just that I kind of played it once. Everyone was learning and nothing was going that well for us in it. And it just got longer and longer without making progress. But I see how the game works and I think there are some cool elements there. And I know there are people who really like the game. So I want to try it again and set aside the time and group to really play it.

14: Legendary Encounters: Firefly

Much like Firefly: The Game, Legendary Encounters Firefly is one that I’ve had fun with, but I want to play more. I really like the show, and I think that the Encounters version of Legendary works better than the Marvel version. And it also falls into the category of I know someone who owns the game, so I could pretty easily play it again if I wanted.

13: Cosmic Encounter

Cosmic Encounter is one that I had in my collection, I really enjoyed, and I traded away. Mainly because I don’t think I can get it to the table all that often. Cosmic Encounter is a really silly negotiation game that works when people lean into that negotiation. There is strategy to the game, but you need to lean into that negotiation to make it work. So it just limits who I can play it with, but I’d never turn down a chance to play Cosmic Encounter.

12: Cry Havoc

Cry Havoc was high on my Top 100 a few years ago, and it dropped down and I sold it. Again, a game that I really enjoy and I would play any chance I could. But it’s an asymmetric game so it is a bit harder to teach and play. With that, I prefer Root to it which is in the same family of asymmetric games. But this is a fun area control game with a cool combat mechanic that is simple but different.

11: Star Wars: Imperial Assault

More Star Wars on the list. Imperial Assault also left the collection only because it is a campaign game. Campaign games are harder to get to the table for sure and Imperial Assault is not exception. I want to get it back sometime and play it. I liked the app that you can use with it to play fully cooperatively. And I like that it feels like a Star Wars adventure.

10: Shadowrun Crossfire

I almost didn’t add this to the list, I don’t know where I want to put Cyber-Punk. But Cyber-Punk is Sci-fi. Shadowrun Crossfire is a game of deck building and defeating challenges, getting XP, and leveling up your characters slowly. That’s the big knock on the game that you don’t level up fast enough, but people house rule around that. It is one I need to dive more into the game, I think you can play it solo, even if it is multi-handed solo gaming.

9: Gravwell

Gravwell is an abstract game with a space theme put on top of it. In particular Gravwell has you getting passed through a wormhole that is closing and now you use different elements to try and escape back. But the different element either pull you towards the nearest object, push you from it, or pull them towards you. It’s a fun little puzzle that keeps it close until someone can get the right cards to make it to the end.

8: Star Wars: Rebellion

Star Wars in a box, as people like to call it. Star Wars: Rebellion has the Rebels trying to undermine the Empire and complete missions. The Empire is trying to figure out where the Rebels secret base is. All while building up troops and skirmishing as you go. It’s a massive two player game, but an amazing one. If you have the time it is worth sitting down with an getting that original trilogy Star Wars feel.

7: Under Falling Skies

Under Falling Skies is Space Invaders meets Independence Day. This is a solo game about fighting off waves of alien ships and researching the mother ship in order to beat the game. I have yet to beat the game, but it is a lot of fun. But I always feel like I’m getting close. I also really like that high numbers make some ships descend faster but are more useful to research or blow up ships. It’s a clever system and a pretty big little game.

6: Galaxy Trucker

I normally don’t like real time games but Galaxy Trucker is an exception. In Galaxy Trucker you build out your cargo ship as fast as you can. Then you sit back an watch it get blown up. Well, ideally not blown up, and ideally you pick up cargo along the way. You deal with asteroids, space pirates, and come across planets full of goods along the way. It might be too chaotic for some, but I really like it.

5: Battlestar Galactica

BSG (Battlestar Galactica) is a massive game of survival when you might have hidden traitors among you. The Cylons are aboard the ship and you might not even know you are one. This is a massive three hours deduction, survival, even a bit of social deduction game. You try and figure out who is a Cylon and if you can get them off the ship in time before they mess everything up. But that’s way easier said than done.

4: T.I.M.E Stories

TIME Stories is almost any setting. There is Ancient Egypt, a land of dragons, pirates, zombies taking over a town, an asylum, you name it. But the core conceit of the game is that you are launching out, sending your mind back in time from the future, to deal with these problems, where time is changing. The concept is amazing, and I have liked each adventure I’ve gone on. I wish it had more of a story running throughout, but the different missions all feel unique.

3: Rogue Angels: Legacy of the Burning Suns

Rogue Angels isn’t even out yet, I have only played it on TableTop Simulator (TTS) but it is amazing. You can watch my play through of it here with the designer, Emil Larson. The game just works, it is a dungeon crawl style game in space. But it isn’t a dungeon crawl game where you just go in fight the monsters and leave. You make important decisions. And you upgrade your character as you go. There is so much I like about this game. When I get a physical copy, I suspect it’ll move up higher.

2: Clank! In! Space!

Clank! In! Space! is a deck building adventure game where you are breaking into a spaceship, trying to be as quiet as possible so you don’t Clank about. But to move faster, defeat more bad guys, and generally win the game, you will need to Clank. Plus there is a push your luck element where you want to get as far in as you can to get the best treasure. But the longer you are in the ship, the more clank and damage you can accrue.

1: XenoShyft: Onslaught

XenoShyft is a tower defense deck building game with some amazing cooperative elements to it. Mainly, I can buy a card and then give you that card if you need help. You only have two troops to defend your side of the base in your hand, I can help you get more. I can even drop in a paratrooper in the middle of fighting a wave of bugs. Add in that you always get money, that’s even better. I rarely defeat the waves of bugs, but it’s so much fun to try.

Final Thoughts

I own a fair number more Sci-Fi themed games that I need to try. Middara blends Sci-Fi and Fantasy. Nemesis is basically Aliens the board game. And I just realized that I missed Not Alone on the list, probably top 6-7. But I still think there are more fantasy games out there that look interesting.

Some that I don’t own that I really should try are the different Dune games. I own the one based on the Detective: A Modern Crime Board Game system which I need to carve out a weekend chunk of time to play.

What are your favorite board games with a Sci-Fi theme?

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Pop-Up GenCon Itself

Honestly, it was just fun to game with strangers again. Yes, it wasn’t the same as GenCon, but I got to sit down on three separate occasions and play games that were new to me with complete strangers. And not only that but to play out at a game store again was just fun.

It’s one of those things that I don’t think I’d completely realized how much I missed. There is just a level of excitement and fun being around people who are excited to be gaming. They are excited to try new stuff, see new games, and just have a good time. The energy is infectious in a good way. And I’m someone who really loves being around people so just being around excited gamers is amazing.

The Games

Don’t worry, I’m going to talk about all four of the games that I played there, plus the ones I saw, but I didn’t want to make them each their own thing. Because I got to play four new games to me.

My Farm Shop

This is one I actually knew about because I’d seen it on the Dice Tower. They played through it live and did a review of it. The game looked fun to me so when that was one of the official Pop-Up GenCon games I wanted to play it. And I have to say it is a very good game. I actually ended up picking it up.

The game is a style that I like, which is in the veins of Machi Koro. If you’re not familiar, each turn you roll some dice and activate something. Your opponents also activate stuff on your roll as well. In Machi Koro what activates is limited. But for My Farm Shop you always activate something. So you roll three dice, one determines what card you get and two determine what is activated. The turns go really fast and you are always engaged doing something.

Unfathomable

Another one that I knew about but I hadn’t seen played. This game I know I’ve talked about before because it’s the new version of Battlestar Galactica. It’s a big game and also a hidden traitor game.

Normally I don’t gravitate towards hidden traitor games. Not because they can’t be fun, I do like Dead of Winter and BSG. But something like Shadows Over Camelot I thought was just okay. I want more game going on with it, otherwise it feels too close to social deduction.

Because Unfathomable builds off of what was done in BSG, I thought I’d be interested. We got to play a whole game, the hybrid won. But it was a blast. The core of the game is very similar to BSG, but I felt like it make a ton of sense how it worked. With BSG, there was just more going on with two expansions making the game very big. This keeps some of the expansion stuff, but trims off some of the fat.

Catan (Yard Game)

This one is not a real game. Well, it kind of is one but not really. It plays like bags but you are aiming for areas to get resources. Then you use resources and are racing to 4 points. The person at the end of the round when someone makes it to four who has the most points wins.

Super simple game, but it is fun. They have little figures for wood, wheat, brick, ore, and sheep, as well as the robber. So you get double resources if you throw the right figure into the right spot. And the nice thing too is that the game maybe took 15 minutes, maybe 20, with four players. But it’s more a convention game versus a real game, not one you can go out and buy.

Descent: Legends of the Dark

Finally, I got to play a game I already own. Descent: Legends of the Dark is a big dungeon crawl, app assisted, adventure of a game from Fantasy Flight. I unboxed it a bit ago on the Malts and Meeples YouTube Channel, which you can see here. But I hadn’t gotten around to learning the rules or getting to the table.

It was a great way to learn the game, I will say. That’s one of the best things that I really like going to conventions. Even with games that aren’t new you can get to see them and play before you buy them. Now, some games, Descent, I knew I wanted to get. But it was fun to actually play it. I really like the mechanics of the game, we definitely got some things wrong, but I can see bringing this game to my table pretty soon here.

World of Warcraft Pandemic

This, I thought, is an odd mash-up. But I thought it was really interesting to learn about it. Because it’s kind of like Pandemic Legacy Season 2 feel to it. And because while it feels like a Pandemic game from the mechanics it is going to play differently. In this game you are trying to survive and complete quests.

I think that’s the really interesting part, from what I remember some quests were in Pandemic Legacy Season 2, basically paying cards into completing things in specific orders. It makes a lot of sense for a World of Warcraft Game. Eventually you need to go fight a big boss as well. Very clever looking game and very accessible.

I also like it made the lose condition easier to track. The game funnels everything into the “outbreak” track. If you can’t place a figure, that’s an outbreak, your character dies, advances an outbreak, and outbreak happens, advances the outbreak. It’s only when that track, which is still short, hits the end that you lose. It’s one of those simple things that to me makes it more accessible for new gamers. You still need to pay attention to everything, but only the one spot causes the game to end.

Final Thoughts

I hope that they keep Pop-Up GenCons around. And I hope that I don’t go to one for a long time. Why, because this just makes me want to go back to GenCon. This year wasn’t the right year to go back for me for reasons I’ve talked about before. And it might not be right for you. Or maybe GenCon itself isn’t right for you. So I hope they keep the pop-up GenCons for the people who can’t make it to regular GenCon. And hopefully, next year, I’ll see you at GenCon.

Did you attend GenCon this year, let me know your thoughts. Or did you do a Pop-Up GenCon, how did yours go?

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Cooperative

A cooperative board game is where everyone is working together. You have a singular objective that you are all working to complete. This could be something like killing monsters in Gloomhaven to curing diseases in Pandemic. But whatever it is, you are working together to complete that goal.

This is done in two different ways. The first one has open information and the second is hidden information. However, with both of them, you still are trying to complete an objective together. A few games do put a little twist on this. Uprising, a 4x fantasy game coming from Kickstarter, has each of you building your own group and playing them. You all need to beat two AI enemies though for the game to be won. But let’s talk about open versus hidden information.

Open Information

Open information means what it says. All the information that each player has is out in the open. Everyone can see what cards everyone else has. This allows the group of players to make decisions more optimally and cooperatively. Pandemic is an example of that. You can see who has what city cards and what colors so you can work most effectively to cure a disease.

The upside and when this works really well is when the group can collaborate as you go. Now, there is the downside because it can also lead to more of an alpha player problem. If everyone can see everything, that means that one person can have an opinion on everyone’s turn. So when playing a cooperative game with open information it’s something to be aware of.

However, with that said, I do still really enjoy open information. It really does lead to more of a collaborative nature of the cooperative game. If I, and others, can keep from stepping on other players toes on their turns and we work together, it is a very different experience. I think that Detective: A Modern Crime Board Game is a great example of this working well for me.

Hidden Information

Hidden information is the opposite. I have cards or information that I have and I can’t share. Gloomhaven is an example of this where I can give an idea of what my plans are, but I can’t tell you how fast I’m going or exactly what I’m going to be doing. Other games like Lost Expedition and Say Bye to the Villains as well do this.

The idea behind this is to keep the choices more in the hands of the player on their turn. You can’t see what I am doing or what my options are, so that means that you can’t tell me what to do. This is meant to alleviate some of the alpha player problem and I would say that it does to some extent. An alpha player will likely still have their own ideas to add, but it should help reduce that tendency.

Semi-Cooperative

This one is a bit trickier to define because it some ways it is competitive and in some ways it isn’t. I’ll give Dead of Winter as an example. All the players have one main objective that needs to be completed, finding a cure for zombies is one on of them. However, each player also has their own objective, and if you don’t complete that by the end of the main objective you don’t win. And there can be a traitor. That traitor might not need that main objective to be completed for them to win.

So you can see how it could be confusing. I think the main thing to note is the main objective and the player objectives. The main objective is really going to be cooperative in nature. All of the players, unless there is a traitor, will want to get that one done. But they will then be acting selfishly to complete their own objective as well. It really throws a different mix into how the game is played.

Also, a lot of these games will have a traitor in them, but not all of them. Dead of Winter might have a traitor but it might not. Something like Nemesis is going to not have a traitor, but everyone’s objectives might be at odds with each other to mean that if one person wins another person might not be able to win.

Competitive

Finally we end on competitive. This is really where most board games lie. Everyone is out for themselves and the winner is the person who has the most points, takes over all the areas, whatever it might be for that particular game. No one will work together for a long period of time because you want to win yourself. Some competitive games an alliance might be useful for a little bit but for a lot of them it’s always about yourself.

There are two different types of games that I could qualify under competitive. Some competitive games fall into a solitaire competitive game and more of a cutthroat competitive game. Each has it’s place and some people will gravitate more towards one or another. When I was just getting into gaming I probably preferred more cutthroat competitive games, but now I don’t mind that, but I don’t want a game to be only that.

Cutthroat

So cutthroat sounds very aggressive and it is. It can be something like Risk where you will get attacked if you are weak. Or Munchkin which as a lot of take that in it where you can make an opponents character worse or the monsters harder to beat. Those are extremely confrontational games.

But it can be simpler than that. I can just take the last worker placement spot or a card that might be better for you in a deck building game. Those are still mean or hurt you, but it is less of a direct take that element to the game. But it is a bit more than the solitaire which I’ll be talking about now.

Solitaire

It is often called multi-player solitaire as well. Because I am not talking about playing games solo. That is a separate thing. This is when you are playing against other players but what you do won’t affect them that much. This can be that deck building where you pick cards that mainly help your self. That might mean that you hurt someone else but it isn’t the goal. It is to improve what you are doing.

Something like Dominion or Ascension are generally this sort of game. You don’t want to bloat your own deck with cards that are bad for you, but some cards that might be better for someone else are also just good for you as well. So there is almost no interaction between players, especially in base Ascension, but a card that allows you to draw another two cards, that is good for everyone.

What is the Best Or Do I Prefer?

I probably prefer cooperative of any type. I don’t think that there is a best type of game. I enjoy a quick cutthroat competitive game, but I used to like longer ones, like Munchkin. Now I don’t like them as much anymore. And I think I like cooperative the most because I can help control that alpha player issue and because working together is just a lot of fun.

But what do you prefer? Do you like competitive games of a certain type of cooperative games? Let me know in the comments below.

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100 to 91

90 to 81

80 to 71

70 to 61

60 to 51

Plus a few notes on how I’ve put together the list:

• These are my favorite, you want what people consider best, see the Board Game Geek Top 100
• If a game you love isn’t on the list, it might be be coming, I might not have played it, and if I have, it’s 101
• If a game looks cool, I have links to buy it from CoolStuffInc or Amazon, or you can grab most at your FLGS
• There are a few games, Destiny 2 Player versus regular Destiny where if they are basically the same thing, I only do one of them

50. Onirim

I think this is the purely solo game on the list and it’s dropped a little bit, but I’m still enjoying it a lot. The app is great for playing this game, but I do like the physical one as well. In this game you are trapped in a nightmare and trying to escape, to do this you are trying to find eight doors. This is done by playing down cards in a row where you are trying to get three cards of the same color in a row, when you do you find a door. But there are nightmares in the deck that are trying to stop you, you have a few different ways you can deal with them. I think that’s where the game really is interesting, because there are powerful key cards that can just get a door in without any hassle, but they are also be used to deal with a nightmare. Or you could discard cards off the top of the deck, but that might get rid of a key. Or you can discard your hand or put a door back into a deck. There’s a good amount of strategy in what seems like a small and random card game.

Last Year: 36

49. Stipulations

One of my top party games, this is one that I’m glad I backed on Kickstarter, but glad that I didn’t back the “adult” version of it. In this game a person picks from four different categories, you might have a superpower, an occupation, lifetime supply of something, or a fulfilled dream, but then, everyone writes a stipulation for it, and you pick your favorite. This game works really well because you can tailor it for your group. If it’s a bunch of college friends drinking, you can make it as adult or dirty as you want, if it’s Christmas with your great aunt and 10 year old cousin, you can make it clean. And it can just get silly, like most party games and eventually people end up writing down weird stuff or reoccurring jokes. It’s really the same concept as a Cards Against Humanity or Apples to Apples, but it’s much more replayable because you aren’t using cards to answer/fulfill the prompt, which means you can change up your answer for a stipulation for the superpower of flight from “But only when you fart” to “But never more than 6 inches off the ground.” and the prompt will feel different when you play.

Last Year: 42

48. Silver

This one wasn’t ranked last year because I hadn’t played it much, it was just one time at GenCon where I kind of got the rules. But I’ve played it a lot since, I’ve probably played the physical game 10-15 times this year, and Silver Bullet expansion 3 times, and the app who knows how many times, but a lot. I am really enjoying this game now and the standalone expansion(s) – I have two, but only played one. In this game you are trying to get your village of 5 cards down to the fewest points possible. The trick is your cards are face down and you only know at the start of a round what two of them are. Cards have values from 0 to 12 and each card has a special power. You can use them for a power, or you can swap out cards with what you’ve drawn or is on top of the deck. If you have two of the same number you can trade in those two for one card, which allows you to get down in cards and lower the number of points you can possibly have. There’s some luck with the game for sure, but overall it’s a very fast and fun game that is a bit mean with a bunch of take that cards, especially in the Silver Bullet expansion, but still a lot of fun.

Last Year: Not Ranked

47. Wits & Wagers

Another party game on the list, this time it’s Wits & Wagers which is a classic party game at this point. In Wits and Wagers you are putting down a best guess or a random number, so some trivia question, it might be something like “How many goals did Pele have in his professional career?” Everyone writes down a number, you sort the numbers and then you bet on who you think was the closest without going over. If you’re right you get more chips to bet or to save because however much money you have at the end is your score. This game works well because you don’t need to know anything about soccer. I know a fair amount, so if you’re playing with me and know that, you can bet on my guess even if you guessed either 10 or 10 million for your number. So you get to play the people and think about who might know an answer, or at least have a better clue than you. The answer, by the way, is over 1,000 for goals by Pele, just in case you get that question sometime.

Last Year: 68

46. Dead of Winter: A Crossroads Game

This one has dropped a bit for me as you can see. I do really enjoy this game a lot, and I would gladly play it, the only reason I don’t play it more is because it’s a bit of a longer game. This is a game about surviving the zombie apocalypse, for a scenario, with everyone having their own goals, and potentially having a traitor in your midst. This is one of those semi-cooperative games where it tries to make everyone look guilty to help hide the traitor. That is one slightly issue that I have with the game, if you beat the scenario, and a lot of them are hard just purely cooperative, you still don’t win unless you get your secret objective. But the rest of the game works really well, and I consider it a half win if you beat the the scenario. This game also has a thing called Crossroads cards, which is why it has crossroads in the name. These cards offer you tough choices that you’ll have to make during the game and are one of the highlights of the game. We have a house rule for them where instead of drawing one and seeing if it happens on someone’s turn, you draw two and if one of them happens, you do the crossroads event. It just highlights that fun part of the game more. Overall, a really enjoyable game that is just tricky to get to the table all the time because of it’s length.

Last Year: 18

45. Ascension: Deckbuilding Game

For a lot of people Dominion is their gateway or introduction to deckbuilding, but I don’t like Dominion, so for me, Ascension is the one that I’d use. This is a pure deck building game where you are getting cards and adding them to your deck to buy more cards and fight monsters. Why I like this one so much better than Dominion is that Dominion has a fixed Market, so if someone can spot the ideal combo before the game starts, they’ve probably already won. Whereas Ascension has an ever changing market. Whenever a card is bought or a monster is killed in the market row, a new card is flipped out, and it might be the perfect card for you, or it might be another monster, or who knows what. So you have to be able to adjust a bit more on the fly and you can pick some really good strategies and just stick with them, but depending on how the cards come out, you might have to still adjust even if you have you ideal strategy started. For me, that’s what I like in a game and why I am less of a Euro gamer and more of a Amerithrash gamer, which Ascension feels like compared to Dominion.

Last Year: 46

44. Cry Havoc

Cry Havoc is an asymmetrical game where the players have different ways of building up their point totals. And it’s also a unique game with a bit of deck building and some really interesting combat. I like this game as it has some area control, some diceless combat, and really different strategies for the different factions. In this game you’re trying to control crystals which will give you points at the end of a round, to do that you need to take over areas, battling for the crystals there. The combat is diceless as I said, but it has an interesting flow to it, first the attacker will place their troops on the area majority, kill, or capture spots. Then the defender will, and it basically goes along the lines of, check majority, check kills, check captures, and if you kill someone who would capture one of your pieces that won’t happen. But you have cards in your hand that you use both to do actions, but that can influence combat as well. So maybe it’s a close fight and we’re tied for majority in area control, I could play a card to move someone up there if I’m the attacker so I can take the area, but maybe my opponent will do something to change that. The combat is different but really enjoyable.

Last Year: 52

43. Century: Golem Edition

This, for me, is a Splendor killer, though, I still have both in my collection. Century: Golem Edition, is a fun hand building game where you are trying to create an engine of cards that is going to get your gems, and trade gems in such a way that you can score golem cards. The first person to five golems triggers end game. But where the game works, besides the amazing components and artwork, is the card play. You can build up a combo that might start by giving you three yellows, which you can turn into two greens, which maybe you can turn into a pink, which can be turned into a blue and two greens, and you can really find interesting ways to manipulate the gems that you have. The game plays extremely fast with either playing a card and doing it’s action, getting a golem, or picking back up your hand of cards being all that you do on a turn. It really does have a good amount of strategy to it, but it’s still easy to teach and to score so it might be just slightly too much for a complete game novice, but someone who has something like Ticket to Ride or Catan under their belt will be able to learn it.

Last Year: 33

42. Not Alone

There have been a number of party games on the list thus far, and while Not Alone isn’t a party game, it is one that can play a larger player count. This is a one versus all game where the all are playing crew of a spaceship who have crashed onto a planet and are waiting rescue. However, the planet and the monster on the planet are not happy that they are there. So the planet is trying to take everyone out before the rescue ship can get there. It’s an interesting game of cat and mouse, because the crew can strategize amongst themselves as much as they want, but they have to do it so that the monster can listen. So do they try and send him down a false path, or can they split things up in such a way to be able to do most of what they want. This is another hand management style game for the crew as they have various locations that they can go to, but they discard it to their own, visible, discard pile and the monster has powers that it can use throughout the game. The game has basically always been close when we play it, and it’s a pretty easy game to play, but one that has a nice tension. Probably, actually, a pretty good Halloween game as it has some horror elements to it.

Last Year: 41

41. Cross Clues

This apparently was the party game section. Not ranked last year because it came out this year, Cross Clues is a fun and challenging party game where people are giving clues so that other players can determine the intersection point between two things. To put this better, you have a spread sheet that is 5 by 5, each row and column has a header of a word, so A might be stick and 1 might be wind. If I have the card that has A1 denoted on it, I have to give a clue that will get the other players to guess A1, maybe I go with something like Kite. But maybe C is tail, now kites have tails as well as sticks as structure on them, so which do I mean. So maybe that’s not the best clue, maybe for rustle, but maybe D is cattle, so wind and cattle might make sense for that. So you have to be clever with your clues, and you are trying to get as many done in five minutes as you can, or since we’ve played it across Zoom, just seeing how many out of the 25 on a 5 by 5 grid or 16 for a medium challenge, we can get and score that. It’s a clever game that works really well, and I’m not sure how many word cards there are, but depending on how they intersect the game has a ton of replayability. Definitely a party game that everyone should checkout, in my opinion, and probably one that’d be really popular now, if it wasn’t for the pandemic.

Last Year: Not Ranked

So what from this part of the list, the beginning of the Top 50, looks most interesting to you? Any you’d put higher in your own Top 100?

Share questions, ideas for articles, or comments with us!

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Pros

• It’s based off of They Live
• Story Driven
• Slight Battlestar Galactica/Dead of Winter vibe
• Hoffman Glasses

Cons

• First Kickstarter for the company
• 4-6 player count (1-3 blind mode)
• Hidden Role Game
• Seems to heavily rely on glasses gimmick
• Random character story discovery

Thoughts on the Page

I really think this is a well laid out page. They have done a very good job of explaining the game play and how the game is going to work. In fact, they really don’t spend much of any time on bling for the game, which is impressive. It’s down further on the page, some add-ons that you can get, but they didn’t turn this into a minis fest which is nice.

They also really have their bases covered. For being a new company to Kickstarter, I won’t say new company, they’ve done a good job of laying everything out and they have shipping, stretch goals, and interesting but non-game play essential add-ons.

Back or Brick
This one is tough for me, I have enjoyed my play of BSG (Battlestar Galactica) and I like Dead of Winter and own a lot of it. That said, the PVP aspect of this and the gimmick of the glasses have me concerned. I like the IP a lot, but it feels, even though they’ve laid out the game well, it might feel derivative of the two games above and just have the Hoffman Glasses as a gimmick or bigger part of the game than they really feel like they should be. For me this is a Brick, but it’s really really close and I think I’d probably enjoy the game if I were able to try it. The player count is also a concern for me, 4-6 players is a high player count and a blind player seems like it’d break the game some.

Is this a Back or Brick for you?

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Betrayal at Baldur’s Gate is a semi-cooperative to fully cooperative board game. In the first part of the game, players are going around the city of Baldur’s Gate, flipping over tiles, finding shops, dark alleys, and more. During this time, they are collecting items when they are told to, but also finding omens of what might be happening in the town. Eventually an omen will trigger what is known as the haunt. Players then compare to the omen to the room it was found in to find out who the betrayer might be, if there is one. This then tells the players how they are actually going to win the game, whether they are the betrayer or the good adventurers.

Betrayal at Baldur’s Gate is a re-implementation of Betrayal at House on the Hill, a horror based game where you are exploring a creepy old house and eventually, based off of room and omen again, a haunt happens. Betrayal at Baldur’s Gate fixes, a little bit, how you determine if the haunt happens so that it can’t happen quite as quickly. There were times in the original that the haunt would happen very quickly. Otherwise, most of the game feels the same with just a fantasy, D&D, skin put on it. I personally don’t like this skin as well. I have no connection tot he Baldur’s Gate video games however, and the people I’ve played with who do, like those nods in the game, something that I can’t appreciate. With that said, I still think that the campy horror style of Betrayal at House on the Hill is more enjoyable, though Betrayal at Baldur’s Gate has a better rule set.

What I do like about this game over Betrayal at House on the Hill is t he fact that each character has a special power to go along with special stats. A barbarian in this game or jock in the other, might have more speed and strength, but in this game the barbarian also has a special power. I feel like all the powers seem thematic to the game and give each character a unique feel. I feel like I generally end up playing a magic user and there are things that make them feel more like a magic user in what they can do. I also don’t feel like any of these abilities are unbalanced in the game.

The components in this game are solid for the most part, there is a ton of cardboard that you have to punch out. The minis in the game are good, however, there are a few parts of them that are too thin and the plastic doesn’t hold up, so it isn’t brittle and it doesn’t snap, it is just that things like the wizards staff sag. I also wish that this game, like the other, came with a better storage solution or at least a lot of little baggies. There are so many tokens that without little baggies, it can take a long time to dig through them and find everything.

But, let’s talk more about the core mechanics, I compared it to Betrayal at House on the Hill, but I haven’t delved into what the game is really like. Like I said above, the game is split into two halves. In the first half you are exploring and in the second half the haunt happens. The exploring part might be the best part of the game because you really don’t know what you’re going to find next. You might be collecting omens because that is what on the different rooms and buildings you are flipping, or you might be loaded down with items and ready to take on the betrayer. While I think that it makes more sense for this random flipping in Betrayal at House on the Hill, it works well as a mechanic, so I understand why they kept it the same way in the Baldur’s Gate version of the game. It just doesn’t feel quite as thematic in this game.

The haunt, however, I like better. I think that they got better at how they’ve written out the betrayer and good players parts of the haunt so you can more clearly understand what you need to do. Now, I don’t think that it’s perfect, but it’s better than it was in the original game. I also really like how there are 10 haunts that do not have a betrayer. You all end up working together and take this game where you were stressing about who the betrayer was going to be and when the haunt was going to happen as you explored, to now working together to stop whatever is happening in the town. And, I keep saying the haunt, because that’s what it’s called in the games, however, I don’t feel like haunt is accurate for Betrayal at Baldur’s Gate because, some of them have a horror theme, but really it’s more like a boss encounter in a game of D&D than a haunt. It works for the game, if everything was horror, that wouldn’t make sense for the theme and tone of the game. I’ve played a handful of scenarios, and I think that about half the time the betrayer or game has won, and half the time the good adventurers have.

I really do enjoy this game. I like the mechanic set and I like the D&D theme on the game. I do think that it’s not as good as Betrayal at House on the Hill, simply because the mechanics lend themselves to more of a horror style of game theme. But if people don’t like horror games, or if you think that the haunts are too confusing in Betrayal at House on the Hill, Betrayal at Baldur’s Gate is a really good option and gives you a lot of fun game play.

Overall Grade: B+
Gamer Grade: B+
Casual Grade: B+

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But we finish off with action points. What are action points, they are points or tokens that tell you how much you can do on a single turn. Maybe you can take five actions, and then you allocate those points to specific actions you can take, like moving or attacking.

5. Dead Men Tell  No Tales
A cooperative game, in this one you are spending actions to try and find treasure on a pirate ship that is haunted and currently on fire. You have to contain the fire, try and find the treasures, deal with skeletal deck hands, and you have a certain number of actions you can take to do all of that. This game is like a lot of cooperative games in that you feel like you can never do enough. The interesting thing this game adds in with action points is that you can pass on your unused action points to the next player. So it might be that you are limited in what you can do, but the next person has a lot of useful things that they can do. You can move closer into position to set-up what for your next turn and then pass any unused action points to the next player so that they can do more. In a lot of cooperative games the action points are static but you can act upon other characters, in this one, you can’t do that, but you can pass out action points.

4. Dead of Winter
Dead of Winter is an interesting game on this list as it uses dice as your action points in the round. The dice don’t encompass every action you can take in the game, but the strongest actions, the ones that help you complete objectives are going to spend a die. Not only that, but the number you roll on the dice makes a difference as well. Some characters aren’t able to search or kill zombies with a low die roll. So in that case your die, which is supposed to be your strongest action is now made weaker and it looks like you are hurting the colony and people are starting to suspect you are the traitor more, but at the same time, they can see the roll, so they know it wasn’t great. And then you get more dice and actions when you have more survivors, but you are also responsible for more zombies showing up and more mouths to feed and making the game harder that way.

3. Arkham Horror LCG
This game doesn’t use the points as a physical token, but a lot of the games with action points don’t. Action allowance might be a good way of describing it as well, because you have a certain total number of actions you can take on a turn. Arkham Horror does this well, limiting you to two actions, and while you can do the same actions multiple times, you always feel the crush of not being able to do enough. Arkham Horror LCG is a placeholder on this list for all of Fantasy Flights Lovecraftian games as you feel the crunch Arkham Horror, Elder Signs, and Mansions of Madness as well. It’s a system that works well for them as it keep the tension high when you don’t have enough actions to do everything that you’d want.

2. Blood Rage
Action points are huge in Blood Rage as you try and get into territories, move troops around, and be able to hang in the round long enough to stop your opponent from doing what they are trying to do. What I like about the action point system in Blood Rage is that certain actions cost a certain number of action points. And the monsters, who are possibly more powerful or useful in some other way, also have action point costs. So you’re trying to balance using your action points so that you don’t run out much before anyone else, because once you are out of action points, you are out of the round at least in being able to take the large actions that are going to be most useful long term.

1. Pandemic Legacy
This game does great with action points, basically each turn the active player spends up to four action points, moving around, curing diseases, trading cards, and finding cures. Then as the game continues, you gain more and more actions that you can take. At the end of the game, you’re trying to balance out these actions in hopes that you’ll be able to survive. Pandemic does a really good job with these actions, because it evolves over time. A lot of games have more of a static action pool with maybe unique characters have special player power actions that they can take, but Pandemic Legacy, both seasons one and two, give more options as you play and unlock more of the game.

There are a ton of games that use this action point/action selection mechanic. It’s a strong mechanic for adding tension to decisions, because you’re almost always short of the action points you want to use in a round. This mechanic, however, isn’t always an ideal for players who might have AP, because it makes your choice really matter. But let’s talk about some honorable mentions:

Forbidden Desert/Forbidden Island – Cooperative exploration games that feel like Pandemic light.
Flash Point: Fire Rescue – Another Pandemic like game that also has a bit of a Dead Men Tell No Tales feel to it as well, this time you’re being fire fighters though.
KrosMaster Arena – Plan your movement and attacks in this Chibi MOBA style game. A little bit simple at times, and almost ways a best way to use your action points.
The Dresden Files Cooperative Card Game – This game is all about the Fate Points, as the action points are called. It’s a pool of action points which is a very different feel from a lot of the games as you as a team have to replenish and manage that pool of points.

What are some of your favorite games with action points? Is action points/action selection a mechanic that you enjoy?

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Starting with the most popular

Roll and Write: This is a genre of board game where you are rolling dice and then filling in numbers, lines, areas, of a game board that is probably just your game board to try and get a higher score than other players. The original example of this game is Yahtzee. Yes, roll and write is that simple of a genre, but it’s having a huge moment now with the biggest game being a German game, Ganz Schong Clever. They’ve evolved past Yahtzee in their scoring, and while it’s a genre I haven’t gotten into, they tend to be a bit more clever in their game play versus Yahtzee which is just telling you the numbers.

Then moving to the classic

Euro Gaming: The next is also a genre of games, they can also often be called worker placement games, though that is a slightly separate genre. These games are the ones where the result of the game all comes down to math. You can figure out an optimal strategy and there isn’t going to be all that much that can be done to stop that strategy. They started to change that, as of late, with making the boards tighter so that you had to plan out things a bit more or taking it away from everyone having to do everything to score enough points to win.

Point Salad: I wanted to put this one next to Euro gaming as a lot of them can be point salads. What this means, is like a salad, you can have a ton of different things in there. So in a game, that means you are scoring points at the end of the game in six or seven different categories that make up your total score. Games like Five Tribes and Seven Wonders are two prime examples of those games. It allows you to customize your winning strategy based on another a things.

And now to one that’s more a favorite

Card Drafting: Card drafting can be a mechanic in a game or the basis of some games. The idea is that you have a hand of cards, you are selecting one card from that hand to play and then passing it on to the next player who is selecting a card from that hand either until all the cards have been played, or there is one left in the hand. This can be done several hands during a game, or it can be a lesser part of the game, maybe just at the start of the game. Two games that use it as the basis of the game are Sushi Go! Party and Seven Wonders. In those games, drafting is the whole game as you’re trying to make sets and score points based off of different criteria. A game like Blood Rage uses it at the beginning of each age to help you strategize and then you play with those cards, it’s similar in Near and Far where you draft cards at the start of the game.

Hate Drafting: So, clearly tied into the one above. Normally when you are drafting, you want to draft cards that are best for you. But in games like Sushi Go! Party and Seven Wonders, you will have an idea of what the other players want or need, so you might draft a card that doesn’t really help you, but it stops other players. Generally, this isn’t a great strategy for the person doing it, unless all the cards are equally as bad for them, but sometimes you do it to stop a large number of points just to keep yourself in the game.

The another genre that was popular and still is going strong

Deck Building: It’s a genre that has cooled off a little bit, probably more so because there are fewer games coming out in the genre that are new, and more expansions instead for older games. In these games, you have a base deck, or some resources to start buying cards, that builds up your hand and your deck. So by the end of each game, the players deck is personalized to them. The biggest game in this genre is Dominion. It has a pasted on theme of medieval times and is really about quickly drawing cards, getting money, and buying victory points. There have been a lot of games since Dominion got the genre to take off that have come out like Marvel Legendary, Xenoshyft, Hogwarts Battle, Clank!, and many more. This also can include games like Arkham Horror LCG and Magic the Gathering. They take it a slightly different way in that you are building your deck before the game is played, but the deck can still be customized to what you want.

Abstract Game: These tend to be the logic based and puzzle based games. A game like Quoridor or Blokus fall into the abstract game. It’s about thinking through and figuring out the puzzle for your given game situation. They also tend to have little theme on them, or if there is theme, it’s pasted on and there is disconnect between the theme of the game and the mechanics of the game. Dominion is a solid example of a game that could be an abstract game without any theme and it would still function just as well, but the theme makes it a more visually appealing game.

That takes us to one of the last overarching genres

Ameri-trash/thrash: It’s really Ameri-trash, but Ameri-thrash is more fun to say. These games are all about theme, whereas a lot of Euro games, their big genre counterpart, focus in on a lot of minute details and figuring out logically how to win, Ameri-trash have more luck involved. They also tend to be a lot more steeped in theme and have theme tying into the mechanics of the board game. Games like Gloomhaven or Near and Far are two prime examples. Ameri-trash games also have more randomness in their games. While Gloomhaven doesn’t have too much randomness, for Near and Far, you are rolling a die quite often to find out if you can complete a skill challenge or win a fight. You see the randomness more so in dungeon crawl sorts of games, such as Star Wars: Imperial Assault.

Gloomhaven takes us into another genre of game as well

Cooperative or Coop: These games are as they sound, you are all playing together on the same team and playing against the game to see if you can beat it or not. There’s no special mechanical piece that is tied into this, beyond that you are all on the game team. The game that caused this genre to take off was Pandemic which has come out with a ton of version and variations on the base game. Gloomhaven and Star Wars: Imperial Assault are also games that fit this genre, but Imperial Assault only does because of an app, before it fit into another genre.

One versus All: This is the other genre. Classic RPG’s fall into this as well as dungeon crawl board games. In these games one player is playing the bad guys, or the antagonists, and everyone else is playing cooperatively against them. In an RPG, that is going to be the game or the dungeon master and it’s a similar situation in dungeon crawl games.  So Star Wars: Imperial Assasult, can be played as a dungeon crawl where one person plays the imperial characters and the other players play the heroes against the bad guys. The app changes that so that no one has to miss out on the story. There are also other games that don’t fit into either the RPG or dungeon crawl genres, like Not Alone where one person controls a monster that is trying to track down all the red shirts from a crashed alien ship.

I probably should define this category next

Dungeon Crawl: I’ve mentioned it a few times, so you probably have some idea what this is, so I’ll talk about it fast. This is a game where you are going through a scenario or going up against bad guys moving through a game board, exploring new areas, and trying to complete some objective(s). Games like Gloomhaven, Descent, and Star Wars: Imperial Assault fall into this genre. You might be thinking that you don’t remember any dungeons or many in Star Wars, but that’s more of a genre given name now that a specific.

Back to more coop games for a second

Semi-Cooperative Games (Hidden Traitor): This is a genre that is closely related to cooperative games and probably wouldn’t be as strong if it wasn’t for cooperative games. In these games you are basically playing a cooperative game where all the players have the same objective. That is, all of them but one (or more depending on the game). Those players are trying to sabotage the mission for the players or have their own objective. However, they are trying to not be found out. Games like Dead of Winter, Shadows over Camelot, and Battlestar Galactica are the biggest in the genre that really needs to get more games.

Social Deduction: This is the category that seems to be stealing a lot of the hidden traitor games. In these games, you have players who are in secret roles and you are trying to figure out who the werewolves, fascists, cannibals, or whatever the games theme says the bad guys are. It is similar in some ways to a hidden traitor game but there is one huge difference. These games are built around trying to draw out that information and all the mechanics are around that deduction piece. So games like One Night Ultimate Werewolf, The Resistance (Avalon), Donner Dinner Party, and Secret Hitler are all examples of this, but the best one, in my opinion, is Deception: Murder in Hong Kong as there is more game to it than games like One Night Ultimate Werewolf or The Resistance.

That brings me to one final trio of definitions. There are so  many more things that I could write about, and I might do a part two, but this will be enough for now.

Light Weight: Probably an area that I could have described games sooner, but games are generally put into three different categories of weight, though the last one you never really hear the weight added to it. A light weight game is going to be a game with fewer rules and fewer options in the game. There can still be more strategy to the game, but it’s simple to sit down and play that game. weight in game can refer to strategy, complexity of the rules, and length of set-up/number of fiddly bits, but generally mainly the first two. Games like Splendor and Ticket to Ride are light weight games to me. While they are a bit more complex than the standard of Monopoly, they don’t offer that much strategy and complexity. Interestingly enough, a strategy abstract game like Quoridor also falls into this category even though it has a lot of strategy and thinking too it, because the rules and game play are very simple.

Medium Weight: Medium weight games are, shockingly, a step up from light weight games. They are going to offer more complexity in their interactions. You have to think through more of what you are going to do, and you can plan out multiple turns, but are more apt to have to adjust on the fly. They still aren’t getting into the area where they are too mathy or too much strategy where you are having to plan out a lot of turns in advance. Five Tribes is a great example of this where you have a number of decisions and options that you can do, and someone can take your move from you but also might not. Century Road: Golem Edition, is another game that is a bit on the lighter side of medium weight games, but builds up good strategy in the game and gives you quite a number of options.

Heavy: Heavy games are steeped in strategy and complexity of the game. A game like Gloomhaven falls into their category. There are a lot of rules to keep track of, there are a lot of little fiddly bits, there’s a lot of set-up, and there’s a lot of strategy. A lot of larger Euro games also fall into this category because you have to figure out what is going to be your best possible turn to get the most possible points from the game. I do want to point out that these games don’t always have to be the hardest games to play, once you know how to play t hem but they can often be more difficult to learn and have strategy that you need to know to be able to play the game well.

There are a lot of definitions, are there some terms that I’ve missed (or haven’t gotten to yet), that you are curious about?

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