Catch Up on the Top 100 Games

100 through 91

Top 100 Games (of all time) 2025 Edition – 90 through 81

90. Wandering Towers

Published By: Capstone Games
Designers: Michael Kiesling and Wolfgang Kramer

Buy Wandering Towers.

This is just a fun simple game of trying to remember where you wizards are hiding and get them to the main tower. I like how easy it is to make it work. You play out two cards and if you have potion bottles filled you can cast a spell. The spells are simple, the cards are simple, you choose to either move a wizard or a tower as far as it says on the card. But it’s still a lot of fun because of that memory aspect and burying your opponents wizards under a stack of towers.

89. Grove: 9 care solitaire game

Published By: Side Room Games
Designer: Mark Tuck

Buy Grove.

This one is two games in one really with Grove and Orchard. I put them together because the games are very similar, though I do slightly prefer Grove. In this game you stack cards to get matching tree types to overlap. As they overlap you tick up dice that are going to give you more points. The more points you have at the end of nine cards, the better you do at the game. Grove adds in scoring cards, and that addition is what pushes it over because it’s bonus scoring, but also how many points you need to beat to win the game.

88. Via Magica

Published By: Hurrican
Designer: Paolo Mori

Buy Via Magica.

It is weird to think that drawing chips out of bag and everyone getting a cube to add to their spells, basically bingo, can make a fun game. But it is great in Via Magica. This is a simple game with powers that you get from completing spells. It’s one of two games that actually has abilities or powers from completing spells on this section of the top 10. But it’s all about drawing those chips and hoping to get the right ones. Or then being smart about the spells you take so you can always use the chips.

87. No Thanks!

Published By: AMIGO
Designer: Thorsten Gimmier

Buy No Thanks!

This section of the list has a few push your luck games on it. No Thanks! isn’t a tradition push your luck game, but it does have those elements. In particular, you need to decide when it is worth taking a card. Cards are bad, cards give you points, so you want to say no thanks to them. But you need chips to do that, so No Thanks! is a game about determining when there are enough chips on a card to make it worth taking. Because, not only a chips needed for saying no thanks, they are also negative one point per chip at the end of the round.

86. Strike

Published By: Ravensburger
Designer: Dieter Nuble

Buy Strike.

Imagine a gladiatorial battle in the Coliseum. Actually don’t, this game is all about rolling dice to get pairs and knowing when to stop if you don’t get pairs. You just want to be the last one in the game and that’s it. It’s a simple game and simple system but it is always fun when it hits the table. I think everyone just likes to make a decision to roll a fist full of dice. And if you don’t get any matches, you can always roll more dice that you held back, but beware the one because when a die lands on that side, that die is gone forever.

85. Marvel United

Published By: CMON and Spin Master
Designers: Andrea Chiarvesio and Eric M. Lang

Buy Marvel United Multiverse Core Box.

Do you want to team-up as Marvel heroes to defeat villains in a fast and easy game? Marvel United is great for that. You pick your hero, the villain to go up against, and a few locations and you are ready to play. This game is all about managing what the villain is doing, and they do some fun stuff, and then chaining off of what your superhero teammates did, because you use the last card played, to have a great turn. This is a great game to teach people cooperative game play because you can really cooperate. And there is so much for it.

84. Homebrewers

Published By: Greater Than Games
Designers: Matthew O’Malley and Ben Rosset

Buy Homebrewers.

I like brewing beer, I did it for a long time. I’m not sure it’s hobby I’m going to return to. But I can still get my beer brewing fix with Homebrewers. This is about brewing the best beers you can. You brew a beer and you go up on a track, then you need to deal with the spent grains, sanitize, get more grains and brew again. All of that is like homebrewining.

But then the game offers different ingredients you add to your brewing. And these cards stick around between brews. So if you brew a porter with almonds, you now always will. And those ingredients give you brew something special that might be more money, or it might be that you move up on another beer. At the end, you just want to be the best homebrewer out there.

83. Chronicles of Drunagor: Age of Darkness

Published By: Creative Games Studio
Designer: Eurico Cunha Neta

Buy Chronicles of Drunagor.

I love my big campaign games. And Chronicles of Drunagor is no expection. It is just lower on the list because one of them has to be and it is one that I haven’t played a ton of. There is so much in the game, but I highlight three things in the video. I want to highlight one here, the activation system. You use different colored cubes to activate abilities of those colors. But when you run out of cubes or need a specific ability, you need to pull back those cubes. Then you cover up a spot so you can’t use it. It’s a unique system that I find a lot of fun.

82. PUSH

Published By: Ravensburger
Designers: Prospero Hall and Brian Kirk

Buy Push Here.

I like simple push your luck games, and PUSH is my favorite of them. This one is just push your luck, but as compared to other simple push your luck games, this one offers just a few choices. Mainly you create three stacks of cards on your turn. But those stacks can’t have the same color or number in a single stack, aka you can’t have two blue cards in a stack. Well, that is easy enough, you could stop early. If you do that, then other players could push their luck for more points. And then there is the die, if you have the roll the die, you might lose cards. It’s all about balancing that risk for points.

81. Potion Explosion

Published By: Horrible Guild
Designers: Stefano Castelli, Andrea Crespi, and Lorezno Silva

Buy Potion Explosion Here.

If you want a game that feels like app game, Potion Explosion definitely meets that need. It is one of those games where if like colors are touching they explode, or in this case, you get them. And it’s all about chaining together colors of marbles the best you can, and then you use them to complete spells. And those spells give you points that you need to win the game, but they also give you one time abilities that you can use to chain together more marbles and complete more spells. This game is just tactile and fun.

Join Next Week

Just as a reminder, I am streaming my Top 100 Games (of all time) 2025 Edition every Wednesday night at 9 PM Central Time. The next few videos have their links up, so you can click notify on them to know when I go live. Or you can subscribe to the channel and click notify to know whenever a new video comes out. Currently I am playing through Legendary Kingdoms on Monday and then my wife and I are playing Baldur’s Gate 3 on Fridays. So join us for those videos.

And thank you for checking out the video and articles. Let me know what your favorite game from this chunk of 10 is and which one you would love to get played.

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Catch up on previous videos here

100 through 91
90 through 81
80 through 71
70 through 61
60 through 51

Top 100 Games (of all time) 2024 Edition – 50 through 41

50. Via Magica

• Published by Hurrican in 2020
• Beat your fellow magic students in a bingo-esque game and utilize your powers best

This is a great filler level game. It’s a ton of fun to collect materials and use them to open gates. And then try and figure out what games and what elements you want to focus on opening first to get benefits from either immediately or throughout the game. As as well you need to grab points, so it’s a fun balancing act in what you’re doing. This is not going to be for everyone as it’s a light game, but I really like Via Magica for a nice relaxing and fun time.

Buy Via Magica

49. Too Many Bones

• Published by Chip Theory Games in 2017
• Chuck dice and battle enemies as you level up your Gearlocks to faceoff against the final boss

This is a fun short campaign style game. It’s not a big story game, but you get that mechanical feeling of leveling up in Too Many Bones that makes it such a fun time. And each Gearlock is unique and plays differently. I think that is part of what makes the same so special. Each characters want to level up in their own ways. And sometimes you just want better stats. But other times, getting and using your unique dice is going to create for some really fun game moments. The game isn’t a story game, but it can provide it’s own story.

Buy Too Many Bones

48. Ganz Schon Clever (That’s Pretty Clever)

• Published by Schmidt Spiele in 2018
• Place dice, fill in spots, and gain combos to get your highest score

I’ve already talked about this system two other times. But this is the original one to use the system and it’s my favorite of them. I really like how clean the puzzle is for trying to solve this game and do best at it. And there are enough combos that you can end up with some awesome turns. But the combos don’t slow down the game too much which is one element that I can really appreciate about this design compared to others. Though the flexibility in how you play is a little bit more limited.

Buy That’s Pretty Clever

47. Dungeon Kart

• Published by Brotherwise Games in 2024
• Rev your engine, take off, and mess with your opponents in this fast racing game

Dungeon Kart is obviously trying to be a Mario Kart style game. And I think it does a good job of it. I’ve played other games that offer some of that, but Dungeon Kart I really enjoy. It does a great job balancing catching up, slinging spells at your opponents and just a fun time. You get behind, no biggie, you get more and better spells. You’re in the lead, well, it’s your own fault you are there and you’re going to get blasted, but don’t worry, you can still catch-up again.

Preorder Dungeon Kart

46. Super Mega Lucky Box

• Published by Gamewright in 2021
• Combo your way into a bingo victory

This is the second bingo like game on the list where something is drawn and all players use it. But this one is a flip and write game that is more bingo like than Via Magica and has you filling in a three by three grid. Of course as you fill in rows and columns you get bonuses that can give you more. And the game provides great offsetting of the luck of the slip with powers from lightning bolts. It’s just a really fun, easy to play and fast game.

Buy Super Mega Lucky Box

45. Cartographers

• Published by Thunderworks Games in 2019
• Draw your best map as you explore the lands in this flip and write game

The theme is only kind of there, but this is a great roll and write style of game. You flip over terrain and figure out how you want to place it out on your sheet. But beware monsters because your opponents get to decide where that’s going to go and it’s going to be the worst spot for you. Plus the game has fun scoring that rotates throughout the seasons so that one of the scoring elements in spring is going to be scored for winter as well.

Buy Cartographers

44. Res Arcana

• Published by Sand Castle Games in 2019
• Can you get your magical engine up and running faster than your opponents in this race to 10 points

I like how simple Res Arcana is, but how thinky it is as well. You need to really figure out how you want to leverage the cards that you have, or draft, in this game. And drafting really adds some strategy to it as you can try and figure out what your best cards are going to be how you can get them to turn out points. The game has this great build to it until suddenly you can get points and then the game just flies to the finish.

Buy Res Arcana

43. Railroad Ink Challenge

• Published by Horrible Guild in 2021
• Can you connect your routes better than your opponents can?

Another roll and write game, last one in this section. Railroad Ink Challenge is a great game of building out routes of both trains and roads and trying connect as many of them as you can together. Challenge adds in challenges that you can push for to score more points. But beware of leaving too many unconnected pieces, those can lead to your doom as they are negative points.

Buy Railroad Ink Challenge

42. Rebel Princess

• Published by Bezier Games in 2024
• It’s Hearts with Shenanigans, in the best way as you avoid proposals you really don’t want.

That’s really what Rebel Princess is, Hearts with shenanigans. But the shenanigans really do make this game. The princess powers are all game breaking in some way, and you want the ones everyone else have. And then the card that determines the special rule for the hand is great as it messes with everything. So you need to be quick to adjust how you are playing every time, and I think that’s great.

Buy Rebel Princess

41. Rock Hard: 1977

• Published by Devir Games in 2024
• Live your best rockstar life as you go from garage band to playing stadiums in this worker placement game

This game is really about living that 1970’s classic rocker life as you build up your band, gain reputation, write more songs all in hopes of playing on the biggest stage. I love how the worker placement is split up over three different times, day, evening, and after hours. And it’s fun that you need to worry about your job, at least for a little bit, and pay your producer as you become more famous because of course, while they help you, they also hurt you. It’s just very thematic for a worker placement game and a theme that I like a lot.

Buy Rock Hard: 1977

Upcoming Streams

Just a reminder on my streaming schedule. It’s not just all my Top 100 Games (of all time).

• Monday night, time varies, I play different small solo games, though I might be looking to start up a campaign again. And generally the streams do start between 8 and 8:30 PM central time.
• Wednesday at 9 PM central is going to continue my Top 100 Games (of all time) 2024 Edition for another six weeks. After that expect this to be when I play my small games. Only 5 more weeks left of my Top 100 Games, then likely this will switch to smaller solo games and video games.
• Friday at 9 PM central my wife and I are streaming a playthrough of Baldur’s Gate 3. Join us for the adventure of Nina and Kaerok and see what choices we make.

The best way to know when we go live, though is to subscribe and click that notification bell. I can’t promise, and in fact it’s pretty unlikely, that I’ll have events to click on ahead of time. Though I do want to get better at it. I hope that you can join a stream and hop into the chat. And let me know what games in this list are your favorite or that you want to try.

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How To Play – Via Magica

Like I said, Via Magica is a bingo style game. Or maybe more Super Mega Lucky Box style game, though, Via Magica came out first. In this game you are trying to capture animus to open different portals, all very magical. What that means is you have three portals in front of you and as a player draws out tokens, you match the animus type, colored white, blue, red, brown, green, and black, to the animus needed on that card. There are wilds, and when that is drawn, you reset the bag of tokens and draw some more.

However, you only have a limited number of crystals. You put them out and you might have two near completion but no crystals left. Depending on what is drawn, you can move crystals around to get a card completed. When you complete a card, you pick a new card. And once someone has completed seven, the game is over.

But it isn’t just that, each card has a power, or a lot do. It might be that you score two points for each green animus that you have. Or it might give you 12 points but be a hard card to complete. And some might make a color wild or allow you to place animus of a certain type for free. So you try and build up combos that will help you get the most points. Because at the end of the game, most points wins.

What Don’t I Like?

I have played this at two and it plays up to six, so I want to play with more. The reason I want to play it with more is that the market of portal cards is pretty static with two players. I might complete a portal, take a new one, and then complete a second one with only one new portal being available. This isn’t a major issue, but with more players the market would be in flux more. It’s a minor quibble with the game, though.

I also wish that the tiles that you draw were nicer. In my final thoughts I’ll talk about how this gives me a bit of a Splendor vibe. Splendor has great chips in the game, and then fewer other components. I wish this one has Splendor like chips as you do draw them from a bag, so as they are handled they will start to wear out. Not as fast as Quacks of Quedlinburg, the chip here are handled less. But it’s worth noting.

What Do I Like?

Simplicity

I like the simplicity of the mechanics. The game is easy to setup, easy to teach, and easy to play. It says 30 minutes, I think in lower player counts that is a bit long for the game. Two players probably takes 20 minutes, unless you get really poor draws. So it falls easily into that category of from box to teach to table in 10 minutes tops. And if everyone knows how to play, probably five minutes.

The game is also going to scale really well. I draw an animus tile, everyone puts down on their portal, if they can or if they want. So while with more players it’ll take longer because it’ll take more time for people to pick portals. This is not going to be a long game ever. Maybe at the full six players it’d take 40 minutes in a slow group. Goes back to that simplicity of the mechanics.

Strategy

I also think, that while it is simple to play, there is strategy and choice in what you are doing. Not tons of a complex level, but when you finish a card matters. I play down onto a portal that lets me place out two crystals on blue animus immediately. Well, if I don’t have two open blue animus in play, that is a waste of my play. Or in the last game I played, I got three colors to be wilds for me which wasn’t a ton of points, but gave me a ton of flexibility early in the game to then go for bigger points.

I think this is an area that people will overlook. They will see it like Super Mega Lucky Box and see such a simple game but not realize the strategy that you can have. And probably lose their first game because of that. There is a lot of luck in the game, what is pulled out of the bag. But there is strategy or thought that goes into which portals you do and when you try and finish a portal.

Who Is It For?

This is a good filler game for gamers who want something quick while waiting for more people to show up. Or maybe as the game night is winding down. Not some party game, but a game with decisions that is fast to play and get to the table.

But, this is also a good game for when you are with non-gamers. The artwork is cute, the rules are so simple, and it plays fast. I could see pulling this one out with family and playing it twice or three times in a sitting, because the game is that easy to get to the table. And it is that level of a Splendor where the rules are simple, animus is drawn, you place a crystal. But as you play you learn more of the game.

Final Thoughts on Via Magica by Hurrican

I really enjoy this game. In fact, I prefer it to Splendor. There are a few games, Century Golem Edition, and now Via Magica, that I put in the same weight as Splendor, same depth of strategy as it were. And I prefer both of them to Splendor. Both Century Golem Edition and Via Magica have more strategies that you can try. And while I might eventually feel like I’ve played enough of either, it’ll take much longer than it did with Splendor.

Now, it isn’t going to be a game that works for everyone. It is a very simple game, but treating it as such should entertain most people. It is a great filler where it isn’t just a lucky party game. And there is no scaling to worry about for the game. So it will never play longer, which I love in games. That way it falls int some of those roll and write categories like Super Mega Lucky Box. But it is also like Sushi Go Party! that way with decisions but not too many.

I want to always have a game like this in my collection. The type of game I play with anyone. It might not get played all the time, but it will get played. It is like Ticket to Ride or Small World in that way. I play those once a year, maybe. But they come off the shelf, and I keep them because they will always find time to get played.

My Grade: B+
Gamer Grade: C-
Casual Grade: A

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