Board Games

I've always enjoyed playing board games. I like Cranium, and Scrabble, Clue and The Game of Life just fine, but I've recently discovered that there are a ton of awesome board games out there, hidden in comic book shops, specialty retailers and, of course, the internet. I did some research today on games I'd like to play. I found three in particular that seemed intriguing.

Settlers of Catan

Ok, so I've played this one before. It's a lot of fun, and has even been called the a "Monopoly Killer". The basic strategy is to collect resources to build settlements, cities and roads to gain ten "victory points". One of the most appealing things about the game is how balanced it is for the players. There's almost never somebody too far ahead of the other players, and each player has the opportunity to collect and trade resources every turn. It's fun, original, and has incredible replay value.

Ticket to Ride

This one seems pretty cool, partially because you get to play with miniature trains. Here's an overview from the maker's website:

"Ticket to Ride is a cross-country train adventure in which players collect and play matching train cards to claim railway routes connecting cities throughout North America."

It's very accessible to all types of players, has with a low learning curve and won best game of the year in just under a dozen countries. Seems very cool, and did I mention it was about trains!?

Dominion

This is definitely the nerdiest game on the list. The premise seems simple: a card based game where you build your kingdom to gain points. However, it's a 500 card deck with an almost limitless variety of ways to win. It's very highly rated, most amazon users agree that it's unbelievably addicting. It only takes about 30 minutes to play. Hopefully you'll all want to try it with me. And I know what you're thinking.