2006 Gaming Year in Review (Part 1)

I’ve always been a compulsive list-keeper, but this is the first time I’ve logged my games played on Boardgamegeek. Overall, I found the logging to be a positive experience – it didn’t take a lot of effort, I didn’t get bogged down in trying to keep track of game results, and I had something to look back on whenever I started to get the irrational feeling that “I don’t get to play enough games.” I mean … I logged 265 games played in 2006. What more do I want?

I also enjoy some of the special features that BGG has attached to the game logging system. Looking at games played over the last thirty days is especially illuminating … I view this display as the “product” of my game-playing hobby. All the thinking about games; the buying of them and the reading of rules and preparation of components; the on-line search for details and opinions; the discussions about games good or bad … all of the stuff matters to me only inasmuch as it results in games getting played, and the “last thirty days” function gives me a snapshot of how I’m doing. I also like watching the sidebar update on this blog each time I play a new game, and I like watching the rise of select games on the overall list of plays for the year. It’s amusing to me to see that June was my best month for games played (39 … MANCON makes it’s presence felt), while September was the pits (only 7 games that month, and five of them on a single day, not sure what went wrong in September).

And the system lets me look back over the year as a whole and analyze my game playing habits as a whole, and project a little bit about what might happen in the year ahead. Rather than go through each game on a times-played basis, I’ve broken the games into several categories. This first post will concentrate on my “Top Games of the Year” and (mostly) my “Solid Peformers.”

TOP GAMES OF THE YEAR: Commands & Colors Ancients (21), Memoir ’44 (11), Battlelore (8)

I already wrote extensively about these games in my “Assimilated” post last month, so I won’t say more about them here aside from noting that I expect Battlelore to be my most-played game of 2007.

SOLID PERFORMERS: Tigris & Euphrates (9), Liar’s Dice (8), Power Grid (8), Tikal (8), Lost Cities (6), Conquest of the Fallen Lands (5), Das Motorsportspiel (5), Pizza Box Football (5), Ticket to Ride (5), Wings of War (5)

I came into this year rating Tigris & Euphrates as “9” (a rate rating for me on BGG); I end the year rating it “8.5” as the bloom has begun to fade, just a bit, after playing this one for a decade. It is still a deep and challenging game but I find I like it a little less, I think maybe my tastes are starting to swing back away from elegant mechanics and more toward “experience” games or games with better-integrated themes. The nine times I played T&E this year were entirely play-by-email games on BGG, and eight of them were part of a two-player tournament (where I think I finished 4-4). I’m not sure I’ll play this nearly so much in the year ahead, but it would be nice to get it on the table for a couple face-to-face games.

Liar’s Dice is a game that I can take or leave, but it always comes out when we’re in a group and drunk, so it will be here again next year. Lost Cities and Ticket to Ride are in a similar category for their ease-of-play and I’m sure they will return to the list.

Power Grid was the star of my face-to-face gaming this year … the Ulm really took a shine to it, and I liked it well enough to get swept up in his enthusiasm and keep bringing it out for play. I was surprised by the degree to which the variant maps kept the game fresh. Overall I would rather play Age of Steam but Power Grid is a solid game that I like well enough, and when a game has momentum you go with it. It will be here on this list again in 2007.

Tikal is a game I continue to like … I’m surprised to see I played it eight times, I think those must have all been on line as SpielByWeb rolled out their web-based version earlier this year. It makes for quite a good play-by-web game as the analysis-by-paralysis downtime goes away, but it also becomes an even more competitive game when played in this fashion, and I think I like Tikal best played face-to-face with friends. The components are just too nice to leave in the box. I resolve to play this one live in 2007.

Conquest of the Fallen Lands is a new game that I really like a lot, but I may have burned it out with the local group. We’ve detected a significant turn-order advantage in this one (which I’ve written about on BGG), and the game may be poisoned insofar as the guys are concerned … but I can’t help but think we’re one tweak away from getting this game dialed in, so I plan to lay low until the Spring sometime and bring it out again.

Das Motorsportspiel sat unplayed on my shelf for years after being acquired in a trade, but then saw a crazy flurry of play in the middle of the year. I think it is an “experience” game for autoracing, not something you’ll play a lot but worth playing as an event every once in awhile. I don’t see it as having enough legs to sustain league play, which is really the only place you can go with it. It will probably stay on the shelf until the next time Warren Spector visits (he’s a race game nut and he’s eyed this game a couple times).

Pizza Box Football was a game that I wanted to like more than I did. I put a lot of time into trying this one, playing face-to-face, and solo with full stats from the Pro cards expansion. I think the only way I’ll really enjoy this one is with a group of football fans that want to play the basic game, and I don’t see a critical mass developing on that front, unless we start another Madden lunchtime league at work, when this game might sneak onto the table while guys are waiting their turn on the Xbox.

Wings of War is a very clever game, and it has a wargame theme (which bumps it up in my estimation). I’ve put some time and materials into pimping out my set, and I’m gratified to see that it got on the table as often as it did this year. It does feel like an underplayed game that I haven’t experienced enough, but it will be hard to get this game on the table versus Battlelore in the year ahead. I also can’t shake the feeling that the scenarios aren’t quite enough, and that some kind of campaign system is necessary (but at the same time I know I don’t have enough guys interested in this one to play it that extensively). If the 3D models and movement stands come out this year, this game might see a burst of activity.