Hoyles Board games

stockton_2

Hi

I am looking to add a few more games to my present meagre collection, of Scrabble, Hearts and Trivial Pursuits. I have put in a bid on ebay for a largish bundle of various games, but I have also noted that Hoyles make a variety of puzzle, casino and card games. Would be interested to hear what people think of these games. Are they worth buying??

Thanks

heartbreak_star

I can recommend Settlers of Catan, Pandemic, Fluxx and Boss Monster

HBS x

Crazy_Jamie

Whether they are worth buying depends on what sort of games you want to add to your collection. The likes of Scrabble, Hearts and Trivial Pursuit are the types of games that you find in most households, along with the likes of Monopoly, Taboo, Pictionary and other straightforward board/casual games.

The games that heartbreak_star has recommended are what could probably be termed 'gateway' games. The board game industry is extremely deep, and those games will give you a taste of what board games can offer beyond the known quantities of Monopoly et al. The irony is that Monopoly really isn't a very good game; it is based almost entirely on luck, takes far too long to play for what it is, and it is often obvious who is going to win long before the end. Even the suggested 'gateway' games offer significantly better experiences in my view. I just thought I'd expand on a couple of heartbreak_star's suggestions and throw in some of my own:

Settlers of Catan: This is a classic game where players compete to build settlements on a map, and accrue resources in order to improve their settlements and obtain victory points by. The first player to a certain number of victory points wins. It is fundamentally not very different to Monopoly in that you're trying to build an empire of sorts, and there is a luck element, but the fact that there are a variety of ways to win the game, along with the ability to trade resources (which brings a proper element of social interaction) makes for a much better experience than Monopoly.

Pandemic: This is one of my favourite games, and is a great introduction to 'co-operative' games, where all players work together to 'beat the game'. Players are a team of scientists trying to contain and cure a number of diseases that threaten to overall the world. It really is excellent; if you are considering branching out to something a bit different to the usual board games, you really should take a punt on this.

Ticket To Ride: This is a fairly casual game in that the rules are quite simple, and games are relatively quick. Essentially players compete to build train routes through geographical areas. I know that doesn't sound interesting, but it is probably the most played game in my household because it is so easy to just pick up and play a quick game. For me this should be the 'casual' game that everyone owns rather than the likes of Monopoly or Cluedo. I'd buy this irrespective of other games that you buy.

Tsuro: Something a little bit different. Players each have a token that moves around a developing board as paths are laid down. The aim is to be the last on the board; if your token moves off the board you are out. You can play with up to 8 players, and games take about 15 minutes. This may sound like a weird thing to say, but the game is absolutely beautiful and really easy to pick up.

Dixit: An original one, this. The game consists of a lot of cards with various strange but impressive artwork on them. On your turn you have to play a card face down with some sort of clue (which can be anything) as to what the card contains. Everyone else then plays a card from their hand that could match the clue. The cards are mixed up and everyone guesses which the original card was that you played. To get points at least one other player must guess correctly, but not all of them. The beauty of this game is that anyone can play it, but everyone interprets the cards differently and gives different clues.

Exploding Kittens: This is a new card game, and the most backed Kickstarter project in history. I backed it when it was on Kickstarter, and have written a detailed review about it on Amazon that you can read here. The short version is that it is fantastic.

Saboteur: An introduction to games where players are all working together save that some players are working against the team in secret. In Saboteur you are a team of mining dwarfs that have to find the gold, but one or more or your number are saboteurs that are trying to stop that from happening, you just don't know who they are. Again, it's a great game.

Elsewhere

I have played Settlers of Catan, Ticket To Ride andDixit and enjoyed all of them, particularly the first two.

I also played Dominion over Christmas - it's an interesting game but confusing at first - better played with someone who knows the rules the first couple of times.

A couple of simple games popular with my family are Apples to Apples (can be very funny)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apples_to_Apples

and Upwords. Upwords looks like a version of Scrabble, but the tactics are completely different

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upwords

There is an adult version of Apples to Apples called Cards Against Humanity. It's very funny, but strictly for broadminded adults!

torbrex

Mahjong, Backgammon and Risk are my favourite board games if you are looking for suggestions.

Crazy_Jamie

torbrex wrote: »

Mahjong, Backgammon and Risk are my favourite board games if you are looking for suggestions.

See, when I talk about games that households tend to own, I'm talking about these. Well, perhaps not Mahjong, but that does fall into the 'classic' category with the other two. Personally I would more encourage the OP to branch out and see what else the industry has to offer if they are so inclined.

The problem is that a lot of 'classic' board games, such as Monopoly and Risk, are not actually very good. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy playing Risk, but it's difficult to make the objective case for it being a good game. There are so many better strategical board games along the same lines. The reality is that most people play the likes of Monopoly and Risk because they are familiar and most people know how to play them. It's a shame really, because with a bit of willingness to branch out and try something new you can find some real gems that will make you wonder why you stuck with those familiar games for so long.

stockton_2

Many thanks to all for your very helpful replies. Jamie, your insight and analysis is very impressive. My partner and I like to play competitive games. We find scrabble is very good because the game can go either way right up until the last word. Free Hearts is another game we really like because both of us team up to try and beat the other contestants. I would agree with you that games like monopoly would not appeal to us for the very reasons you stated.

I know that there is a big world of games out there and it is a case of making the effort to find some others that are challenging and interesting.

There is such a bewildering choice that it is almost like a minefield and that is why I am very grateful for the replies that we have had because it gives us a specific route to finding the things that we are looking for.

Once again, many thanks for your replies and helpful suggestions about what games to go for.

Crazy_Jamie

stockton wrote: »

Many thanks to all for your very helpful replies. Jamie, your insight and analysis is very impressive. My partner and I like to play competitive games. We find scrabble is very good because the game can go either way right up until the last word. Free Hearts is another game we really like because both of us team up to try and beat the other contestants. I would agree with you that games like monopoly would not appeal to us for the very reasons you stated.

I know that there is a big world of games out there and it is a case of making the effort to find some others that are challenging and interesting.

There is such a bewildering choice that it is almost like a minefield and that is why I am very grateful for the replies that we have had because it gives us a specific route to finding the things that we are looking for.

Once again, many thanks for your replies and helpful suggestions about what games to go for.

If it's competitive games you're looking for that are good for two players I would highly recommend the Nordic Countries version of Ticket to Ride. There are several different versions of Ticket to Ride, most accommodating four or more players, but the Nordic version is specifically designed for only two or three players, and it is extremely well balanced for two players. My wife and I like to play competitive games as well, and that version of Ticket to Ride is the one that we play most often. Our other favourite is Carcassonne, which also works well with two.

It can be difficult to find competitive board games that work well with two players, as whilst most do accommodate two players, they're usually notably better with more players. The two games mentioned above are ones that I know from experience work well with two players. We've also recently purchased Memoir '44, which is a two player only strategy game set in WW2 which is supposedly very good, though we haven't actually got round to playing it yet. Hive is another highly rated two player only competitive game that you might want to have a look at. Again, we own it but have never got round to playing it.

Johnmcl7

Is the Nordic version of Ticket to Ride quicker? I played the version with the US map on New Year and was extremely impressed with it as you quickly come to appreciate just how clever it is as they're so many different strategies which can be forced to change at short notice. The only issue was it took quite a while so the smaller one sounds good.

John

Crazy_Jamie

Johnmcl7 wrote: »

Is the Nordic version of Ticket to Ride quicker? I played the version with the US map on New Year and was extremely impressed with it as you quickly come to appreciate just how clever it is as they're so many different strategies which can be forced to change at short notice. The only issue was it took quite a while so the smaller one sounds good.

John

Ticket to Ride is generally quicker anyway the fewer players that you have because the game ends when one player has run out of train tokens. The box of Nordic Countries gives a playing time of 30 to 60 minutes, and actually games between my wife and I do generally take about 30 minutes. I expect that's quicker than the games that you have had with more players on the US version (the Europe version is a similar size to the US version).

You're spot on about the strategic element of Ticket to Ride. It's something that kind of creeps up on you as you suddenly realise while you're playing how finely balanced the game clearly is. The beauty of the design is that you can never truly know how well your opponent is doing because you get points both for the routes that you have on the board and the journey cards in your hand, and clearly you cannot see your opponent's cards.

The bigger maps such as Europe and the US offer good balance for larger groups, but even with the rules changing slightly for smaller numbers of players, the maps are still big and don't quite offer the same level of balance. The advantage of Nordic Countries is quite simply that it can only be played by two or three players, and the balance is absolutely spot on. As far as I'm aware it's widely held to be the best balanced version all in all. As I say, highly recommended if you want a competitive game for two people.

JasX

Hi Stockton,

A good resource for looking this kind of thing up is

https://boardgamegeek.com/browse/boardgame/page/1?sort=rank

They usually have a good clutch of reviews of pretty much every boardgame out there, I think as others have hinted it's worth paying attention to the "this game works well/best with X number of players" sections. If you're mostly playing against your other half you may find what may be a great 4-5 player game is decidedly lacking when played 1-on-1.

Also depends on the complexity you're after, a lot of the games mentioned above are fairly straightforward mid-lightweight modern games (easy to pick up but starting to get a little meat to them)

Worth noting the game that held the top spot for most of the last 10 years was a 2 player only game called "Twilight Struggle" renown for being fiendishly strategic but less accessible due to it's complexity (ie not one to play against your mum at christmas)

Other people prefer lighter games tho some do standout as working well on multiple levels eg "codenames" is a very devious game built around word association that was one of the bigger hits of 2015 (do you give a safe clue to pitch for 1-2 words or a more convoluted but dangerous one to go for for more points) but that game needs 4 players.

Do you and your other half prefer games where the strategy is alot about bluffing? or crunching numbers and bidding on actions? or simpler games where the game's 'theme' is a big part of it's entertainment value.

Finally if you have a local boardgaming club (or even boardgaming cafe which seem to be springing up around the place) this can be a good place to try out a few to work out which ones you like before buying any for yourself. (as in a modern boardgaming club rather than the local pensioners bridge league ;p)