Top 10 Board Games of 2024

0:00 hello and welcome to board Shing my name's Wayne and I'm Matt and this is a very special video oh yes it is as we are in end of year season this is our top 10 games for 2024 what a huge video this is yeah and it's in 4k so you can't select 4K now 4K both St 4K we've leveled up absolutely hit that button and the other button that you should probably hit if you want to know is the Subscribe button come on guys you know if you enjoy we're doing let's roll it let's roll that's absolutely hit that button and join us as we dig into our top 10 games of this year Matt what a year it's been oh it's been a fantastic year so many games and uh yeah we can't wait to talk about it so I think we should in go let's go cut more dreams and G GS click subscribe it's a Vibe for two BS are me what what for you and me what what here what you should play see so mat as we talked about 2024 was an amazing year and uh we're going to start as soon as we can but just a couple of little things I put around my list and I'm sure you have as well all

1:30 of these games were available in Europe in 2024 exactly a 2024 release date release date in 20 or delivered in 2024 I got a few Kickstarter that only if they've been already delivered like largely so uh anything that is still not fully delivered stff that is not in my list uh or anything that came out before 2024 is definitely not on my list there we go I've also excluded self-imposed exclusions any remakes any reprints anything like that because they've been amazing ones um but that was just for me uh fair enough yeah I I accept those rules POs to yourself I did not fair enough but should go to number 10 yeah let's go number 10 okay Mt give us your number 10 all right my number 10 we start with armonies from libellud uh what fantastic game is definitely now my alternative to Cascadia uh I really love the the building your own environment especially the verticality so that the fact that you can stuck uh your um your tokens on top and building like this little 3D environment I find it very uh very nice to play and yeah we were late to the party because we play quite late in into the year but since then I played a lot and I really enjoyed it with with different player counts and two three

3:02 four players and uh yeah it's it's absolutely fantastic you know that you enjoy this yeah I thought and again we came late to the party cuz there was a lot of Buzz and it came out much earlier in the year but I thought it was absolutely fantastic I don't know if it replaces things like Cascadia or because it does some of those things together um but I think it does enough of it really well that you could probably have it in uh in addition to if you really like kind of games yeah yeah yeah yeah and and I feel that it's um it's definitely one of the strongest game this year especially for this its Simplicity uh is in couple of innovative things or like stealing left and right but in a very classy way uh so um I felt that that was a very very strong game so that's why he's in my position number 10 and Wayne what about you instead oh so from my number 10 we are looking at alai Dawn on civilization of course so outside da of civilization uh we did a review of it and you can check that out in the corner there to find out why I really liked it this is a great blend of area control uh and deck building almost kind of traditional deck building in a way got a throwback Tech you've got this big open market like Dominion cars that you can buy stick in your deck but you're using those cards to make influence on the map yeah which is really really cool uh you're going to be uh playing cars to get new settlements out to get new te techologies and what I really like about this game Matt is the fact that you have

4:33 the civilization cards that going to be making you slightly more asymmetric over the course of the game yeah it helps the asymmetry into the game the the all the factions are slightly asymmetric you got the one that is a little bit more aggro the one that likes to build more that the one is faster Gathering resources uh but yeah the cards make it that a symmetry like more and more stronger um especially because you as a player you can then decide want to go heavy on the building side heavy on the uh on the Agro card so the the FY card um no it's it's absolutely um a joy to play uh more on the four player side I think that is where the the game Shin is in the full four players less players I'm not really sure but um yeah absolutely a super strong game okay we are at number nine uh and Wayne what's your number nine for 2024 well my number nine for 2024 is a short stabby game by the name of quter ass UK by games UK and what a great game this is I um we saw this for the first time at UK games Expo it did and it sold out like people love probably minutes in seconds yeah people love this game and I'm not surprised really simple gameplay flow draw three cards play three cards with the twist being one has to go to you one has to go to one of your opponents and one has to go in the center table at the Queen's table and

6:04 that's going to be the thing that determines whether the cards in front of you are valuable or whether the cards in your front of your opponents are valuable really smart gameplay with some stabby little backstab it's very it's very quick um you can play with a lot of people that are not ball Gamers so again the the rules are pretty simple and basically when you vote when you put your cards on the on the center table that it's a very unique um kind of like tapestry tap Center um uh and basically you putting cards there to get a faction to go up or down the sh favor with different families yeah exactly it's h it's very nice and as you say very nice and stubby CU you can get really mean if you want and H it's a it's a great um party game for ball Gamers or for someone that wants a little bit more than just a simple uh party game yeah and it's all done in 15 minutes or less yeah all right okay Matt what about you what's your number nine uh my number nine is Lord of the Ring Duo for Middle H um I know you say you didn't want to add any remix or reprint or reimplementation to your list but I feel like this game is so good that it needed to be on the one of the best game for 2024 uh taking something strong as 71 the duo mixing it up with um Lord of the Rings IP uh getting a great great artworks and mixing it all together give

7:35 a good shake and bringing out one of the best two player games that you can find on the market at the moment for a price that is super low as well yeah it's a great price point and we actually did a full review of it which you can actually see here so go check out that uh to find out why it is so good and it is really good it takes a great framework in S1 draw which is already one of the best two playay games but does more than just paint the theme it adds more mechanisms with that area control type bit as well kind of a little Chase which replaces the back and forth of of the 7 which it does really really well I think it's a fantastic reimplementation yes it is it's um again it's a what I've saiden on the review it's a 2.0 version of 7 Wonders duo with a very strong IP like Lord of the Rings so it's very much woo match made in EV certainly is so M what's your number eight my number eight for this year is a independent game is myia the Strategic mus the Strategic mushroom game not the other Melia theia or the other Melia this is the the better Melia of of all the other melas um uh Melia again mushroom the mushroom strategy game um is a is a very very nice um uh Innovative um area control and um uh where you trying to basically build your mushrooms but your sports

9:06 were going to go left and right so you don't really know because you're rolling a dive and they will go with the wind as the spos do they and but at the same times you need to uh to be very strategic and um and control The Bard see where you can go where you cannot trying to stop the other people from growing their own mushroom uh it's um quite a deep game but with a very very simple Frameworks around it and it works absolutely beautiful and the artwork and everything is absolutely standing stuff it's an amazing production for an independent production really it's it's amazing I love the whole creating uh sort of trains of resources you've got you know connected resources together nice little hand management piece as well uh yeah it's a fabulous achievement from Jack at splitstone games and uh I can't wait to see what he's got next yeah absolutely that's fantastic and uh Wayne instead what is your number eight my number eight is the shiniest game on this list which is River of Gold River of gold we love of gold yeah I think it was really really good and again we did a full review of it which you can check out I'm going to add all of the links below and up in the C so if you're watching this on laptop you can then click on that uh but I love this game and there's something about it m it's very like almost a traditional Euro design traditional with a twist with a Twist yeah absolutely but the thing that really makes it stand out is that stunning production and also this is a game that flows way easier than it looks to flow does that make sense of flows

10:36 like the river but it's like really smooth Snappy gameplay for something that looks more intimidating yeah I think we um we call it a a relaxing Euro uh cuz again you floating with your boats on the river and then every time that you move your boat something is going to happen on the territory so your um around you and while you're moving down the river you will collect more points or you will collect resources you will bring um stuff to diesel de merchants or um it's quite relaxing it's not cut throy it's not um it's not too heavy there's a little bit of a a gimicky when you need to to do the score the point scoring so every time that you move in a certain territories the people will get this or that this or that this or that but apart from that it's pretty relaxing and uh it's beautiful absolutely beautiful so that is mine that is River of gold Wayne lucky number seven lucky number seven what is your number seven go my number seven is a Cooperative game and it is called Leviathan Wilds okay and the vith and Wilds I played with my buddy Nick and I'd heard of it but hadn't played it and I was kind of like ah I not sure how interested I'll be in it I played it absolutely loved it I think it's a fantastic Cooperative game this is a really it's kind of like uh have you ever played Shadow of the Colossus yes the video game Shadow of the Colossus it's that you're working

12:07 together to fa one of these giant rock creatures you have to Traverse your climber climbing up this giant beasty and then like attack the corruption on it like you might have done in in the video game y uh and you're going to be utilizing your deck of cards to do that and the game does this fantastic deck construction type thing but instead of you know constructing decks like you might do in Arkham Horror the card game you just take a uh I think it's like a um a character archetype and then like a a job archetype and you just smash them together and and there's like a bunch of each and you can make lots of really cool combinations I think it's absolutely fantastic really easy light deck work amazing cooperation work as well which is what I really look for CU it's it's like you can upgrade another players so can make jump higher onto the into the monster yeah it's really it's really good I still have to try it I didn't I wasn't lucky enough to be that that day cuz someone has to work uh but apart from that not it sounds like um a very very cool game it was amazing yeah the vith and Wilds so Matt what about you uh I got kind of like the similar thing to but it involves a lot of giant Minis and I'm talking about Primal The Awakening by Reggie games uh again another independent publisher they came out they finally released a game that came on Kickstarter a couple of years ago and now you can buy on their website and it's a it's basically um a boss Butler but uh where you got your giant

13:39 dragon or your giant mus in the center of the um of the of the of the table and uh each player will move around the monster and uh will do deck building to build that that deck to do combination and and trying to slay the dragon so something quite similar to to Le done uh but with giant Min a little bit more more on a on the on the serious side more D Andes um but the the deck building is absolutely amazing and uh the more you progress into the story again it's a campaign but you can play as well as a as a scenario and uh yeah you you mix all your cards and you try to in a corporative way helping your friends to do more Combos and to try to kill the the giant Beast um it's a very very good one I really hope I can play more and more it takes a little bit to put it on the table but I find it absolutely amazing Primal the Awakenings fantastic so Matt give us your number six my number six is uh my favorite Euro Game of the Year oh my god there there a Euro game in here yes it is it is set from CG um uh a very wide Euro game with this S without the fire team even if then you can discover aliens um but I I really love I I love that it's one of my favorite Euro game ever probably it's

15:12 very wide you can do a lot of things but the fact that you can explore space explore the planets and getting resources and building your super engine and discovering aliens is um it's it's very very good and I love all the small mini games inside the the game that you can you need to keep track again wide it is wide but I really really enjoyed it every time that we played yeah I think it's a fantastic game it's a great pick um yeah set as you say is wi lots of mini games together really got a little bit of a control we've got a bunch of hand management going on um you have this sort of set collection thing I really like the supercomputer something really fun right but as you say what I really like is it tries to make use of theme so it's not just dry tries to implement it's quite Spacey and I really and if you want to know more we got the review that came out a few months ago yeah go check that out as well we did very much enjoy it and way he said which one is your number six my number six Matt is uh harmonies okay we start we started getting into um double up ter yeah we're doubling up now be play a lot of games together so it's gonna happen frankly um but harmonies was a bit higher for me because I don't know I just really enjoyed this I think there's nothing bad to be said about that game it's great production um a fantastic price point Y really fun game to play it borrows from

16:42 other stuff but that's not a bad thing it borrows no no no because it borrows successfully and then adds another couple of interesting twists on top of it what I really loved about that game m is not just the whole you know sort of drafting from the center which is really interesting and then having your restrictive little area as opposed to Cascadia where you can kind of build wherever right this is really heavily restrictive which is really interesting and having those scoring cards and you can only take a few of them so um and when you start taking you're kind of committed to to getting that done but when you're doing that you might be sacrificing other scoring options so it's that scoring F that I like in those kinds of games it's it's really good again uh it's in my top 10 because of that um I really enjoyed it and how the the replayability the game as is fantastic I think it's going to be one of the games is going to stay the collection for quite a while for quite a while on to number five way let's go to number five we're halfway through halfway through what is your number five in the top half of my games of 2024 is of course arcs AR is uh I was wondering where is ar ar number five um do I prefer it to Route no I don't um do I prefer it to oath yes so I think so it sort of fits between those two games for me okay um it is table flipping annoying but once you accept that that's what the game is it's great fun and it is highly aggro it is interactive it is incredibly interesting it is innovative has

18:13 fantastic art I mean all of those great things come together to make a wonderful product we still haven't managed to get to the uh campign but we are determined to do this over the Christmas break uh and and revisit it because I keep hearing it's amazing and I keep seeing it it's amazing uh but it's it's got to be arcs M fair enough uh you know how I feel about ARS is G that I love and hate uh but I can't it's funny cuz it kind of grew on you over time didn't it it really it is and to be honest well well let's we can talk about it after this but um yeah uh my number five instead is a proper Cooperative Adventure game okay and it's fade Forge Chronicles of car um I found fate Forge being um it is a Dungeon Crawler um Adventure game um where you are in this fantastic world that the guys and mighty BS have built with a lot of laws or everything is fantastic with a great app companion app that you can use uh to to to progress into the story um but the fresh take that they took to a to a generat that I love that has been out there it's been copy and paste a lot in the in the recent past they they took a completely fresh take with the fact that you rolling your dice behind your screen and you kind of like need to try to figure out with the other place what you're going to do without knowing exactly what you're going to do um I found that very

19:45 interesting and uh very refreshing and the the story itself is pretty cool H I love the use of the map cuz it's not just do you find in the Box your map of the of the city of the places where you that you visit it's not just a piece of paper you're actually actively using during the story cuz the story will tell you oh you went nor and then left and then North and need you need to find your way onto the map and find out exactly where you are um I find it very it's been a very very refreshing to the dungeon CLA in gener and I can't wait to see more because the guys I think they got um an expansion coming out in the next few months I can't wait I loved it um spoilers that was number 11 for me I think it's an amazing game okay excellent excellent game we'll maybe talk about it later but what a fantastic pick yeah cool on to number four four wow okay Matt what's your number four breaking well into the top uh my number four another another Indie another Kickstarter delivery for this year uh one of the best two- player games that are played in ages and we're talking about celb Shark versus Octopus great great year player games it is it is24 best two player games in a while uh yeah it seems like we can talk about in another video about about the the trends of of this two player game things but um Kel uh completely asymmetric you play one player plays as

21:17 the shark and you trying to uh do a back building with dice rolls uh to to try to do the your your action is going to be moving around the map and trying to find out the octopus and then eat it while you as the octopus you're going to have a deck building mechanism so completely opposite from the from the shark and with your deck you're trying to work with the tiles on the on the tables that are basically your hiding spots and you need to move between your hiding spots and trying to get out from the um from the shark trying to to get you um it's an amazing game the flaws is absolutely perfect said and you want to play more and more and more yeah it's a fantastic game amazing production as well love Kel yes absolutely so kelb what's my number four and my number four mat oh yeah which one is your can't leave without my number four my number four is another crossover course which is setti slightly okay okay so um setti I've already talked my bit about setti fantastic Euro game I prefer it's terraforming Mars and arova shoot I agree with you I agree there you go so uh comments below if you disagree but I think it's a it's a fantastic game a really great achievement from cge and again we didn't mention it in the review so I'm going to mention it now made with rewood components uh so underscore again CG's amazing commitment to ethical game production uh which is fantastic and it is uh in some ways a quite traditional game for CG they normally do crazy stuff

22:49 like apps and other things going on I think with this one they still they still did something Innovative like having it so wide with so many mechanisms many mini games they all work together in a very very smooth way that like the rotating board as well yeah the rotating board is great as well um yeah it's just a fantastic fantastic uh achievement by CG I love I love set it's a good let's go going to yeah number three Podium let's go okay Wayne We are on the podium y uh give me your number three come on explorers of nooria oh I really love this game this was such an underrated gem for me an unknown hit before played it with Tom from the guys said bandra games yeah that's right and uh Tom raved about it atel he was like this game is amazing I love it it's like my favorite game of the show I was like what and then we I played it and I was like this is really really really fun a quite a lightweight um I won't say family class it's more than that somewhere in the beginner categ the in the beginner category like upper Beginner category uh a great game of sort of um token Drafting and then a little kind of worker placement using those same tokens as a worker placement which is really as well and then a tableau building thing as well so you got these three elements in in conert uh to create a really fun interesting interactive experience um you are essentially trying to be exploring different areas of navor which are basically just tracks pretty looking tracks trying to push your your your

24:19 little characters up those tracks uh as far as you can to get many points as possible but there's lots of different ways to score points you've got end round points you've got end of game points you've got uh immediate points and where you focus is up to you really fun game it is I I did not love the assum um it it to me fell short in a couple of things but again that is um simple like Personal Taste into into into with this or that game um but yeah no it's it's an absolutely great game with a great production more toward the the beginner beginner friendly as well so absolutely so what about you though you're number three my number three uh I love it and I hate it and it hurs there we go I hate it so much that that I think about it a lot I hate this so much I think about it a lot and I want to play more it's so funny CU like when we when we first played it you were like I don't like this I I hate it I hate it I hate it so much that I wanted to play more uh and now now it's the end of the year and I think like if I have to pick one of these games which one I really want to play uh definitely is one of of the first one first picks that I will I will do and it's um it's probably because it's so frustrating that I wanted to try to do better uh and I want to try to master it CU I think it's a it's a great piece of a game of design with a lot of flaws that make it it

25:51 very frustrating uh but I'm not sure if I call it flaw probably not flaws that they are just like mechanics the games that makes you go Bonker uh TR to understand the design space yeah but at the same time you're just like what am I doing wrong and next time I'm going to do that and every time you play it every time we play it I kind of feel like oh I can do a little bit better a little bit better but um again I hate it so much that it went up to my position a powerful feeling number three Matt top two what's your number two me uh my top two is another two-player asymmetric game I know wor what it is I think you know it cuz it's not in your list yet so it must be more or less in this position I'm talking about Ironwood from mine Clash what great game um lovewood it's probably one of not just in 2024 I think he went straight up in my top 10 ever uh he's a fantastic asymmetric two-player games where you got your deck building and uh your area control that movement on the board uh with a completely different type of game when you play the the Ironclad or the other the wood Walkers um I find it like it's so deep and so strategically sounded and uh that I Cal way every time to play more and more and uh I think we should play after this the

27:22 game Ironwood is an amazing achievement mate it's a fantastic game it's so fantastic it's so my number two oh perfect go boom it's an amazing game and yeah that whole um sort of hand management as opposed to deck building so you you just have your hand dra draw your handed cards and then like what what can you do with your cards uh and there's some really amazing stuff there's great drama in the game which we've discovered there's always something that your opponent might pull out which makes you go oh my God how did you do that or why did you do that and you have to really react on the Fly it's a h i such an amazing production as well is Beau the production is beautiful it's one of the best production of of the Year production versus price point versus uh depth of gam playay I mean it's such a great package I mean it couldn't be anything other than like really high up on the list of all the games I played this year and I fell in love with it immediately you were not yeah when we when we play ukg I think I I dragged you there to to right and yeah after a couple of turns you were like I love this game and uh and since we got C is we we yeah we played a lot um and it's yeah it's it's a thing of beauty really really is so that's why definitely yeah definitely number two for the parus oh yeah full review cuz that you can find out more and why we love it so much and Matt are you ready for the number one game before that we're going to do couple of honorable mentions okay I wasn't ready after this okay when uh I cut you off guard

28:56 but uh it's okay give me give me give me three honorable mention again for of the Thousand games that came out to you this year three that are not on the leas that should have been on the leas sadly I didn't play all 5,000 but I did play a few but unfortunately s good job but I already mentioned uh fith foron in my number 11 position it's an amazing game definitely deserves me to underline it but for one that I haven't mentioned yet uh it's going to be Joy rid Joy Ride is an amazing racing game a really fun one a meritra di Chucky uh nonsense very very fun game um another one I want to mention actually he came to quite late in the party is Barbarian Kingdom oh yes a really cool game absolutely uh we've got a review either coming before or after this and it's an absolutely really interesting area control game so uh do go check that out perfect um the one I want to mention is is alai unfortunately fell just just out like 11th position but I did love alai and it definitely deserve more that deserves all the love that he's that he's getting it's absolutely brilliant game uh the other one I want to talk about it is um probably the best third party game probably not a party game but Power vacuum that's great I was going to mention that power vacuum is amazing power vacuum is a great trick taken with a big twist politics with a politic twist to it and we had a lot of fun

30:28 playing Power vacuum with Rob thank you yeah that was uh that was great and the the last one that I want to talk about yeah Barian kingdom was my on my list as well because it's uh it's such an amazing game we should have um a review coming out very soon maybe it's already out maybe not but uh ever Che look for barbarian Kingdom all of these games really really good uh yeah but number one though let's go all right when we are at the number one I think I know which one is cuz you haven't mentioned it so far you haven't mentioned it mention so far it's not your mentions it's not your horable mentions so I think that we can clearly say yeah that the game of the year is one two three Re number one that was easy that was really easy so Matt I did not expect this to be your number one of the year um I'll tell you why why it is my number one um when I think about this game uh I think think a game that I'm going to play for the next 5 10 years maybe um is a game that is uh very simple to put on the uh on the table it's very simple to to um to teach to people that are not even board gamers and you can play it like straight away nice and simple and and having and having a lot of fun while at the same time it's a game that can get a lot deeper uh with the playing on the on the Island map instead of the

31:58 Scotland one and you can play with people that actually are ball Gamers and you can get way more competitive um and I found that that mix makes me feel like this is a game that is going to stay in the collection for a long time and I'm going to be always happy to put on the table that's why it's number one what about you yeah it's such a fantastic game like you say you've got two sides of the map uh for two different types of Gamer In The Box uh it's a great price point as well um if you really want to Crunch with your friends get really competitive play on the island side with the open objectives it's tremendous it really takes the game experience up a level I think but that's not to say that the Scotland side is any worse it's just different no no no just different it's just different yeah just different tactical uh you've got to think on your feet more in the Scotland side there's no real like longer term planning but it is just an excellent game on both sides with a beautiful production and that an ethical prod ethical production again everything used to Rew and everything there is not a single piece of plastic inside the box it's really really great so we keep commending Mighty boards for those choices the artwork is amazing it has it's obviously a very kitan game it it is it's Dr K distilled into a into a 20 30 years of of experience in inside a box and we really love it yeah we really really love it and it's an absolutely deserving recipient of our number one game of 2020 2 if you like

33:29 check out the full review to find why it's number one so Matt that was our top 10 of 2020 yeah what a year guys what yearing year I love this year this has been our first full long full long year as a show as a as a channel it is and uh yeah now we are 4K now we 4K after after year one we got an upgrade of camera and everything um but that's and we only did that thanks to you folks absolutely absolutely that's that's been an amazing year tremendous year it's it's defied all of our expectations frankly when we started this uh and we love it so much so much we keep doing it um but Matt we only played a fraction of the games that were available so again this is our top 10 in terms of like Wayne's one and my one of the games that we most enjoy during the year um we played a lot of games we haven't played all the games so since that's physically impossible we got fulltime jobs financially I'd be broke so this is yeah we did what we could for you I know we missed a lot of game I'm still got on my list a lot of games that I haven't played that came out this year that I want to play andromeda's Edge or Slayer Spire shaon Bas there's so many games that are still there on the list that we try to get our hands on on the most of them but again um if you really feel like that we miss something I typ in down in the comments let us know which one we should definitely pick up from

35:01 2024 that we haven't covered let us know your favorite games of the year either a top 10 or a top five or a top one and in fact if you're watching this video before our award show comes out then there is a poll that you can find uh in the description below and on our Instagram page uh where you can pick your game of the year for the community award and that is slightly different it's a video that we're going to roll out in in a few days and that's going to be purely Awards so the the best two player games best production the best it's kind of like the night of the Oscars the I'll be wearing my my best clothes will get his shirt on yeah so let us know what you think what are your games of the Year let us know in the comments below do you agree with our piics do you disagree with our pics we love to hear from you and we'd be more than happy to discuss that in the comments and if you like this video you should probably like and hit the Subscribe button yeah like it and definitely hit the Subscribe button yeah cuz that really helps the channel mely gives us more drive to to produce more stuff and uh we're trying to do our best for you guys and we love doing it so love doing it yeah absolutely check out the rest of our content and we're going to catch you again real soon for you and me what's what it been here what you the play see