Counting from 10 to 1000

 1000 Is Just the Beginning

As I noted in my previous Friday post, I'll be posting my top 10 favorite plays in honor of hitting 1000 plays logged. That number is still weird to me. I know that it's probably not going to mean that much in the grand scheme of things, but as I look at my journey over the last few years with board games, it's a wild number to think about.

I've noted in previous posts that I have ADHD, which means that usually I'll get super excited about something, do that thing for a set period of time (like 2-3 months) and then I'll get bored and move on from it. That usually means that I'll really get into an activity and then burn out on it because I've done it way too much, which is pretty evident by the number of projects that I've started and abandoned halfway through.

But board games have been different for me. There's something about them that has just held my attention much longer than other things that I've been interested in.

It might be the challenge of constantly looking to perfect my game, or having such a wide variety of games to play, or maybe it's the connection that I get with other people when playing games. I'm pretty sure it's a combination of a bunch of different factors, but being able to say that I've hit 1000 logged plays in less than a year is something that is astounding to me as it represents a major milestone for me. I've stuck with this hobby for long enough that I've been able to reach one thousand separate plays of games that I've put here on BGG and that's a major milestone for me.

Plus, I've been able to write about my experiences with games, and that's something that also has lasted much longer than I expected. Being able to write this blog regularly has been nothing short of a miracle for me since it's require hard work and patience. Something that my ADHD does not really lend itself to. It's been both a challenge, but also encouraging that I'm able to write this blog. I know that I go on far too long with these posts, but it's the way that my mind works. It just goes and goes and goes and I have to get my thoughts out or they'll be gone forever.

This blog helps with that. Sort of.

However, I've gone on far too long without getting into the list! Here's my top 10 favorite (or remembered) games that I've played over the last year or so in my quest for 1K plays:

#10 - For Science!
This one stands out to me not only because I really enjoyed the concept of building a cure out of kids blocks and the wacky player powers that this game comes with, but also the venue that we played this game in. I had met with my regular Saturday gaming group that we met once a month for and it was my friend Zach's turn to bring games for us to play to the meetup. We normally met at a local Caribou Coffee as the board game café that we would prefer to meet up didn't open until 10 AM and that was an hour later than we would like to meet as we only had a very small amount of time that we could connect.

What stands out to me the most was during this particular game, Anthony (who will be a regularly occurring mention here) had chosen a player power that allowed him to place more blocks or hold more cards in his hand or something advantageous, but had to only speak in "beeps" and "boops" because he was a robot. This hilarity was only compounded by my friend David arriving and immediately bursting out into laughter at seeing three adult men playing with kids blocks in the middle of a coffee shop. It made for an excellent story and has solidified this play in my mind thoroughly with how ridiculous it was.

#9 - Deliverance
This one stands out to me because of the circumstances that I played it in. This was last summer (2023) and our regular Saturday gaming group had been going strong for some time, but two of our members weren't able to make it. Anthony had just gotten his copy of Deliverance from Kickstarter and he wanted to pull it out for us to try. I had a friend visiting that weekend and we both hopped over to Anthony's place to sit in his basement and appreciate the spectacle before us.

I don't remember what boss we were fighting against, but I do remember choosing the Archangel Azrael, who was primarily focused on dealing damage through negative status effects. With the game being brutally difficult, there were times where I would spend the other two players' turns figuring out what I was going to do in order to do the most damage to the enemies. I remember it clearly hearing Anthony say, "Watch this," when it came to my turn and I would unleash a flood of damage to our enemies, which would often result in one or two being overwhelmed by the damage and dying.

It was a long, grueling session, but I do remember feeling like a king after that game and absolutely falling in love with the game after that play.

#8 - Castles of Mad King Ludwig: Collector's Edition
I remember this game very strongly as it was the one that introduced not only Castles of Mad King Ludwig to me, but also introduced the collector's edition and it was one of the first times that I went to Anthony's house to play games. We went over to have dinner with their family and our daughter was very entertained playing with Anthony's kids, which left us with some time to play a game together. I remember Anthony had talked about the game previously and after some discussion with Sarah, we agreed to play the game since it sounded really fun to play.

What I didn't expect was for Anthony to lug up a massive box and place it on his table and proceed to take out tray after tray of components and rooms, expounding on all of the cool things that the collector's edition contained. I was enamored with the double-layered and double-sided boards and all the options for swan colors and Sarah became absolutely in love with the idea of building a castle with a wild selection of rooms and gardens. After we finished the game, I could swear that I saw Sarah's eye's twinkle with how much she loved the game and how much fun she had with it and I immediately knew that it had to go onto my wishlist. Fast forward a year and a half or so and I was finally able to get the collector's edition of the game, much to both Sarah's and my delight, but it all goes back to that first day where the game was introduced to us.

#7 - Wyrmspan
This game happened earlier this year (2024) and I remember it distinctly being a cold February night when I finally got my friend David to agree to meet me to play the game. We met at a local board game café and I knew that he would fall in love with the game when he was able to play it as he had pretty much everything Wingspan related. When Wyrmspan was announced, I happily told him that I'd get the game so he could play it and after a long wait, we finally were able to get it to the table.

His look of joy and excitement when I pulled out the game was second to none and I knew that he would love this game. David had played probably close to 50 games of Wingspan in the past, so I knew that I was in for a challenge when we got into the game. We ended up playing the game for close to 2 hours and David managed to eke out a win 101 points to my 99 points. Both he and I agreed that the game was more challenging than it's predecessor, but I found that I was in love with the depth a bit more than the original game, Wingspan. It was such a fun experience because I got to see how excited he was to play the game and enjoy his expression of wonder with each new dragon he came across.

#6 - Magic Maze
This game was several years ago at least (before the pandemic), but I remember that this was the first time that I had played a cooperative board game with a time limit to it. There was something magical and stressful about playing a game where no one could talk, but we all had to cooperate in order to complete the objective of getting to each character's weapon and then out of the mall in order to win the game. The caveat was that everyone controlled every pawn, but each person could only move one direction (or two based on player count).

It was a chaotic scramble that I remember laughing hysterically after because I was so stressed the entire time. There were multiple times where one of us had angrily hit the "Do Something" pawn in front of another player and I believe the first game we played, we absolutely failed hard. Subsequent plays resulted in us winning, but I remember thinking that this game was a great, fast cooperative game, which was different than any other cooperative game I had played. I also remember thinking that I needed to get it because of how much fun I had while playing the game and no one I knew owned the game, which would then be followed by almost two years of me searching for a copy to get my hands on.

#5 - The 7th Continent
Wow. This game blew me out of the water on my first play and I think that's what stands out to me so much about this game and that initial play of it. I had played adventure games in the past, like Mice and Mystics and Near and Far and I understood the RPG-esque aspect of the games, so I was expecting something similar with the 7th Continent. Instead, I found myself immersed in a world reminiscent of Jules Verne with a dash of HP Lovecraft thrown in for good measure, all wrapped in a style of gameplay that felt similar to the Choose Your Own Adventure books that I read as a kid.

Instead of having to imagine the wild world of those books while I read them, the world came alive with each successive card that I placed on the table when I played the 7th Continent and began to explore the wilds that my character had found himself in at the beginning of the game. There was a bit of a learning curve to begin to learn how to survive the world, but as I began to understand how to best survive, I really caught the true exploratory nature of the game and the wonder of what was contained within the box astounded me. Each new piece of terrain that I came upon held secrets waiting to be unlocked and that persisted even through the end of the game, and left me wondering what other secrets were hiding away in the box that I had yet to discover. The sense of wonder and excitement that I got from the game was unlike any other I had experienced and it really tickled my sense of adventure.

#4 - One Night Ultimate Werewolf
This was actually a series of games that occurred on my birthday last year when we had a bunch of friends over to play some board games. We finished up the night after several other games and at my request we pulled out One Night Ultimate Werewolf (UNUW). This is easily one of my favorite party games, not only because of the quick nature of the game, but also because of the social deduction that is inherent within the box when you play the game.

This was probably the largest group that I had ever played ONUW with (we were about 8 or 9), but that only lent itself to more chaos and fun. I'm not entirely certain who was which character, but I do remember that we had the extra roles from the One Night Ultimate Werewolf: Daybreak expansion included as well. This sticks pretty prominently in my mind as we were playing with the curator who had a set of face down tokens that the player would put on one individual that had anything from turning that person into a villager/werewolf, or even add the "Shroud of Shame" that required players to face away from the table. I of course got the token with the shroud and had to spend the rest of the game facing away from the table. I don't remember my role, but I do remember that the entire table started laughing uproariously about my plight. It was a great time.

#3 - Everdell: The Complete Collection
This is another one that stands out because of Sarah's reaction to the box and components inside. I had initially borrowed Everdell from a friend earlier in December to try out before we bought the game. Sarah immediately fell in love with the game when we played it so that was the final nail in the coffin that I needed before I bought the collection of the game. I purchased it directly through the publisher and when the massive box arrived, I opened it up with glee.

I'll never forget Sarah's expression when we opened up the box for the first time when we got the game to the table. There was such a glow of excitement in her face as we pulled out each tray from the box that I knew that I had spent some good money on the game. We proceeded through the game, playing the basic cards, but I could tell her excitement from the play was that it was our copy of the game and that we could play it at any time that we wanted. We finished the game and there was such a feeling of satisfaction that we could play again and again if we wanted that the scores didn't matter. It was a wonderful experience and it still holds up to this day.

#2 - Thunder Road: Vendetta
While my initial play of Thunder Road: Vendetta was with two expansions, I purchased a copy of the base game early in February after falling in love with it the first time I played the game. I can easily point out every game that I've played as one of my favorite games that I've played, but one stands out the most to me.

I had brought the game down to my dad's place on vacation, which caused me significant stress, packing away the game in my suitcase, but I managed to get it down and once it was set up on the table, I knew that it was going to be fun. When we finally got to playing the game together, it was after we had watched Mad Max: Fury Road and we were all jazzed for the game. There were multiple times where me and my brothers clashed with my dad, causing chaos the entire time down the road, yelling "WITNESS ME!" every single time we bumped, shot at or just caused mayhem on the road. It was such a fun experience and I think it was probably the most fun that I have ever had playing games with my brothers and dad.

#1 - Clank!: A Deck-Building Adventure
It took me a long time to think about what my favorite play was and there were so many games that came to mind, but this one I think is the one that overshadows them all. I've noted in previous posts my initial feelings about Clank! and how they had changed when I bought the game, so I won't repeat the tale here. If you want to read about that more, the post can be found here.

The game that stands out to me the most as my favorite has to be the second game of Clank! that I played with Sarah. We had initially tried to play the game the previous night and while Sarah liked it, she still had a few questions about rules and how to play. However, it was the second night that we played Clank! that things clicked with Sarah about how good the game was. It was this game that ultimately showed me how good Clank! was and helped me to see what I was missing in my first few plays. It was also the game that I realized that Sarah had an obsession with figuring out secrets as she nearly lost her chance to score because she wanted to know what was under each secret that was on the board.

Since that game, we've played a whopping 18 games together, not including the sequels, In! Space!, and Catacombs, and it's easily one of our favorite games to play together. We've gotten most of the expansions and we're working up to getting the legacy version of the game as it's something we love to play together. It's been a game that I've shared with multiple groups and it always is a hit, and yet it comes back to that second game that I played with Sarah that showed me how much I enjoyed the game, and that's why it stands out so much to me as my favorite play.

The End Is Just The Beginning

And here we are. At the end of the post, looking forward to the future. The next big milestone for me probably will be 100 posts here on the blog. I'll be doing my regular end of the month post about the games that I played on Wednesday and hopefully on Friday I'll have a review of at least one, if not two separate games. I'll probably have hit 1000 plays by that point and I'll make sure to have a special aside for what my 1000th play was.

Thank you for being with me on this journey and here's to 1000 more plays!

Give me your thoughts:What are some of your favorite memories while playing games? Are there any that stand out to you within the last year that you'd like to share? When it comes to keeping track of your games that you play, do you log them, write them in the box top, or keep track of them in another way so you can avoid the dreaded "Shelf of Shame?"

As always, thank you so much for checking out this blog. If you liked it, please hit the green thumb  at the top of the page and feel free to leave a comment on the post. I appreciate all interactions and will respond to everything that I can. If you really liked the post and want more ramblings, feel free to subscribe and get new posts every Monday/Wednesday/Friday.

*Originally posted on BoardGameGeek on 5.8.2024*