Oh baby we made it to the end of the year. Are you surprised? I mean you shouldn’t be. I’ve been posting semi regularly and no part of my posts included the phrase “and I think I am going to die next month.” This was actually a pretty good year for gaming. Nothing spectacular but I had a mini group that so far has met up one day every month and it has worked for us so far. I had pretty frequent mini game weekends in the beginning of the year and I got to go to not just my usual convention but a whole other mini convention which was above and beyond expectations. Some good additions were made to my collection and definitely not enough things left it….but that’s a whole topic upon itself, and one that has been sitting in my drafts for…too long…
I felt that last years post was a little lacking so I am going to try to set up something a little better this year with more stats and more things I care about!
The Stats of 2025
As before I am using my BGstats app data to figure out how this went. I track only in person games that were played mostly by the rules (this is a key point for some games I play with my kids beings excluded) and played to completion (ditto). Some small issues actually come from how I track. I am still deciding whether multiple instances of a single game played back to back is a single game or a group of games. I haven’t really been consistent for this but I am trying to make them all individual instances of games….mostly because it feels better to be consistent. I include 2024 data where I had it.
| Metric | 2025 | 2024 |
|---|---|---|
| Total Plays | 244 | 228 |
| Games Played | 94 | 85 |
| New-to-me Games | 21 | 23 |
| Percentage of collection played | 37% | 36% |
| H-Index | 7 | 7 |
| Cumulative H-Index | 18 | 15 |
| Percent of Total Games Played cumulative | 86% | |
| Games with 25+/10+/5+ plays | 0/2/13 | 1/3/6 |
| Number of Days Spent playing Games | 107 (29.3%) | 87 (23.8%) |
Looks like we got rid of the 2024 slump and brought up the number of games, the number of games played overall and I started tracking a new metric which my wife decided to try to “hack” near the end of the year which was my cumulative H-Index which if you have never seen the stat before is that you have played N games n individual times. That means as of this year I have played 18 games 18 times. I have not yet played 19 different games 19 individual times, though I am about 4-8 plays away from that if I decide to target it. I think it is an interesting goal to try to get this number to go up by 1 every year. I think as time goes on it will get harder and harder to do so but I mean at least it’s worth trying! The other goal I have is Percent of Total Games Played Cumulative. This one is a bit more self imposed. I would like to get this as close to 100% as I can. I would like to say I have played every game I own at least once. That being said it looks like I will have to cull some games to make this really happen, since I don’t see a game of Kingdom Death: Monster happening any time soon.
The cumulative games played is my breadth, so my depth would be the other stat that is interesting which is how many games I played 25/10/5 or more times. While we see that I did not play any games over 25 times this year (after Uno held that title last year). I actually ended up playing 15 games more than 5 times this year and it wasn’t all Kids Games. Stuff Like Slay the Spire, Guards of Atlantis, and Spirit Island show up on the list of games played more than 5 times….so that’s good to see here’s to hoping some heavy games stay on that list.
Moving on to some other stats who did I play with? My family still has control over this stat pretty heavily. My partner is number 1 with 95 of the plays. My two kids take #2 and #4 respectively for the oldest and youngest and my monthly meetup of 3 friends fill out the remainder other top spots(#3,5,6). Player count distribution looks quite similar to last years:
| Player Count | Percentage Played |
| 1 | 1% |
| 2 | 26% |
| 3 | 28% |
| 4 | 28% |
| 5 | 13% |
| 6 | 3% |
| 7+ | 1% |
A lot of concentration in that 3-4 player block. A lot of that 2 player block is actually just games with my kids though several with my partner and a few with other board game buddies. So with that let us move on to the slightly less arbitrary awards of the year
New to me games this year: (a mostly complete list)
Presented in Alphabetical order with mini review
- Autobahn: This was a math trade acquisition and I got to play it once with the monthly group. This was a very enjoyable euro for the medium heavy. Definitely doesn’t feel multiplayer solitaire in any way. You are always worrying about what other people are building/doing and how you can kind of latch onto it to make your moves better or more efficient. I think I need a few more plays to really get the feel for this, which may not be easy because I don’t know how much love the rest of the group had for this.
- Dogs of War: I played this for the first time knowing the kickstarter for this was coming. I wanted to see if it was going to live up to the hype. I expected a bunch but I don’t think I expected that it was just a take on the worker placemenet genre. Also after hearing the rules described elsewhere I think I may have had the rules taught to me incorrectly. It was interesting enough (and my collection really lacks worker placement games) so I did end up backing the new kickstarter and though the changes are said to make the game “less crazy” I think that overall it will end up being a better experience for me and my group when it does arrive.
- EGO: Kickstarted this and got to play the game. I enjoy this one a lot, it plays fast it makes the gambles fun and knowing when you really need to take them and when you are willing to hold back and take a worse reward is quite important. The expansion boards I would say make the game much better and offer more opportunites, I don’t think I would even play without them. I think similarly about the communication events, though I have less experience with them, I think more opportunities to plan ahead is important and makes the game better.
- Fast Sloths: I got to play this game at a convention and boy do i want a copy. It’s such an interesting race game because your options just decrease as you get closer to winning. You basically want to have a plan on how to get to the final point you need before you get to the second last point because if you are stuck on your last point it is very hard to move and even worse nearly impossible to move efficiently. I would love this game for my collection but it may be difficult with the prices that copies of this game go for. But I am definitely keeping an eye out.
- Hot Streak: What can I say about this game that hasn’t been said thousands of times. Every play is wild crazy and causes great laughs and big groans. Watching your runner get absolutely pummeled by the worst luck when they had amazing cards in the pool is painful and watching your had fought mascot inch over the line when by all accounts they should have been disqualified two reshuffles ago gets everyone really going. This game will always be in my collection, I stay by what I wrote in the first monthy write up that this was shown. I can’t think of a person who this game isn’t for, its for everyone!
- Knarr: This was also picked up in a trade and is a fun quick efficiency puzzle engine. Knowing when to acquire more cards to get a ton of bonuses from every placement and when to turn that into a silver trade engine is quite important. Nothing hurts more than being stuck with 38 or 39 points after your turn though, often giving your opponents one more turn to whoop you. Keeper and a good fun quick game.
- Mistborn: The Deckbuilding Game This was brought by someone else to a gathering and I was happy enough to play it. An interesting take on the deckbuilding genre but I don’t think it does enough to get away from the standard deckbuilding tropes to really make me want to own it. It was worth a play but I don’t think it justifies being owned.
- Monopoly: Pokemon Edition Oh man it took so long to get a kiddo game on here. Kind of impressive. What I wrote about this is still accurate. I like what it does about keeping money tight and makes it hard to actually do too much. The game generally lasts about 1-2 runs around the board and then someone meets the win condition due to the cards, there is some take that but it is often used just to finish up the game and is in service of the game ending faster.
- Nightshift: A game brought by a frequent gaming partner so I was more than happy to oblige. The game has some great ideas and is good for representation for dancers and people in the business. I see the humor but also the representation in the rules and the cards and I think this is good, everyone should have a game for them. Though as a game…its just kinda meh. I think it works, I’ll play it if someone asked for it but I don’t think I’ll own it or seek it out.
- PUSH: A simple push your luck that I got for free for just showing up to a convention. Is it a game I ever would have added to my collection willingly? Probably not but it is a pretty fun little push your luck game that goes fast and rewards silly situations. It will probably be donated at some point or traded away but I don’t regret playing/owning it.
- Sky Team: Man I am still so proud of my kid for picking this up…unprompted from me and enjoying it. I think this is an excellent little family co-op. Plays fast, you succeed or lose fast and there are interesting choices and things to work through throughout the game. That being said I would never have picked it up myself. I can probably a whole post about this but I just don’t see myself having time to play just two player games. Maybe if I get a good partner for playing 2 player games I could see this being put through the ringer but most of the time I just have more than one person.
- Slay the Spire: The Board Game I have written about this several times over the couple of times over the year and I know at this point I am being a horse that has been beaten to death by other reviewers for more than a year but this game is really good. Contention games knock this out out of the park with how well they translated the online game into a very excellent feeling co-op board game. I feel like there is so much more for me to explore in this game even if it might not make it to the table as much as I would like
- Spooky Stairs: Picked up to be a kids game but also makes an excellent late evening game with friends. It’s silly, it’s fun and it is over fast enough. I don’t think we have had a game where the person who pushed a ghost to the end fo the stairs was actually the person who won….at least not yet.
- That’s Not a Hat: So simple, its a basic memory game but inevitably no matter how well you are doing at some point someone loses the plot and what ends up happening is that everyone quickly loses track of where every card is. Even though there is only 1 more card than the number of players. It finds friends and laughs no matter where it goes.
- Through the Desert: Finally played this after trading for a first edition German copy (many of them became easily available after the new Allplay came out). I definitely see who this is as popular as it is and it is generally way faster than the game makes you feel. It also manages to have different “phases” from grabbing the easy points to eventually trying to get majorities. The choice of when to move from one phase to the other is what can determine the winner. Overall it deserves all the praise it gets and it won’t be leaving the collection any time soon.
- Zoo Vadis: I’ve only gotten to get one play of this so far and I would like to have more to figure out how I feel about this. I really enjoyed my first play but it didn’t give me a definitive feeling especially about the mid and late game. If I am ever in a position to update my copy with the nicer poker chips I would probably do it though.
Best New to Me Game
I feel like this has to go to Slay the Spire. It works so well and it is so innovative and fun. I don’t see myself getting tired of it any time and yes it definitely is a little easy at the lower ascensions but it lets you get a good feel for it before you can really sink your teeth into the strategy and start going crazy with it. I look forward to so many more plays!
Other Random Awards
Most Shameful Unplayed game: Ugh this one always hurts because I feel like the same game would be here every year which is The King’s Dilemma…. but I can’t pick that game every year so and while there are another two games that could be on this list, one has already been rectified early in January and another will be played by the end of January. So lets go with a fun train game that I played more than a decade ago but haven’t had a single play of it since it entered my collection, Age of Steam, yea I know there are like 500 maps but I’d just like to play the original. Maybe I can get it together for RamiCON.
Weirdest game play of the year: This is an easy one and goes straight to Hot Streak. The game should not be as good as it is…it shouldn’t even be a game, let alone a great game but Hot Streak continues to make friends everywhere it goes and I think that it won’t stop or be replaced anywhere else. A quick runner up to Spooky Stairs which reminds us that a game doesn’t need to be novel or complicated to be good. It just needs to put a very simple spin on a known quantity. In this case specifically on roll and move. The game is effectively Candyland except you don’t know which piece is yours and it creates great experiences because of it.
The game I am looking most forward to next year: This one is easy. Cysmic. I’ve been following it and I am hoping it will be ready to play for me by mid March (though doubtful…things never fulfill quickly in Canadia) it looks so wild and crazy and I just want to see if it holds up on the table. The hype is real! On a second note I am hoping for some plays of Phantom Division when it delivers. I got to play a pre-production copy and it makes me want to pull out and play more Seal Team Flix this year even if Phantom Division can’t make it to us for a bit.
The Final Bits
This year is another good year in board gaming from how I look at it. Sure I don’t hit anything close to what you see a lot of people who primarily board game or make a living off of it but over 200 plays isn’t anything to scoff at and neither is playing a game almost once very 3 days in the past year. I originally wanted to put goals for next year of board gaming and also the goals this blog, but as you can see this is getting quite lengthy and I think that splitting that into it’s own post has some value in keeping the word count a little bit lower for all the imaginary readers I have out there! So here is to the great gaming time that was 2025 and looking forward to a better 2026 (at least in terms of gaming).