Catch Up on the Top 100 Games

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

Top 100 Games (of all time) 2025 Edition – 60 through 51

60. Trinket Trove

Publisher: GameHead
Designer: Rocco Privetera

Buy Trinket Trove

I love how Trinket Trove has pretty simple rules. But it is a game that offers more than just simple game play. You collect cards in your hand that will be your score at the end of the game. There is a twist, though, as those cards you also use to bid on other cards. So you need to bid to get more cards or get cards that you want, but that means you mess up your hand. I think that little twist is clever as well as being able to take the cards others have bid to make for a really fun game.

59. Vampire: The Masquerade – CHAPTERS

Publisher: FLYOS
Designers: Thomas Flippi, Gary Paitre

Buy Vampire: The Masquerade – CHAPTERS

Now to another one of those big adventure games that I love, we have Vampire: The Masquerade – CHAPTERS. This is set in the World of Darkness/Vampire: The Masquerade RPG setting. And it is a scenario driven adventure game. Now all the scenarios chain together, so it is meant more as a GM-less RPG sort of setting. I like the simplicity in which it plays. And I think balancing things like hunger and abilities is interesting in the game. The story is the element that really gets me though, as the combat itself is pretty simple.

58. Five Tribes: The Djinns of Naqala

Publisher: Days of Wonder
Designer: Bruno Cathala

Buy Five Tribes is Not Available Currently

This mancala style game is going to give you a ton of ways to score points. And I like that tension of trying to figure out a good move on your turn. Now, I know for some that might introduce some analysis paralysis and there are people I won’t play it with. But I like that puzzle of figuring out what I think is a good move for me and dropping off workers until I get to that last spot. I also like that everything gives you points in the game as that makes even a less than perfect turn still give you something.

57. Too Many Bones

Publisher: Chip Theory Games
Designers: Josh J Carlson, Adam Carlson

Buy Too Many Bones

Another adventure game on the list, I own so much stuff for Too Many Bones. This one is about the Gearlocs that you have and leveling them up. Each one is going to play differently. Some of them might let you level up archery as you unlock new dice, others might start to build bombs that you can use in combat. But this game is one with a great flow. You do an adventure piece, you fight some bad guys, you level up and then you repeat. You do that until you feel that you are ready to face off against the boss, and if you are lucky, you are ready and can win.

56. First-Class Letters

Publisher: GameHead
Designer: Peter C Hayward

Buy First-Class Letters

I love roll and write games, and I like word games. This one is a bit of both. You roll letters and you need to come up with words that use them. But there is a twist to that because there is a letter that you can’t use as well. And of course that is going to be a common letter to make it tricky. To add to that, there are some spots where they set the letter the word must start with. And all the words at the end need to be in alphabetical order. There is a bunch going on, but not too much to ruin the fun.

55. Super Fantasy Brawl

Publisher: Mythic Games
Designer: Jochen Elsenhuth

Super Fantasy Brawl is Currently Unavailable

I don’t love all fighting games. There are a few that I find great, and Super Fantasy Brawl is one of them. This is a game of fighting against an opponent to knock out their characters and complete objectives. But what I love about the game is the simplicity of the play. I play three cards a turn and do their actions, one for each color. Or, if I use a color for a reaction on my opponents turn, then it’s two cards on my turn. I also like that you score objectives at the start of your turn. So you need to hold that spot through your opponents turn.

54. Century: Golem Edition

Publisher: Plan B Games
Designer: Emerson Matsuuchi

Buy Century: Golem Edition

Century: Golem Edition is a great hand management engine building game. Each turn is simple, but the better you are at figuring out how to create a combo with the cards in your hand, the better you’ll do. It’s all about getting games and leveling up those games to get Golems, who are points, in the game. You can get the regular version of this as well, it’s the same game, but I love the Golem artwork and the gems in this are just more fun.

53. Pandemic Legacy Season 1

Publisher: Z-Man Games
Designers: Rob Daviau, Matt Leacock

Buy Pandemic Legacy Season 1

This one is for all the Pandemic Games. I love the Pandemic System, though I haven’t played base Pandemic in quite a while. Mainly because I think that Pandemic Legacy Season 1 and Season 2 are so good. The system just works and the story that you get within the legacy games is great. I even played Pandemic Legacy Season 1 solo on Malts and Meeples early on. So you can see that there, if you want to see how it went for me. I almost feel ready to play it again. If legacy isn’t your thing, than maybe Star Wars, Warhammer, or Lovecraftian horrors will work.

52. Mesozooic

Publisher: Z-Man Games
Designers: Florian Fay, Alexander Ortloff-Tang

Mesozooic is Currently Unavailable

Back to back Z-Man Games on the list, but Mesozooic is very different from Pandemic Legacy. This one is a small little drafting game where you draft eleven cards to make your zoo. But those cards, you don’t get to decide where they fit in your zoo. Instead, you shuffle them up and then then a sliding puzzle, you race to get them in place in 45 seconds. You do that draft and slide puzzle three times and whomever has the best zoos at the end of that is the winner of the game. It’s silly fun and I like it as something really different.

51. Deception: Murder in Hong Kong

Publisher: Grey Fox Games
Designer: Tobey Ho

Buy Deception: Murder in Hong Kong

Finally wrapping up with #51 we have Deception: Murder in Hong Kong. This is the one social deduction game that I like, and that is because there is deduction as well. You start to piece together the clues from the Forensic Scientist to figure out the murder weapon and clue. Of course the murder and accomplice are trying to keep you away from that, and the witness is trying to subtly point you in the right direction. It’s just a great time and there is always a story in this game.

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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How To Play Cacao

Cacao is a tile laying game where you are trying to get the most points for selling cacao beans at the various settlements. And you gain points for also having workers adjacent to water, temples and more. But for the most part your turn is very simple.

On you turn you take one of three tiles that you have and you add it to the grid of tiles out in front of you. There are very few rules for placement, the main one being that you can’t put a worker tile adjacent to another worker tile. You can rotate your worker tile any way you want. The tile is always going to have four workers on it.

Then after you place if there is a empty spot adjacent to that tile and another worker tile, so the two tiles form a right angle, you fill in that spot, or spots with scoring tiles. The scoring tiles might be villages where you can sell cacao or it might be spots where you can get your crop. As I mentioned as well there is water, temples, and more that give other scoring opportunities.

Then you activate the workers on the tile you just placed. And you decide which order to activate them. So you might want to harvest cacao beans first so that you have something to sell. Or you might want to sell first so you have room harvest more cacao beans.

The game ends once every player has placed all of their tiles. It’s possible at the end of the game that someone might not be able to place a scoring tile because they are all already out. In that case, just place the tile and activate the worker. Whomever, at the end, has the most points, wins.

What Doesn’t Work

The game plays differently at different player counts. Mainly at lower player counts, two or three, it’s going to be more strategic. I play a tile out in a way that is going to benefit me greatly and maybe will be hard for you to come and get to it. Higher player counts it’s going to be more random. More on the board will change between. It only plays up to four, which is nice it won’t be too random, but as compared to two players, it’ll be way more random. I think for some people it might limit how many players they want to play with.

What Works

The turns are fast-ish and simple. Yes, you need to really think about where you want to put things. But the decision space is limited. It does grow as the game goes on because there are more spots to play. The decision space, though is never too bogged down. And often times, if you don’t have cacao beans or you do, that is going to help make your determination for you as to where you want to go.

The game is also not too long, but it’s not too short either. This could be a game where it goes on and on and you make a giant map of tiles. But it’s not like that, the game plays quickly. But it’s also not too short. I feel like I have a good amount of time to make decisions and get points in the game. If I do that well or not is on me. But the time is there for me to try and do that.

And I like that the tiles are different. On a tile, for your workers, you might have two on one side, and one on either side flanking it. Or one it might be one worker on each side. Or even three and one for a few of the tiles. So when do you play that really powerful action? Because two workers means that you could sell two cacao beans to a village. But maybe I want to get that many instead. The choice is always good.

Who Is Cacao For?

This is for people, I think, who like a game like Carcassonne. I think this one is easier in some ways. And that’s not a bad thing. Carcassonne can sometimes be challenging to teach farmers and there’s a bit going on in there. This one it’s just that little bit simpler and there isn’t the worker management, at least not in the same way. So it’s going to be a game that is very welcoming and friendly to people who are maybe newer to board games.

My Final Thoughts on Cacao

I enjoy this game quite well. I own it now so that fact should be pretty obvious. There are certain elements that really draw me towards this game. In particular, I like the different workers on the tiles. And I didn’t mention it, but some of the cacao “fields” have two beans on them, so you get two for one worker. I think there is a good amount of emerging strategy in the game as well.

The water is interesting as well. If you don’t get water, you get negative points. So that is rough, and it means that you need to think about that. I like how it can block people out as well from water. So now they need to be more effective on the temples having worker majority there to get the higher of the two points. So Cacao while simple is not a game that is devoid of some really good decisions.

Let me know your thoughts on Cacao.

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

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Catch up on previous videos here

100 through 91
90 through 81
80 through 71

Top 100 Games (of all time) 2024 Edition – 70 through 61

70. Sagrada

• Published by Floodgate Games in 2017
• Build the most beautiful stained glass window

This game is just a great drafting game experience. The ease of play is wonderful as well because you draft a die and place it while other people are going on drafting their own dice. Especially with the 5-6 player expansion, which can be worked into the lower player counts, it makes it so you don’t need to spend time with what others are doing. But both ways to draft the dice and place the dice are mainly the same and really good. Plus the way you need to play the dice to not have colors or numbers adjacent makes a great puzzle.

Buy Sagrada

69. Mesozooic

• Published by Z-Man Games in 2018
• Slide your dino-themed park together in this light filler game

Mesozooic has a couple of great elements to the game. Firstly it’s drafting, and I really love drafting. But the game is more than that. You also need to complete a slide puzzle. You see you draft 11 cards and shuffle them up to create a 3 tall and 4 wide grid with an open spot. Then you slide them around frantically for 45 seconds like a slide puzzle to get the best dino-park that you can. It’s silly, light, and a very fun time.

Buy Mesozooic

68. 7 Wonders Duel

• Published by Repos Production in 2015
• Draft cards and build wonders in this head to head game

I like this game better than 7 Wonders. Mainly because I played 7 Wonders a few times at two and it isn’t a good game. 7 Wonders Duel is great that way, as expected. But the game is more than just a better version, I think that the drafting is very clever. I love the trying to avoid revealing a card that is good for your opponent. And some of the cards being face down so unknown until they are revealed. And the two side ways to win with science and military add in tension to the game as well. You can’t just draft your best engine, even though you want to.

Buy 7 Wonders Duel

67. Icecool

• Published by Brain Games in 2016
• Help your penguins sneak out of class and get fish in this dexterity game

Yes, the theme of Icecool is that simple and I love it for me. I love the flicking element of the game, it’s just fun. And I really enjoy the silliness of the game. This is one of my favorites for a late night of gaming. Just sit around and flick penguins and have a laugh. It is possible to get very good at the game, but it’s also a game where players can just have a great shot by pure luck. To me that is what makes it a fun game for all ages.

Buy Icecool

66. Super Fantasy Brawl

• Published by Mythic Games in 2022
• Choose your team and face off against an opponent in an arena

This game is coming back, kind of. I say kind of, I expect that most of the game is going to be the same, but CMON bought it from the now defunct Mythic Games. So I want to see what CMON is going to do with it. Because I love the simplicity of the game. Super Fantasy Brawl has you activate three different colors of cards each round. And you can do some on defense as well, but that means you won’t do as much on your turn. Then you either try to knock out your opponents for trophies or complete goals, or most likely, do both. The game is strategic but also fast and easy to play.

Follow Super Fantasy Brawl: Reborn

65. Trailblazers

• Published by Bitewing Games in 2023
• Create the best hiking, biking, and kayaking routes

Another drafting game on the list. This is the last one for this time, but there are four and possible five if you count drafting your team in Super Fantasy Brawl. In this one you draft cards to create trails. I love the trail creation aspect of the game because you really need to strategize as to how you’re going to do that. And I like how the game becomes more complex in your trail creation throughout as you add in other hubs that you need to start and leave from for each of the three routes.

Buy Trailblazers

64. Mind Up!

• Published by Pandasaurus Games in 2023
• Play the right number to collect and create sets of colors

This game is so easy to learn and play. I actually wrote about it yesterday in that exact context, so you can checkout the article after this. But it’s simply play out a card simultaneously with the other players. Then you look to see who played the lowest number, they get the lowest number from the middle. And after that it’s about trying to get the colors you want into the highest scoring column you have. The whole thing is just a really easy to play and simple time. I explain it better in the video, by the way.

Buy Mind Up!

63. So Clover!

• Published by Repost Productions in 2021
• Can you find the right pair of words based off of one word clues?

This game is always tricky for me to explain. Basically you have cards with four words, one on each side. And you have four of them making this little four by four grid. Each side is going to have two words, if that all makes sense and you’re picturing it. You need to create a one word clue so people can guess and put it back into that same order. Not that hard, well, it is when the words don’t connect at all. And there is going to be a mystery fifth card added in. But if you give the right clues you can lead people down the right path to recreate it.

Buy So Clover!

62. The Castles of Burgundy

• Published by alea in 2019
• Take a new kingdom and turn it into a bustling land

A game that I wouldn’t have expected that I like. But I really enjoy The Castles of Burgundy, a game of using dice to purchase and place new things into your land. As well as using them to sell goods, and get workers that let you manipulate your dice. There is a bunch going on and I feel like I need to nail down my strategy for it. But I really enjoy what this offers and it’s a new type of puzzle for me to spend time diving into as a game. I even have the fancy version coming that alea did with Awaken Realms.

Buy The Castles of Burgundy

61. Letter Jam

• Published by Czech Games Edition in 2019
• Work together to figure out what everyone’s letters are because you can’t see your own

If you know what Hanabi is that will help with it. But Letter Jam is a game where you can’t see the letters that form your word. Other players can see one of them at a time but they can’t see theirs. So you give clues to help people narrow down what their letters might be for their jumbled word. Of course everyone needs to get theirs figured out by the end of the game, but it’s cooperative so the challenge is great but fun to tackle.

Buy Letter Jam

Upcoming Streams

Just a reminder on my streaming schedule.

• Monday night, time varies, I play different small solo games, though I might be looking to start up a campaign again.
• 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.
• Friday at 9 PM central my wife and I are streaming a playthrough of Baldur’s Gate 3

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.

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Game Play

In Super-Skill Pinball: 4-Cade, you are rolling dice and filling in spots, hitting targets on a pinball table. You can nudge it to try and adjust where the ball is coming down, you fill in the bumpers so that you can unleash more points, as well as getting special bonuses for completing special challenges. You bounce around from place to place on the board, but you always end up going down, with the exception of the three bumpers in the middle where you can ping around inside of them, like you do in actual pinball. You have three balls in the game, so you score points over those three balls until you’ve lost the last one, and then that’s your end score. Each round the dice are rolled and everyone picks one of the two dice to use.

Game play for this makes a lot of sense. Of course your ball in a pinball game would drop further down. It makes sense that if you’re up in the three bumpers it can rattle around inside. All of it game play wise makes a ton of sense is really enjoyable. The scoring is also simple enough, when you hit things they show that you either get points or you get points if you fill in full sections, so that’s easy to track. The one thing that I did have trouble tracking was where my ball was on the table, now that was my own fault as they give you an awesome pinball to move around. I just did a bad job of keeping up with moving it around. That’s more on me than anything else.

The Components

This game has really nice components. I mentioned them above, but the pinballs that you love around to keep track of where your ball(s) are, that is amazing. It comes with four dry erase boards as well for each of the four pinball tables, as well as four dry erase scoring boards/bonus boards. Really nice components and very nice dry erase markers. The only knock that I have on the dry erase markers is that I want to be able to stick the cap to the back of the marker, and that really didn’t stick well.

Now, the rule books, the rule book is huge and is going to be a bit of effort to get through. This is because they have to explain how each of the tables works and what is unique about it. That is a lot to get through for what looks like it should be a fairly quick game to get to the table. However, they make it easier to get to the table by giving you a cheat sheet to get the simplest of the pinball machines up and going quickly. I like that more games are starting to have their tutorial or shortened rule book to get your going faster.

Roll and Write Comparison

This roll and write feels different than most other ones that I’ve played. Granted, I only played the first introductory machine out of the box thus far. But it feels like it does some fun things, and that it is one that people will find interesting as the table. The theme definitely works for the game. Most roll and write games are pretty themeless, even one of my favorites, Cartographers, that theme really isn’t that there that much.

It also does one thing that I expect in most roll and writes now, and that is limit the downtime. In Super-Skill Pinball: 4-Cade, downtime doesn’t exist. Well, it exists in one very specific spot. When the dice are rolled, everyone uses the dice. It isn’t one roll per person, it’s a roll for everyone and everyone picks one of the two dice. That means that no one is ever waiting during the bulk of the game. There is one time when you might be waiting. And that is at the end of the game. If you lose your ball before the other player(s) do, you might be sitting there waiting for them to finish so you can compared scores. This is a minimal issue to me because the game goes quite quickly, and it’s one that I have only played solo thus far, I can just see that downtime occurring to some extend every game.

Initial Thoughts

Not final thoughts because I need to play it more, but initial thoughts on the game. I like this roll and write. Now, I like most roll and write games so keep that in mind. But I think that I’ll like this one a lot. It has a good thinky element to it and some solid push your luck in terms of nudging the dice and trying not to get a tilt on the machine. It is also surprisingly thematic for a roll and write which gives it a whole lot more points in my book. I also was really impressed by the level of production in the game.

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After a week off, I was back at it with Pandemic Legacy Season 1. How did I fair this time as I tried to save the world from diseases and drink a beer? Spoiler, the beer was drank.

Pandemic is a game where you are trying to cure the world of various diseases. However, in the Legacy version of the game, things are turned on their head, and you have to deal with even more problems. You can find out more of a description in the first Pandemic Legacy video on Malts and Meeples, or over on Board Game Geek.

Yesterday’s beer was from Destihl Brewery out of Normal Illinois. It was a blonde ale with a lot of fruits called Hawaii Five Ale. It’s a solid beer, but the peach in there is the most prominent fruit flavor and the others are kind of lost in there. I wish the flavors would be more distinct, or that the peach was balanced better with the rest of the flavors, or maybe not even there.

Bottoms up!

We’re back, the break was a little longer than I had planned, but with the 4th it made it hard to stream. So how is our game of Pandemic Legacy Season 1 going to go this time?

And what is Pandemic Legacy? In the game, you are trying to cure diseases on an ever changing board where rules are added, cities run into troubles, and the diseases can even change. You can find more information at Board Game Geek.

I also tried out a new beer and brewery to me. It was O’so Brewing Company and their beer Hop Debauchery. This was a good tasting New England Double IPA. So pretty tropical in flavor, but not too sweet. There was a good grapefruit flavor that wasn’t just bitter, but had a good depth of flavor. A beer that I’d definitely try again.

Bottoms up!

What’s going on in the world in this game of Pandemic Legacy? We had some surprises come when we played last time. How will that affect our game going forward?

Pandemic Legacy is a game where you are trying to cure diseases on a changing board that is unique to your game play. In the end, your game is going to look different than any other copy of the game. You can find more information about this game on Board Game Geek.

As for my beer yesterday, I drank Into It from Modist Brewing out of Minneapolis, Minnesota. It is a Raspberry and Lime Lager. An interesting taste up front, but it ends up just finishing like a lager, which was kind of disappointing.

Bottoms up!

More Malts and Meeples after about a week off, I was able to get the game to the table last night with a little interruption in the form of a baby who decided he should do a 180 in his bed and confuse himself.

But how did game number 10 of Pandemic Legacy Season 1 go? And what is Pandemic Legacy? Pandemic Legacy is a cooperative board game, that I’m playing solo, where you are trying to cure diseases, but each time you play the board changes based off of events that happen or things you do in the game. This could be adding a sticker to the board, or tearing up a card. You can find out more about Pandemic Legacy Season 1 from Z-Man Games on Board Game Geek.

And what was last nights beer? My malt for the night was a repeat of a previous game. It was a hot day, and I wanted my favorite beer, from Odell Brewing Co., St Lupulin. It’s just a nice straight forward EPA (Extra Pale Ale) with a good summery taste. It also is a good beer even when it is a bit warm.

Bottoms up!

Back again last night with another game of Pandemic Legacy. How did it go this time? And what is happening in the world that is probably going to cause me to lose?

Pandemic Legacy is a Legacy game where you destroy components, add in new rules, and generally change up the board so that each person’s play through is unique. While all of that is going on, you’re still trying to cure a number of diseases so that the world isn’t wiped out. You can find more information on Board Game Geek.

Yesterday’s malt was from Odell Brewing Co. It’s my personal favorite beer, the nice and hoppy and summery beer Saint Lupulin, and Extra Pale Ale.

Bottoms up!

Join me again as I come back and try and win Pandemic Legacy Season 1 with style.

If you aren’t familiar with Pandemic Legacy, it’s based off of the game Pandemic from Z-Man Games where you are trying to cure four diseases. However, in this Legacy game, things change and you might not be able to cure a disease, the board might change, rules might be added, or cards might be destroyed. More information can be found on Board Game Geek.

And what about the malt on last nights Malts and Meeples. Last night it was a Raspberry Blood Orange Fruitsicle from Odd Side Ales. It’s an interesting beer, a bit sour from the raspberry to start, and then finishes with a sweet orange flavor. I wish it was a bit more tart overall, but generally, it was quite refreshing.

Bottoms up!