Ten Games to Start Your Game Collection (And Twenty More)

Randolph Pub Ludique's games library. That's a lot of games. 

One of the most common topics I see in board gaming communities like DFW Nerd Night, The Boardgame Group, and /r/boardgames is about folks who are new to the hobby and want to expand their board game collection, but aren't sure what to buy. We're in a "golden age" of tabletop gaming, and with 1,500 new games being released each year, there are plenty to choose from and plenty of ways to evaluate them.

I've crowdsourced this list by polling the members of DFW Nerd Night, and used that list, plus some of my own discretion, to put together "Ten Games to Start Your Game Collection". It's important to note that these aren't the ONLY ten games I think our new friend should purchase, just the first ten that should give her plenty to play for the foreseeable future.

Ten Games

Surprisingly not included. 

Nerd Nighter Nate Owens posted an interesting question on his blog this morning: "Could I reduce my collection to just 10 games?" I think it's a fascinating exercise, and it's tangentially related to Jones Theory, which states that we should keep only the best game in each genre/style in our library, so as to play only the best games.

I'm occasionally asked what my favorite games are, and the answer is quick for me: "Betrayal at House on the Hill and Battlestar Galactica". These are numbers 1A and 1B, but I don't play them often because they require a specific type of play group (great friends!) and a specific atmosphere (relatively quiet, a place where folks can pay attention for 2-3 hours). When I started to answer the "ten games" question, I assumed I'd list both of these, but I surprised myself by omitting one.

The "rules" are that each game can have as many expansions as necessary included, and they all count as one item on the list. For my sanity, I'm not including my Magic: The Gathering cube as a game, as it occupies a different place in my gaming life and frankly, I'm writing the article so I get to cheat a little bit.

Without further adieu, my list of ten games that I'd keep in my library:

Goodbye, New Friend

www.jessie.org

This morning a young boy died. I met him last November at the Ronald McDonald House in Fort Worth, playing games as we’re wont to do on third Fridays each month. I only met him once. I remember speaking with his mother, talking about the games they play with his older brothers, talking about his treatment, and why everyone loved him so much.

This kid - he was hands-down the best gamer I’ve ever met at the RMH.

We played Set, and he got it right away. He just ate up anything I put in front of him, so we naturally got into a discussion about the finer games in life, which ended up being a conversation about my favorite games, which ended up with me making a late-night dash to Evolution Games to pick up a copy of Ticket to Ride to give to my new friend.

I can’t remember everything about that night, no matter how hard I try. I’ve been teaching games with my wife for more than two years now, and we meet a lot of people. Some stick with us because we see them every month, and we try really hard not to think about how messed up it is to see somebody more than once at the RMH.

This kid – I met him once. I talked to him for an hour. He’s stayed in my head for a year.

Gen Con Interview - Madison Sites from Days of Wonder

Madison Sites, one of our dear friends from Days of Wonder, took a few minutes out of her insane Gen Con schedule to talk about hot games at Gen Con and future conventions that Days of Wonder will be involved in. Five Tribes was a big hit at Gen Con, as was Memoir '44 and Ticket to Ride!


For a full playlist of interviews from Gen Con, click here!

Dominate 19th Century Commerce with Iron Horses

Iron Horses by Chris Rossetti takes you back into the 19th century when Railroads dominated commerce. Climb aboard any one of Lydon Rail Company’s four railways and race to be the first train to successfully deliver $1,000,000 in resources! Be wary of what lies ahead, as setbacks are bound to happen! Tariffs will slow our delivery, maintenance will stop you in your tracks and hijackers are eager to steal your payload! Fix what you can, deliver the goods and chug along to victory! 

Ticket to Ride, by Alan R. Moon

It’s no secret that Days of Wonder is one of my favorite game publishers. They put out quality games like clockwork, typically elegant, re-playable, and beautiful to look at. Ticket to Ride is the epitome of what DoW creates – a game so simple a six year old could play it, but compelling enough that it’s the second-best selling hobby board game in the US, and one of a very small number of games that I see in every single game library I come across.

Ticket to Ride is for everyone. I love maps and numbers, and TTR has both – but if you love quick turns, little down time, and plenty of tension, well, it’s got those things too. It’s also beautiful – the board, the pieces, the cards, all become something wonderful when laid out on a table. This game feels important. Every time I pick up the box I’m surprised by how heavy it is, and every time I play it, I’m surprised again by how much I enjoy it, despite having played 500+ times before.

If you’re a board game enthusiast, odds are you already own TTR, or at least have played it enough times to have an opinion. If you don’t own it, or haven’t played it, put this on the top of your list. It’s among the three games I ALWAYS recommend to a person starting a new game collection, and I think it should be federally mandated that the app has to be on every iPad. If you’re not already convinced, read on!