Games for Christmas 2014

Some fun dice games for Christmas plus stocking fillers

For those looking for their once a year games purchase, be it for children or the family, or just another game to add to their collection, then this article will hopefully offer some interesting possibilities. Possibilities all easily available online and most at around £20 or less!

This years's article focuses primarily on dice games, however towards the end of the article there are also ideas for Stocking Fillers all under £10 and mostly card games.

Each game has a suggested children's age it is suitable for; however this also gives a really good indication of how thoughtful or complex the game is and therefore what to expect when you open the box. All the games fall into one of three categories:

· Simple Family Game (8 years)
· Stimulating Family Game (10 years)
· Thoughtful Family Game (age 12 and up)

I recognize that you may have stumbled on this article and know little about modern board games, and be a little intimidated by games you will probably never have seen in the shops. No worries; using the power of Google and YouTube you will find lots of video reviews that will both expand on my short explanation and give a clearer idea of how to play any of the games that interest you.

A New Begining

It has been a long time since I have put pen to paper, and a lot of water has passed under the bridge since I last wrote anything, but the joy I encounter around the world of games is still there and the desire to record it is slowly returning!

Many keen Gamers will have a circle of friends and family around them that I would call ‘Social Gamers’. These people enjoy games when they encounter them but rarely buy any themselves and it is unlikely they would list Board Games as a hobby. However it is these people on the periphery of the avid enthusiasts that are fuelling my enthusiasm to start writing again. In particular this brief post was prompted by:

• Turning up to see friends for a BBQ (with no games) and once the table was cleared it was the friends that raided their son’s small stash of games so we could play a game, or two: Straw, Hick Hack and Hey, That’s My Fish! In over 20 years of friendship this was a first!

But this most recent fuel is in addition to:

• Mentioning modern board games (and our Friday lunchtime group) in passing to a colleague at work and having her come back and ask ‘did you mean board games, I love board games! I used to love playing them as a kid and now I have children of my own……’ The conversation that ensued revealed that she was completely unaware of the word of modern board games and for those that know the film the Matrix it was like she had just taken the ‘red pill’. Her eyes where opened and I don’t think it would be going too far to say she was overjoyed at the feast of games now available to choose from! With her desire to involve her young children then her first purchase is not a gamers choice but an excellent little game none the less, Sherlock. It has proven a great success with her family. Gamers will no doubt be pleased to hear that other purchases are Race for the Galaxy, Pandemic, Comuni, Voluspa and Qwirkle.
  
• Highlighting the London On Board Meetup group to another colleague at work (and member of the lunch time group) and he going off over the bank holiday and spending 5 hours gaming with a group of people he had never met before and having a wonderful time.
  
• Combining a love of modern jive dancing with a love of food and obviously games I have been hosting monthly dinners where different people bring different courses and we intersperse each course with a game. The dance friends have never played any of the games before but the combination of good company, good food and good games is proving great fun.
  
• Following last year’s Essen trip it was the game (The Sheep Race) I didn’t buy that ultimately caught the attention of my Social Gaming friends and when I did buy they also wanted copies to play with their families and friends.
  
• Lastly, introducing games designers to the team at work and seeing it result in a Print and Play game for schools – The Flood (more of that in future posts).

It is also nice to report that the gamers group at Crowborough whilst not very visible at pubs in the area is alive and well meeting at a variety of people’s houses anywhere between Tunbridge Wells, Hailsham and Haywards Heath and has drawn in a number of new members. 
It’s meeting are a bit adhoc but its active and has a huge collection of games between its members. The only sad part (from my point of view) is I had hoped to start a Social Gamers Group and it is ultimately now a group of Gamers!

Reviews will follow slowly and other posts as the inspiration takes me but they are likely to be occasional rather than regular! Happy Gaming!

Olympic Games In The Office

Some ideas for running a games session in the office, inspired by the Olympic games

Now that the 2012 Olympic Games have started and interest / enthusiasm for the games is increasing I thought I would offer some ideas for games you might choose to use in the office as a bit of fun. Some of the following we have already used in a very successful lunch time session last Friday.

My aim was to bring people together from across the organisation and from every level for a fun relaxing session. It was less about competition and more about laughter. Importantly each game took no more than 30 seconds to explain. Having a wide selection of games I had a few to choose from however there is a link at the end of the article that will take you to a pack of games ideas produced by the Friends of the Elderly.

UK Games Expo 2012 - The Journal

The highs and lows of my weekend at the UK Games Expo

As the train headed north on Friday morning out of Euston I found my seat and couldn’t help but overhear the conversation of the other 3 people at the table talking about ‘decks’, ‘cards’, ‘combo’s’ and a number of other distinctly game type terms. Aaaha me thinks they are going to Birmingham for the UK Games Expo, but no they were a group of friends who love Magic The Gathering heading to Aberystwyth for 5 days (and nights by the sounds of it) of Magic games! The journey sped by as we talked and quizzed each other about our respective interests finding common ground at times and significant differences at others, most notably the direct combative nature of their game versus my preference for Eurogames which rarely have head on conflict.

UK Games Expo - My Highlights

Some of the highlights from this years UK Games Expo

The UK Games Expo goes from strength to strength attracting over 4,000 people and a diverse range of people who enjoy playing games from hardcore games, families, role players, social gamers, wargamers and more - groups of gamers not normally found under the same roof.

Board Games On Technology

Some thoughts on board games for iPhones, iPad’s, and Android phones

A friend recently came into work and mentioned that following our conversations he and his partner had bought Tigris and Euphrates for their iPad. They had had a great time playing it. Not surprisingly this piqued my interest and as I don’t have one of these beautiful devices I asked him if he would be kind enough to write a little bit about his thoughts on the game / using the iPad to play a board game.

“These days, many of the big-name board games are available for iPads. They tend to be visually identical to the traditional versions of the game, but they do offer some advantages:

Interview with Albrecht Werstein CEO of Zoch Verlag

We have had untold hours of fun playing the many Zoch games in our collection (Bausack, Hick Hack in-gackelwack, Furchs and Fertig and Safranito to name just a few) and I felt it would be interesting to interview their CEO, Albrecht Werstein and find out a little more about the company and its history.

Reiner Knizia Talks About Games Design

I have mentioned the prolific Reiner Knizia a number of times on my blog and the other day I stumbled upon a talk he gave at the end of last year on games design that I thought was well worth sharing. If you have an interest in games and a half hour to spare then make yourself a coffee and enjoy this stimulating talk.

He uses some interesting slides which hopefully will not offend any of my readers.

Reiner Knizia: Maximum Impact Game Design from Utrecht School of the Arts on Vimeo.

News Update - More Zoch Games Available In The UK

Following discussions at Essen Spiel 2011 I am pleased to be able to announce that some of the great games we have been talking about on my blog are at last going to be readily available in the UK through our friends Paul and David at GamesLore.

Aquileia	£32.49
Fuchs and Fertig	£7.49
Bamboleo	£45.99
Bausack	£45.99
El Paso	£18.49
Safranito	£27.49
Geistesblitz	£9.49

The prices are indicative and so may change.

Having only taken delivery of them today (19/12/2011) they may still show as 'pre-orders' on the GamesLore web site but its is great to see that games that we have picked up in Germany and have had so much fun with like Fuchs and Fertig, Geistesblitz, and Bausack are going to be more readily available in the UK.

Games for Christmas 2011

New and alternative board game ideas for this Christmas

As the pressure builds towards the Christmas and New Year bank holidays many people will start thinking about what game to buy for Christmas. Having played some brilliant games this year with people representing a broad cross-section of society from primary children to people in care homes (and every point in between) I thought it might be worth highlighting some of my favourites from this year. I have broken this article into three section:

• Games We Have Had Lot of Fun With During 2011
• Alternatives To The Perennial Favourites
• Where To Buy The Games In This Article

And it maybe that an article written earlier this year may be of interest on Why Games Work in Some Families and Not Others.

A common factor amongst the games in this article is they generally seek to emphasise social interplay, maybe a touch of strategy, more skill than luck, short playing times and rarely have player elimination.

Games We Have Had Lot of Fun With During 2011
These games are not necessarily games that have been released this year but they are games that I have seen being enjoyed by many different people and or caused a lot of laughter when we have played them.

Essen Spiel 2011 - An Overview

Some background on this massive games show and a walk around one of its halls

Most people in the UK will not have heard about the Internationale Spieltage or Spiel for short. This is a mecca for gamers who come from all over the world to buy, sell and play games of every type - except computer and internet games. It runs annually over 4 days in Essen, Germany attracting around 150,000 people with this year 810 exhibitors from 34 countries. With it attracting so many families (this should really be stressed, it is not a geek thing) and friends looking to play, there are tables in all of the 11 halls where you can just pitch up sit down and play, or buy a game. With so many people it is not surprising that it is also a key event for designers and this year's show saw 750 new games being released (some of which appear on this list)

What follows is a set of photo’s taken on the Saturday walking around just part of the main hall. It starts with

Families That Enjoy Playing Games

Other bloggers writing about the games they play with their children

Regular readers of my blog will know that I am a keen advocate of games both as both a tool in society and as a valuable resource for fun and education within the family. I recently stumbled upon a list of games played by a Canadian family with 5 children aged from 9 through to 14. The children had graded the games (adding their own comments about each game) creating a top 10; I felt particularly inspired by the effort that had been put into their top 10 list and the breadth of games played and thought it would be of interest to others. I also thought that their list and comments might provide some good ideas as minds turn to thoughts of what Christmas presents to get for those children near and dear to you.

The list can be seen here with a list from the previous year here

If you are interested in which games other families have fun with then check out these two blogs.

1. Growing Up Gamers – Mum (Angie), dad (Randy), Katie (5) and Jack (2 – it is never too young to start playing games). This blog has a strong educational leaning as Mum is a teacher.

2. The Board Game Family - Mom and Dad, Trevor, Jaden, Brooke and Caleb. They do a number of reviews (including video’s) with the children leading and giving their own marks for the games, plus there is a list of their favourite games

I am sure there are other families’ blogging out there about their experiences but these are two I find particularly interesting. I hope you enjoy their efforts and they help inspire more families to explore the fun that can be had with modern board games.

Discworld: Ankh-Morpork

Waterstones best selling game, but will it have any lasting impact in the UK?

Say board games to most people in the UK and they immediately think of the likes of Monopoly, Cluedo and Risk, but go to your local Waterstones store this autumn and nestled amongst the aforementioned titles you will also see a very different game – “Discworld: Ankh-Morpork”.

Why is this particular game worthy of comment beyond that fact that it is based in on the much loved Discworld created by one of Britain’s most successful and popular authors Terry Pratchett? The answer to this is complex but important.

1. Last year the UK was described to me as the ‘black hole’ of

The Importance Of Theme And Mechanic When Selecting What Game To Play

A conversation during one games evening

An interesting conversation ensued at our last Monday games evening concerning the games we like and dislike. Not surprisingly everybody's list was slightly different, buy interestingly as much as we enjoy playing games there are equally individual games, or game themes or mechanics that we dislike. This conversation might be summarised as:

• Crispin likes the lighter games particularly ones with more social interaction e.g. Bohnanza and Saboteur, but ‘doesn't do’ co-operative games e.g Castle Panic and dislikes Galaxy Trucker and RoboRally.

• Daniella likes pretty much any game (and wins many) and loves RoboRally.

• Ben likes the generally likes the funnier games including Landlord, Braggart, Galaxy Trucker and Saboteur however he will play pretty much anything but doesn't generally enjoy some of the more thoughtful games such as, Alhambra, Seeland and League of Six, dislikes RoboRally but enjoys games such as Blokus and would happily play an exclusion game such as Bang.

• Gwen and I like pretty much anything but with a tendency towards more medium weight / tactical games but no exclusion games e.g. Bang. More specifically ‘Gwen doesn’t do’ SciFi games and Kevin ‘doesn’t do Railway games’ (Kevin keeps this quiet but you might have noted the absence of Ticket to Ride in my collection).

• It now seems that all of our group dislike Race for the Galaxy, claiming it to be to complex (check out this video for an unbiased assessment and form your own views).

Why do I recount the conversation? Because if this group of people who like playing games (and have probably seen many more games than your average UK resident) find there are games that they dislike, I suspect that if one of those had been their only ever encounter with games it might have left them thinking "I really don’t like games". A view that seems common to a large percentage of the UK population and one that could demonstrably be based on only a limited exposure to the games available today.

Why Games Work In Some Families And Not Others?

This is an article written as part of my work with Imagination Gaming for the February 2011 addition of thru-the-portal an ezine for Social Gamers which sadly due to work pressures has not yet been produced. We hope you like it.

Is it just chance or are there common factors that affect or indeed afflict those families where the mention of playing a board game will illicit groans or worse people making for the nearest door; meanwhile in other families peoples’ eyes light up and as one person on Boardgamegeek (BGG) put it “my girls are already making a beeline to the game closet”?

I suggest that there are three broad areas within families that result in a negative response to the question ‘anyone fancy a game?’

A. Playing The Wrong Games
There are thousands of games available but for those who have not discovered modern / designer / Euro games when asked ‘what games they have played’ they will likely reel off a series of games whose names will likely include 2 or 3 of the following Monopoly, Trivial Pursuit, Scrabble, and Cluedo. The games will typically have been bought around the holiday season, arguably from retail outlets who sales staff who know little about the games themselves, they just know what sells. Worse yet there maybe the games around a popular TV series or films where the key factor in the purchase is recognition of the images on the box or whether the intended recipient like the program / film in question, if so it must be the right game for them.

Sadly the games mechanisms are often weak, heavily luck or knowledge based, or overly confrontational often with an exclusion dynamic and with a playing time that one commentator suggested leads to “the slow strangulation of the weaker players” or as another person put it 

Mum Doesn't Like Games But There Are 3 She Will Play

Last night I had the pleasure of meeting a gamer who lives reasonably close but who I hadn’t met before.

We met in a pub part way between our two homes and obviously played a couple of games, Carolus Magnus (a new one for me) and Race for the Galaxy (a favourite of mine), but also had a long chat about a number of aspects of gaming - between turns and perhaps as a way of distracting the opponent, or is that just the cynic in me speaking?

One topic that came up in our conversation I thought might be of particular interest to readers of my blog.

He described how, whilst supportive of his hobby his wife really didn’t like playing games with maybe only three exceptions.

What Would You Do To Help Your Child? Play With Them?

The theme of parents, children and play is one we have visited a number of times before in various guises within this blog. However, recently I unearthed a study reported in NewsWeek concerning a 32% improvement in reasoning abilities and a 27% increasing in processing speeds achieved by a group of 7 to 10 year olds who started using games in school. This level of gain would normally only be achieved over a year of education but was in fact achieved over an 8 week period using games for

Families Driving the Resurgence in Board Games

A real resurgence of interest in board and card games in the UK

Mark Rivera of  Board Games in Blighty (a fellow games blogger) recently interviewed Michelle Davis, one of the three founders of the Cardiff based bricks and mortar shop Rules of Play.  One of her comments was particularly interesting given my own thoughts on this subject.

"From talking to our customers, it seems that there is a real resurgence of interest in board and card games in the UK – particularly driven by families. They appreciate the opportunities that gaming as a family bring – with younger kids it’s about having fun as a family and also picking up valuable social skills – negotiation, how to lose gracefully, how to take turns and so forth. There are some great games out there which different ages can relate to in different ways – with even the most surly teenagers happily getting involved, which is great to be part of!"


The full interview can be read here

These positive comments are supported by a 10% growth in games sales in the 4th Qtr of 2010 as reported in the  ICv2's data reported here with the top 10 board and card games for Q4 2010 being:

1. Settlers of Catan
2. Ticket to Ride
3. Small World
4. Munchkin
5. Dominion
6. Dixit
7. Axis & Allies
8. Carcassonne
9. Pandemic
10. Forbidden Island

Beware Modern Board Games are Addictive!

The growing trend to play card and board games in China

Whilst this is not yet the case in the UK, there have certainly been some reports along these lines in China where an online survey earlier this year (of 343 people – hardly representative in Chinese terms!) suggested that 60% felt they knew children who where obsessed with board games. One example given was an 11 year old boy becoming hooked on a new board game, Killers of the Three Kingdoms, playing at a local gym until the lights were turned off at 9:30pm. Perhaps this underlines the old adage that too

Games for Christmas 2010

What to do with guests over Christmas / Some Christmas Gift Ideas 

If you are thinking computers games and Wii, DON’T; Monopoly, Trivial Pursuit, Scrabble etc NO; the miriade of commercial games based on popular films or TV shows STOP !

There is whole world of great games out there waiting for you, just not in the high street stores. They are less well known because they are rarely sold by high street retailers (with the exception of specialist games shops) and so are largely unknown to the UK public. If you want to buy any games mentioned below (prices will range from under £6 to £40) then there is a list of internet retailers on the right hand side of my blog titled Where to get the games.

As we approach the festive season our minds turn inevitably to the various ideas for presents and there are a number of lists out there of games that would work for Christmas (as just a couple of examples Mark Rivera's list is here and the BoardGameGeek recommendations here), so I thought I would approach this blog from a slightly different angle and look at what games you might want in the house for others to enjoy over the festive season.

Modern board and card games come in many forms but the best ones are not designed around hackneyed old games or some cult TV program / film of the moment, but rather stand out from the aforementioned games because frankly they are better. You know the saying ‘a pet is for life not just Christmas’ well so it should be with modern games. The games talked about in this blog post and my blog generally are great fun and hopefully you will be tempted to play them at other times of the year, not just over Christmas.

To those who say 'they don't like games' or have had bad experiences in the past with games I would make the following points concerning these games:

• You don’t need to be good at spelling, general knowledge, computers or anything else to play them and have fun. I guess maths and a little logic will help but we all need a lot more of these elements to survive in the modern world than you will find required in the games listed below. 
• There is not a dice in sight, the games are about how you deal with the situations and cards you are dealt not about trying to roll a 6 or indeed any other number.. 
• The games are more about building than destruction, meaning that direct conflict between players should not be something to worry about, particularly if everybody remembers that when playing games it is more important to enjoy the journey and have fun than win at the expense of ruining the journey for the other players. 
• There are games listed below that are in all probability unlike any games you have played to date.

This blog post is divided into three elements, so you can just go to the part that interests you:

1. Quick Games for Christmas Morning
2. Fun Games for Christmas Afternoon
3. After the presents – Boxing Day
4. Conclusion

Quick Games for Christmas Morning 
With people coming and going and a focus on food preparation you may need ways of amusing and distracting people for 20/30 minutes at a time. The following are some simple games that are quick to teach and will amuse both young and old: