I’ve been reviewing games for a long time. Perhaps too long… Often I forget where I stand on games so it’s worth taking a stocktake once in a while to make sure my board-game-dar is still working.
These are 10 games I’ve previously reviewed in a list from worst to best with updated 2022 opinions.
How do they hold up after I’ve played another couple hundred games?
Tales of the Arabian Nights
For some, Tales of Arabian Nights is the best game they’ve ever played. Its non-sensical non-linear story creation delivers hours of whimsy and hilarity.
For me, it’s a waste of time.
You’re better off reading a choose-your-own-adventure novel or playing some Dungeons and Dragons. Then you’ll get a story that doesn’t read like it was the first draft of Shakespeare written by a thousand monkeys.
Then if you take the story element out of Tales of the Arabian Nights, the gameplay is like my award for Best Board Game Reviewer: non-existent. Often you’ll move towards your objective only to be transported elsewhere for story purposes. If you’re not into ‘lol random’ humour this is a major kick into the craw.
While Tales of the Arabian Nights was once revolutionary in 1985, it is now a relic. Games like Arkham Horror 3rd Edition and Forgotten Waters demonstrate how to effectively weave storytelling and gameplay together. There’s no reason to ever play this game again.
Kept or Culled: Culled
Tak Tak Jack
Released in 2008, this is another game that wouldn’t survive if released today. Like The Fuzzies, it’s a Jenga clone. Where instead of pulling out blocks, you’re tapping on a plastic tree with a plastic axe.
In retrospect, what got people excited about Tak Tak Jack was that it wasn’t Jenga. In a desert of dexterity games, it was an oasis. This meant people were drinking mouthfuls of sand and claiming it was Mount Franklin because Tak Tak Jack didn’t improve on the formula set by Jenga.
Kept or Culled: Culled
Letters from Whitechapel
Now we’re talking.
A deduction game based on Scotland Yard. Where one player takes the role of Jack the Ripper and the rest of the players are London’s best and brightest. Or dim and dullest if you’re Sherlock Holmes.
Either way, Letters from Whitechapel is a fantastic hour-long hidden movement game that takes at least two hours to play. Overstaying its welcome like it’s your awkward friend who never knows when to go home after a party, and sticks around to tell about their Animal Crossing bug collection.
For most people, Letters of Whitechapel has been replaced by the younger, sexier Whitehall Mystery. However, there are a lot of fantastic options in the deduction space including Fugitive, Cryptid, and Tragedy Looper.
Kept or Culled: Culled
Lovecraft Letter
Imagine spending a whole paycheck on a meal from a 5-star Michelin Restaurant, only to put tomato sauce on it.
That’s Lovecraft Letter.
The original Love Letter (also on this list) is fantastic. It’s one of those games that has clean, lean deduction with rules so simple, you can teach your grandma.
Yet even with granny playing, there are enough interesting choices for you to enjoy.
Lovecraft Letter dehances the original by adding randomness and more complex mechanics. Polluting the streamlined design of the original like a BP oil spill. While I prefer more complex games than Love Letter, this was not it.
Kept or Culled: Culled
Clank! A Deck-Building Adventure
It took me a long time to come around to Clank! A Deck-Building Adventure. I think it was my third or fourth play before it clicked. Up until then, I was forcing myself to play it to try to find the magic.
I love deck-building games.
I love sneaking and stealing gold from a dragon’s dungeon.
Yet Clank! A Deck-Building Adventure felt too random for me to enjoy. At the time I was deep into the cult of Dominion (BGG Link), which handles deck-building like a business transaction or a no-nonsense factory line.
Now I’m amid my rehabilitation into a non-Dominion society, I can see the value in having a random marketplace. But it does need to be balanced with other mechanics so the game doesn’t devolve into a dice roll. A game that does this brilliantly is Lost Ruins of Arnak.
However, I loved the frantic scrambling you get from the last half of Clank! A Deck-Building Adventure. But I love it more in The Quest for El Dorado (BGG Link) which forgoes the foreplay and gets you racing from the word go.
Kept or Culled: Culled
Raiders of the North Sea
My biggest board game regret is selling off Raiders of the North Sea.
At the time I hadn’t played too many games and was taking baby steps into the genre of worker placement. However, the randomness of raids was just too much for me. You’d spend all this time building up the resources to go on a raid. Only to be thwarted by bad luck.
It didn’t seem fair.
News Flash: life isn’t fair.
Having spent a lot more time in the hobby and played games with zero randomness. I’ve bounced back the other way. Wanting a bit of excitement and randomness in the games I play.
As such I have a deep longing to play Raiders of the North Sea again. The theme, the art, and essentially everything outside of the raids are exceptionally well done.
In 2020, they re-implemented the game as Raiders of Scythia (BGG). Combining new mechanics brought in from the expansion and new art.
Maybe that’s my ticket to trying this game again.
Kept or Culled: Culled (Unfortunately)
Love Letter
Back when I originally bought Love Letter, there were only two versions. The original Japanese version from Kanai Factory and the AEG version came in a small velvety pouch.
Now there are more versions of Love Letter than mice in the South Australian mouse plague.
Love Letter captured the hearts and minds of board gamers everywhere. With its simple, yet addictive gameplay, ability to be played anywhere, and small velvety bag. Which was the pinnacle of deluxification back in the day.
I haven’t played Love Letter recently but few games have managed to match its design. A sixteen-card game, where you have a one-card hand, must seem like a fever dream for those playing card games back in the 60s.
On a personal aside, I’ve been debating swapping out my deluxe edition for the 2019 version which has some different roles. If you have any experience, please let me know what I should do!
Kept or Culled: Kept!
5-Minute Dungeon
If it’s the end of a board game night, where we have limited time and brainpower, 5-Minute Dungeon is the game I reach for. It’s the epitome of dumb fun. Like watching Tik-Tok or YouTube Shorts, you can put your brain on autopilot and just enjoy throwing cards onto the table.
The five-minute timer works overtime in this game, creating an unmatched level of insanity. Trying to be somewhat efficient in coordinating everyone’s cards and abilities is impossible. Leading to many laugh-out-loud moments.
The expansion 5-Minute Dungeon: Curses Foiled Again (BGG) is a fantastic addition and for the longevity of the game, a must-have. It adds the right amount of variability to keep me coming back years after its release.
Kept or Culled: Kept!
Welcome to the Dungeon
One of the original games that got me into the hobby. A decade later and it still keeps me entertained.
It is the pinnacle of bluffing games.
In it, you play as adventurers boasting about defeating a dungeon. One player goes: ‘I can do it without my armour.’ The next player goes: ‘Oh yeah?! I can do it without my armour… AND MY SWORD!’
This one-upmanship is as funny as it is fun. But beneath the veneer of bravado, the game is extremely calculating. Where you’re given enough information to figure out what’s going on, but not enough to see the full picture. This leads to these knife-edge moments where you must decide if you’re in or out.
Fantastic game, one of my favourites.
Kept or Culled: Kept!
Dale of Merchants
If Welcome to the Dungeon is the penultimate bluffing game, then Dale of Merchants is the penultimate deck-building game. Where you race other animal merchants to set up stalls in the marketplace.
It’s another game with a silly theme with mechanical richness underneath where it’s all about tradeoffs. You can use cards as money, to build your stall, or for its action. So each turn is a struggle to figure out your best action.
On top of this, building your stall is a puzzle requiring you to give up cards. Giving up-tempo as a result. This is disastrous as Dale of Merchants is at its heart, a racing game.
Dale of Merchants is also a game that’s gotten better over time. With Dale of Merchants 2, and 3 cleaning up the rules and introducing more animal types. Then Dale of Merchants Collection came out and introduced player powers and even more animal types. It’s the complete package. I could live my life without playing another deck builder again.
Kept or Culled: Kept!
With this post, we’ve added over 100 games to the board game list! A massive milestone, hope you’ve been enjoying the journey so far. Have you played any of these games? If so, how is my board-game-dar?
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David, I pretty much agree with your reviews here — nice look back and trimming the list! BTW, I know that Perseverance: The Castaway Chronicles went out to you folks down under — you should see if you can find someone to play it with. It is amazing with a sense of story/history across the two episodes. I also wanted to say that I was at a conference a couple of months ago and hosted a game night with my students and colleagues — Love Letter was one of the games I taught, and, as usual, they loved it and had a great time with it. Of course, they are also enamored now of the new Star Wars Jabba version — I haven’t played it yet (don’t have it yet), but I’m seriously thinking it would be a good alternative to have. I haven’t played Dale of Merchants, but now you make me want to find someone in our game group with it and give it a shot.
Oh my word. I just checked for Perseverance… It’s a cool $270! It better be great! Haha.I have heard good things about the game though, and would love to play it some day. Speaking of Mindclash they’ve just announced their next game – Septima about a witches coven. Which I kind of love. What do you think?
Also I’d love to learn about the differences between all of the Love Letter version at some point. As each one has a bit of twist. I really hope in Stars Wars that Jar Jar is the princess. 😉