Board game
A board game is a game for one or more players played with a wood, plastic, or paper 'board' specifically printed to play that game. Most board games fall into two categories, those with random factors (dice, spinners, cards) and those without.
Types of board games (genres):
- Two-player games of pure skill: where both players know the entire game state at all times, and random generators such as dice are used.
- Abalone - Alquerque - Checkers - Chess - Chinese checkers - Fanorona - Five Field Kono - Go - Hex - Lines of Action - Mancala - Nine Men's Morris - Ninuki-renju - Pente - Phutball - Reversi - Shogi - Six Men's Morris - Three Men's Morris - Xiang Qi
- Two-player games with luck or incomplete information
- Modern Wargames: Where strategy games are abstract, a wargame usually portrays a specific battle, war or other historical situation. The game board is usually a map of the historical location, and the pieces usually represent the actual military units involved. Wargame rules are usually far more intricate than the rules of, say, Chess, in an effort to accurately simulate the situation in question. Risk is perhaps the most widely known wargame however some aficionados would say that it is too simple to be included in the category. I often explain wargames to the uninitiated as "Risk on steroids".
- Race Games: where the players move pieces along a track, usually a distance randomly set by the throw of dice. The winner is usually the first to reach some specific location on the board.
- Ludo - Senat - Backgammon - Pachisi - Snakes and Ladders - Careers
- Settlers of Catan - Euphrat und Tigris - Lost Cities - El Grande - Tikal - Java - Torres - Carcassonne - Bohnanza - Elfenland
- Acquire - Battleship - Boggle - Clue - Crokinole - Diplomacy - The Game of Life - Monopoly - Scrabble - Upwords - Scotland Yard - Kill Doctor Lucky
- Trivia Games
See also: History of Board Games, Card game, Mind sport, Zillions of Games
External Links
- Funagain Games - an online retailer; includes short profiles of many propriety games.
- Boardgame Geek - a board gamer community site; includes user reviews, strategies, and session reports.
- Traditional Games - includes information on classical games.