Top 10 Hottest Board Games: December 2025 - The Best of BGG

All right, we are back. It's time for the best of Board Game Geek. Let's do it. >> What's up everybody? I'm Mike. I'm Nick. We got the Brothers Murph. And it's the last board best of board game geek of the year. >> That is not of all time. This is I like doing this. Yeah, it is the last one of the year.

It is December at the time of recording this. Um, and so the next one will be for the new year. Yeah. Which is very, very cool. But this is the best of board game geek, where we talk about the hottest games of the month, some personal things that we've seen on there, our personal favorite game of the month, and some news.

And you know what? Let's go and get into some news. Bit of Board Game Geek news is it is the time for the annual support drive. So, if you like Board Game Geek, if you like what they do, uh, if you utilize the site, you can donate to them. They obviously have advertising as well, but they do depend on thing this kind of support drive every single year.

A lot of people do Patreons. A lot of people do Kickstarters. A lot of people put features behind a payw wall. BGG really doesn't want to do those things. And they really really don't want to make you pay for BGG. So they rely on the generosity of all of us. And so if you like BG, if you think what BG provides has value, please consider consider donating to the support drive.

Their goal this year is 20,000 supporters. We'd really really love to hit it because let's be honest, if you're watching this video, you you're on BG a lot. So, please consider supporting. It would really really mean a lot to BG and us who work with BG. Uh and so consider uh you know, helping out. The the thing that kind of keeps board games all running, right?

It is the the the pinnacle, the mecca of all of board games is BG. So, consider supporting today. So, one thing I think is very useful every year is the holiday kind of gift guide that Board GameGeek puts together. There's a lot of other channels that do this as well, and I highly recommend you go and check all of these out.

What I really like about Board Game Geek is they really break it down uh and make it easy to kind of explore further uh to find some cool games. They break it down by categories. If you're looking for cooperative games, you have a list of recommendations right there. Familyw games, more heavy strategery type games, I think that's the the word for it.

uh you can find uh you know a blurb and information about why this game is being recommended and of course it's linked right to that game's page right here on board gamegeeek so you can go in and look further you can take a look at some of the pictures of the game see what other people are saying different reviews and videos that have come out for it so it's a really great resource for kind of narrowing down your scope on potential gifts to give uh family members or friends this year uh getting a little bit of information and then having a ton more to deep dive on.

So, do check out the holiday uh gift guide if you're looking to gift uh some games to the friends and family in your life. And uh we hope you enjoy. So, that's a little bit of board game geek news for you. We're going to now go and talk about the hottest games of the month. At the end of the year, there's always a lot of uh talk about what everyone's favorites are and stuff and that has impacted some of the hotness.

So, let's head down to the chairs here and go over it. Alrighty, it's time for the hottest games of the month. These are games have been all over the hottest. People are clicking on them. People are talking about it. Let's go and get into it. >> Number 10 is be a game that we actually just played. We just tried.

Uh well, you had sold a little sold a little bit. This is going to be Vantage. >> Yes, >> Vantage is been hovering around the hotness basically since it got announced and since it came out. >> It's been out for a while, too. So, it's had some staying power. >> It has had some staying power. This is a game where you are uh a co-op game where you're crash landed on a planet, but you're in different spots and you're basically going to have a card in front of you and that is where you are and you can basically interact with the things on that card and you can see the things on that card, but no one else can see them because they're not on that part of the planet.

>> We're basically all communicating through radio, you know, we're talking. >> Yeah. Like I don't know, there's some weird wood person here. And so, uh, and then on each card, there's going to be like usually like five or six things that you can do on the card. Like you can interact, you can like fight, you can rob, you can choose what you do, and then you'll read excerpts out of a book that will then kind of determine what you do.

Sometimes then you will then usually have to leave and move to a new location, and you can see stuff there. Um, and it was really interesting. I was I was not sure about this one going into it, but I actually am having way more fun than I was expecting because it was just so fun to have the story that I was experiencing and then hearing about the other two stories because there's not too much like game game in it.

>> No, it's really about exploration like it is, you know, Jamie Stemire said as much with the is like, you know, they created a a vast world >> very large >> with all sorts of characters and different things. There's like a thousand plus almost 2,000 cards in the box. There's a ton. >> It's insane.

>> Uh and it's really about like making, you know, the story, you know, what you want. What are you excited to go explore? What are you excited to go see? >> We You have a mission each time you play. Ours was to um >> get a quest and complete a quest, which of course you have to come across someone who will give you a quest, which we did come across.

>> Yeah, we did. Um but you know really it's you know they even say like hey just sort of enjoy like explore around and if you you lost you could there's a mode where you can say like no we didn't we can keep playing or if you feel satisfied with the story you told that day >> you can you can move on and uh >> we all were in very different parts of the world.

>> Mike was married. >> I got married. >> You had like a house. >> I had a house. >> You had a house. Jimmy, who we're playing with, was like hacking into some tower. Yeah. >> And then I I found a whale taxi in the ocean and I was trying to solve a murder mystery. >> The whale taxi you don't sit on.

You rode in its mouth. >> Yeah. Exactly. It was wild and it was very fun to just experience everyone's stories. It was It was very very interesting. I was >> I don't know if you mentioned while you were on the whale taxi, you were also trying to solve a murder. >> That's what I'm saying. I tried to solve a murder mystery.

Yeah, >> that was our quest. But yeah, so and that's just like the tiny sample. It's not to say there spoilers cuz there's a million places you can go. There's like six options, so you could do different stuff on those cards. So, tons of stuff. Vantage is uh we thought it was very, very interesting, but yeah, people seem to be liking it and playing it.

So, it's number 10 of the hotness. >> Number nine is the fate of the fellowship uh you know, pandemic system game. It's been a while since we played it. >> Oh, we're playing it again. >> Uh this is again based on the pandemic system. So, it's a cooperative game where we are uh playing as different members of the fellowship and the free peoples in general.

uh trying to overcome Sauron and his forces. Uh completing specific missions uh will have to complete three missions and then destroy the ring which is the the kind of always the goal. >> Yes. >> Uh as well and you are doing this making use of your player powers, certain specific actions and abilities you can do.

Y >> um as we try to kind of navigate these armies that are moving around, fight those armies, try to get to the areas and stuff based on whatever missions we're doing. pandemic where it's like the all sudden boom there's a really the hot spot that you got to deal with right now, right? Yeah. >> Yeah.

Uh so we are big fans of this game personally because we're big fans of Lord of the Rings. Pandemic was our gateway game is what got us into the hobby. So like two things coming together. >> Two great taste tastes great together, man. >> Uh and yeah, it's been really fun. And this one has been in and around the hotness since it, you know, really kind of was announced.

>> It's kind of always hovering. >> Um and and yeah, it's >> I'm curious. You think they'll expand it? They don't really do many expansions for pandemic. I don't think so either. >> There's so much content in that box. Like, you know, there's a stack of missions. Yay. Yeah. High. And you're only using three of them.

>> And to be fair, they don't really expand pandemic much other than the original pandemic. >> Yeah. I wouldn't imagine so. I mean, I'm not anti, but if they did like a Hobbit one or something, I'm not anti that. >> I'm not anti Mattly. >> Maybe we could do some of that. But, um, yeah, it's been really fun.

>> Uh, I know Aldi, who uh owns Board Game Geek, loves this game right now. This is the Old King's Crown, isn't it? >> And you got to play this at BG. >> I did. I played Scott's copy of it uh with a couple friends. And um yeah, we played a four-player game of this. It is a >> sort of lane battler war.

It's kind of like war where you want >> war, not a war game. Yeah. >> Yeah. It's kind of a war game kind of like war. uh where you want to have the highest value card to win a uh one of three kind of uh you know encounters that are going to be happening, clashes or whatever. >> Uh and so on its in one way it's very straightforward and simple.

Just play the high highest card >> and you win. And we all start off with like the same uh mix and and stuff of cards. We might not have all the same ones in our hand, but there are different values with different abilities and stuff. we all start with the same. You have the ability to kind of get some different things and we are all unique factions that have uh certain avenues and things we can exploit that others can't.

>> Um but what this game comes down to is all of the various ways that you can break the rules of the game in like >> crazy ways. Uh there are basically these cards you'll be bidding on uh at the start of each round and you'll play one of those cards from your hand and again highest value card will you'll get first pick of what's available.

>> Uh and these things are all over the place in terms of abilities. There's ones that will break the rules of a clash and stuff. They'll allow you to steal things from opponents uh to there's like these uh little buildings they can put out to add extra strength to an area and they might allow you to recover those more easily and there's again a huge stack of them.

You won't get through nearly all of them in a game, >> right? >> Uh so you're going through and taking those things might break rules. You can steal those from other players in future rounds. You can play cards uh you know with like a flanking ability. So when I reveal it, I can actually move that card to a different lane.

So if I'm like I'm not going to win this one. I'm going to move it down here. And then I reveal two cards and I add their values together so I have a better chance at winning that. There's different rewards you can get >> uh for winning, you know, one of the battles in addition to getting your your little victory point and stuff, which is the goal.

>> Uh and and that's really kind of what it is. It's, you know, as Ollie described it, it's like war, but there's a million little knobs and levers, little things you can do to to change change stuff up. It's a beautiful production. >> My gosh. >> Amazing. The designers, the artists, it's like a passion project to the max.

It's a really awesome production. Very cool game. If you are okay with, you know, conflict heavy, you are messing with each other. You are at times stealing stuff from each other, but that's the nature of the game. Uh, and I quite enjoyed my time, uh, playing it and just again really enjoying the production, which is, uh, top, >> pretty stellar.

>> Number seven is going to be STI. >> Wait out here. >> Uh, yeah, last month we talked about the STI expansion, which was on the hotness. This time it's just normal STI, but uh it's probably here because of the expansion. Not to mention if SEI is not on the hotness list, which it is many months, it's usually like 11 or 12 on the list.

It's always kind of one of those perpetually hot games. It's been out for about a year now. >> Yeah. >> Uh just had the expansion drop at Essen, but this is a game where you are searching for extraterrestrial intelligence. STI is a real thing in the world. world's basically a bunch of different satellites kind of in a big old desert >> and they're just kind of looking for signals, looking for stuff, looking for someone to be like, "Hi, >> hey, what's up Earth people?

>> You guys, you got theorem. That's cool." >> Boom. You guys started using solar. Not yet. That's crazy. Quit quit burning bones and use the sun, you know, doing stuff like that. I assume that's what aliens are. >> Yeah, I know. Uh, but nonetheless, uh, so that's a real thing. But in this game, you will actually find aliens.

So, you're finding like little bit of alien traces in different parts of the game. And then you'll eventually discover the two aliens that are in the game, but you don't know which ones are in there because you shuffle them up, put them out there. Uh, it's really, really fun. Both of us, uh, SETI was our favorite game of last year.

I think it's still our favorite game from 2024. Love STI. The new expansion, uh, we actually just played the other day for the first time >> ago. Yeah, >> we picked it up. Um, and we got to play it. It's kind of a more stuff expansion. There are three new aliens, which I'm like, just give me more aliens.

>> Everything else in the expansion was really, really cool, but just give me more aliens. Um, but then there's kind of like the Prelude expansion like terraforming Mars kind of thing where it's like um kind of a jump start >> kind of a jump start. You have some asymmetric agencies that you are now.

So you have a little bit of asymmetry, but those things aren't massive mass. They're not like super super gamechanging or gamebreaking. So it's just kind of a more stuff expansion, which is great. Um, yeah, love SETI so much. I hope they keep expanding it. I just want more aliens. Just keep giving me more aliens.

Number six is going to be uh the great library which on crowd right now which on crowdfunding. This is the next Vital Sera game. Uh you know they they do pretty much one game a year. Basically one game a year. Yeah. >> Crazy considering these are all very large games. Uh so it's pretty impressive. Uh this is one we actually had a chance to play uh over on our channel um in the past month.

In this one, you are uh tasked with transcribing manuscripts and and bringing in great works from around the world to fill the library of Alexandria. Uh and and uh you are going to be uh hiring, you know, training scribes to be able to translate your everything is kind of in the areas of like law, arts and medicine.

uh and you are kind of chaining together uh and finding every which possible way to do as many actions as you can and around many ways you can do actions before you eventually have to pass and the main resource you're paying in is time >> because these things took you know a long time every round is a generation.

Yeah. So this is something that's you know the game has taken place over hundreds of years and stuff like that. Uh, and yeah, you were going and sailing around, grabbing these manuscripts, using your scribes to translate those manuscripts to be able to put into the library. And again, all these different bonuses and stuff along the way.

>> Uh, yeah, this one was uh fun for us. We enjoyed it. It was very, very combo heavy. It's very much like the last couple of Seras have been like that where you're not getting that many turns, but you're trying to chain as much stuff, which is a very common thing in board games right now. it seems like in general.

Yeah. >> Um where you're trying to chain things together and so um yeah, I I liked a lot. I really like the theme. It's got great eno tool art. Um yeah, great library is another it's another laser and it's it's still good. >> Next up is going to be Hood Troubles in Sherwood. This is also on crowdfunding right now.

This is uh based around Robin Hood and it's kind of like a root light in terire really anything like root necessarily but just like >> every single character you can play as like the bishop, you can play as a sheriff of Nodingham, you can play as Robin Hood, >> the French nobility >> French no um and all of them are very very very different.

Um they're you're basically playing kind of a different game but it's much lighter than Rouge. We actually got a chance to uh cover this one for them. Um and it was interesting. It was cool. Um, and the characters do play quite differently. So, like I was the bishop and the bishop kind of the clergy.

Um, you I basically can hire other people's workers to like work on stuff for me and then I can put like buildings out onto the board and then people can use those buildings because they're they have benefits on them. But if they use them, they give me a point and then they flip over and then I can use the other side and then they'll flip back over.

So, I'm basically trying to put these buildings out where people are and trying to um and hopefully they will use them so that I can get some points. It's one of the main ways they get points. Not the only way, but the sheriff of Noddingham, you were kind of like trying to put like deeds out and stuff like that.

>> I was like declaring deeds and things uh and trying to kind of spread out onto the map as far and wide as I could and control as much of the map as possible, trying to subdue everybody basically. Uh, and the more kind of presence I had in various locations, I would kind of generate points every single round.

Uh, by doing that, Robin Hood was all about, you know, getting his scuffles. They can move around the the wood spaces for free, >> like stealing from the various caravans. >> Yeah. And they would give money. Yeah. You could rob these caravans stuff. They would give money to uh to different locations and stuff and that would gain them kind of fame.

Yeah. And as they did, they can put more camps out so they rob the rich, give to the poor. Uh, and then the French nobility, which didn't play as, they kind of uh can can assign people um these declarations, I think they're called, and stuff, which are these powerful things, but of course, they're going to be generating points.

It's a race >> to uh I think 25 points. Different ways of generating your points. Again, very kind of root inspired in that way where it's like we're we're it's just a points race, but we have different ways of achieving that. And you kind of have to home in on like your faction's strengths and kind of work that engine as best you can.

>> Yeah. Next up is gonna be a big old roll right called Tend. This is by Ivy Studios whose games are always very very highly produced and that is the case of this. Tend is I I believe delivering to people right now which is why a lot of people are playing it. >> Had a crowdfunding last year or earlier this year.

>> Last year earlier this year yeah one of the two. Um, but nonetheless, Tend is a it's kind of like >> kind of got like a Stardew Valley feel to it, but you are um on a planet uh tending to that planet. So, you can have like animals, you're doing crops. It's kind of Stardew Valley in that sense. You're like digging down to the mines, which are like scratch off, like scratch off lottery tickets, which is like the woods.

>> So extra, but I love it. >> Yeah, it's dope. >> Um, and then there's like this, what is it? Is it Zenith? The Zenith Corp. >> Yeah, Zenith Corp. They're looking for this this company that we're like >> not quite sure what they're doing. >> It's kind of like sh if you ever play Satisfactory, it's like fix it is the same thing.

It's like this kind of shady corporation. >> Don't worry about it >> that they're kind of like don't worry about it. It's fine. Just just keep keeping us crops, keep sending us stuff. And so that so it's got this really fun kind of overarching theme over it. But yeah, it's this big rolling right where you're you're again getting crops, getting animals, you're digging down the mines, >> all this stuff and putting it in your cargo manifest which you're trying to fill rows and columns of uh of those types of goods you're producing.

And in the deluxe version of the game, they even have like these stamp pens. So on one side's a normal marker like tip, you know, >> and on the other side it's like the stamp for whatever the symbol, >> a green little leaf, >> a little leaf, you go boop. And I'm like, again, I have a studio has so unnecessary >> courted the market of just like unnecessary extraness, but it is awesome.

It's great. You know what I mean? >> I love it. I love it. I don't care. Again, they're not for everyone, but I love it. It's for the people who want that. I think it's great. Yeah. So 10 is really fun. I want we we recently got our copy of it, and I want to retry it again because we played it when it was on crowdfunding.

>> Yeah. They were still tinkering with certain things. >> Yeah. And so I'm really excited to try the finished product. But yeah, that is 10. >> We played this one last night. >> We did. >> We played this last night. We played Speak Easy. >> We did play Speak Easy. >> Another Vital Lera. This one, >> this one is delivering to people.

>> Uh, great library is on crowdfunding. So, >> pretty prolific. Uh, yeah, go ahead. I think it's my favorite laser. I think I I think it's my favorite Las. It's way up there, but like Speak Easy is really good. >> Speak Easy is really really good. Uh, Speak Easy is about uh the prohibition era here in America.

Um, and so the time where alcohol was uh illegal, yep, >> uh, they, uh, had a constitutional amendment about it. And so a bunch of speak easys, bunch of underground bars, which is what a speak easy is, popped up all over the place. Um, and alcohol consumption, I think, went up during prohibition, which is hysterical.

It's safe to say that amendment didn't work. >> It didn't work out. And so, but nonetheless, that's what this is about. So, you are putting out speak easys. You're putting out nightclubs and casinos. Um, but there are rival mobsters. you're all mobsters who are coming into Manhattan trying to kick you out.

You can overtake their stuff. There are going to be um police that go out in every single district and basically if there's a police in your district and you don't have a family member protecting your building, that building basically doesn't exist anymore. >> Get ready to get shut down. >> And so then you can put out your stills, which is where you can make hooch, you can make moonshine and whiskey.

Um, and basically you can produce alcohol there, but then you have to send a truck there to go pick it up and then deliver it to your various buildings and then you can sell it for money. Money is your points in the game. >> You can just buy from rum runners. You got people on the boats. >> You can rob the rum runners.

You can rob the rum runners. >> There's a ton of stuff and this kind of like great library which you talked about is very much about chaining in together actions. There are kind of four main actions in the game and but you can do those main actions a lot of different ways through like worker placement, through card play.

You're getting these tokens called city tokens. You can do it through that. You could do these actions in a ton of different ways. How you string all that together is kind of up to you. And you can also play the game very differently because you produce alcohol at your stills building, but you don't necessarily have to build your stills building.

I did >> um and I that's where I was producing most of my rum. You didn't build yours at all. You were just buying rum and stealing rum and Mike ended up winning the game. So, you can really play the game out in a bunch of different ways. >> Yeah. I think that's interesting though with like talking about that is your money are your points.

You are going to be spending it. Yes. >> A lot of it in the game, but it is an interesting thing where you're like, I better get a return on this investment because I just spent 20 points. >> Yeah. I need to get >> to get this big thing >> at least 21 points back. >> Yeah. And you have specifically 11 turns in the game.

>> With that said, you're doing sometimes multiple actions on a turn uh including the main actions with those city tokens and stuff. So, it's uh feels very satisfying for us in that. >> Really fun. It's the theme is cool. It's Ino Turtle's I think best work. So beautiful. It's just it's really really good.

I really really like Speak Easy. I just think it comes together so well if you give it can give it a shot. It's if you like listener games, give it a shot if you haven't tried it. It's super fun. >> Next up is Unstoppable. And I was really confused on why >> Me too. >> the um why it hit the hotness.

I finally found out because there's a new version. >> There's a new version of it coming out. is I think it's dungeon crawler Carl. >> Dungeon Crawler Carl. >> Dungeon crawler Carl >> m mix m mix m mix m mix m mix m mix m mix m mix m mix m mix mashup mashup and so but this is going to be a standalone version of it but it is mixable with the original game.

Do you know anything about the dungeon crawler? I looked at >> someone recommended it. I I think if I'm right >> seems wild. >> It's like someone creates stories through RPG stuff. >> So it's it's like a it's like a literary RPG thing. >> I don't think I'm not sure. I know there there's books. I know there's books.

And so it's basically a guy named Carl and his ex-girlfriend's cat. And they're basically in this like weird sadistic game show, like galaxywide game show where it's like a lot of it takes place on Earth. And on Earth there's like this multi-tiered dungeon. It's like a game show and that's like the dungeon they're going through.

I don't know. There's a whole bunch of books. It's this huge thing. I had never heard of >> someone someone recommended the series to me. They're like it's insane. And and I think there's audio books that are really good of it. They're like, I highly recommend it cuz it's really entertaining. >> Here's an Unstoppable themed around Dun Carl.

Yeah. And so there's going to be a campaign for it in 2026, I believe. Okay. >> But Unstoppable is a solo or two-player game. Uh mostly solo. It's part of the Renegade solo series. Although you can play two player and I actually prefer it two-player, but um >> John Declair. >> It's from John Declair.

It's got um uh again kind of card crafting type things where you have these cards. You can upgrade them. On the back side of the card though are um enemies and so basically there's no card drawing in the game despite the fact that it's a deck builder. >> Basically um you'll have enemies out in your kind of battlefield and when you defeat an enemy on the back side of those enemy cards are your cards.

So when you defeat an enemy that card flips over and comes into your hand and that's how you get cards. Every new round you're going to get one new card from the game but other than that that's the only card drawing you do. everything else you have to defeat enemies. And as you put on these upgrades, >> you're making your card stronger, but it almost always will have an upgrade for the enemy, which is on the other side of the card.

So, it kind of, in my opinion, solves >> It's a self-balancing game. >> It's a self-balancing game because it solves kind of the problem in my opinion with a lot of card crafting games by Johnny Claire where you'll have a couple cards that are so good and then all your other cards are kind of like meh.

Whereas this one, it's like now your really really good cards are great, but they're also gonna be really rough on that. >> You really kind of want to like spread it out a little bit if you can or make that card so strong, but you need to be able to use it because you're making bigger problems. >> Yeah.

And it's like we haven't done our our top 10 games of the year, but for most of the year, Unstoppable has been my game of the year. So, I'm really excited about more Unstoppable. Uh I just love >> expansion, not the dungeon crawler Carl, but uh the first expansion for Unstoppable. The fact that this one's going to be compatible with that, I'm like >> cuz I think it's just like you just take a character and take a boss and that's kind of it.

So I'm like why not, right? And it is a kind of sci-fi galaxy game. Why not, you know? So I don't know. I love Unstoppable so I'm excited for anything. >> Number one is going to be Eternal Death. This is all over the >> Yeah, this is one that I saw some people playing at BGcon. >> Uh and a buddy of ours got to play it and uh I didn't get a chance but I was very keen to.

This is one that like I don't know its origin story in terms of uh I don't think it was crowdfunded or anything, but it's got really awesome art. It's got this cool fabric board. Uh you know, the the board is black and white and stuff, but you have these colorful cards going down. Uh it's a cooperative game kind of system.

There's different uh stages that will have more and and fewer, you know, complex rules and stuff. Uh but you are ultimately going to be playing cards down uh as a team one at a time to these kind of rows and the general placement rules will be that you can't have the same color next to each other can have the same number next to each other.

It's almost kind of anti- Uno in that way. Uh and you're playing these cards and as you fill up these rows, you get these the person who puts the last card in the row gets this kind of stack of cards from one of these eternals. These cards are going to have different colors, different number ranges.

Uh but they will also come with a curse. So while you get these cards, which is very important, you're also now making it maybe harder uh to to be able to play cards legally. Like one, I saw an example means you can't play fives and sevens. There are ways to overcome those curses and negate them, but until you do that, you're you're you're hampered.

But you want to be filling these rows because if ever there's a player who can't take a main action, one of which is playing a card. you start with five cards in your deck, that's it. >> Uh the game is over. So, you need to be winning these things. You can also pass cards to teammates if you're like, "Oh, this guy is hurting." Or, "You know what?

>> Let's make sure you can complete the row cuz then you get the stack of cards because we all actually have a few cards in our hand." But then there might be rules for a row where on top of those placement rules, it might be that the numbers have to ascend or they have to descend or as you go on, they get more and more kind of complicated in that way.

>> Uh it's just one that seems really cool. It seems cool. Anytime there's a really good co-op game, I think it's going to get loved because there's a lot of people like to play work together as a team. I love the look of this so much. I think the art is uh really fantastic. I think that's what's been drawing people in.

The cover is really cool looking. Uh very kind of different and uh I think it's captured people's attention. Yeah. And uh yeah, there was like I think maybe a couple, but one person in general at BGGcon who was just running >> Eternal Decks with anyone that was interested to play, which I thought was very cool and a bunch of played a few games with them.

>> Wow. >> Uh and they were just like happy to share the game with people, which I thought was awesome. I hope it becomes more widely available. I'd love to try. >> Yeah, it it seems really really cool. So that's the hotness. So at the end of the hotness, we always talk about the 10 most played games of the month.

Um, on BG you can log your plays. If you do things like a BGA, if you use like BG stats, you can have those automatically upload to BG. So, log your games on BG because it will affect this list. So, the 10 most played games of the last month was Sea Salt and Paper, which has 6,613 plays. Lord of the Rings, the Fellowship of the Ring tricktaking game has uh 6,759.

Still going strong. >> Yeah, we're going to see two towers show up soon once that comes out. It's going to think you're going to see that one on the list. Uh, Sky Team has 6824. Tag team has 6877. So, they both have team both Scorpion Masque and they both have 6,800 views. >> Two player games on BGA.

Wow, the the synergy. >> That's crazy. Harmonies pretty much always here at 7,988. Arnova has 9,343. Wow, it's fifth. I guess people hate this game now. >> Wow, it's really >> It's usually like one or two. Wow, >> get wrecked. Arnova, I love Arnova. Uh, Castle Combo has 10,472. Take Time, which we tried recently, which is very fun, uh, has uh, 11,91.

Bomb busters has 14,136. And Flip Seven back on top with 15,700. >> Wow, man. A lot of uh, a lot of those games you play multiple rounds. I've played eight or nine rounds of take time already just because you might fail and have to redo it. So, that one can rack up those plays. Sure can. Uh, it's a very Yeah, but that's most played games of the month.

Mikey, I think I hear the click clacking of some giga bits. My Murf pick is going to be the Golden Turtleback miniature painting competition. I have talked about this during a best of BTG I think at this point a number of years ago, but I was looking at it again. And I was like, you know, I want to talk about it again cuz this is a monthly miniature painting competition that is on BG and that is voted on by the people on BG.

So, you can submit a uh miniature that you painted in the previous month. So, right now the one for November 2025 is going on. So, you had to have painted it in November 2025 or at least finished it in 2025. Uh, November 2025. And you can put up there and then basically who whatever one gets the most thumbs that will win the Golden Turtleback um competition.

It's just a friendly little competition. I have entered in it a couple times because I really really love painting miniatures. It's just so cool. There's all different kinds of skill levels. There are some very, very new painters, some very, very experienced painters. It's a really, really welcoming place.

People leave wonderful comments. It's really, really awesome. If you like painting miniatures or you just want to go see some cool miniatures, make sure to check out the Golden Turtleback miniature painting competition. It happens every single month. So, my mer pick is going to be uh this kind of set of photos uh from user Puerto Rico who uh has kind of, you know, judged up uh their copy of Sleeping Gods with a cool boat and adding like a little bit of cotton stuff to make it look like it's, you know, causing little white caps on the water and uh different, you know, setting it along with the different monsters and stuff you'll be fighting in Sleeping Gods to kind of bring the story to life.

Uh, I always love seeing the creativity of people. You know, this is a hobby that we all enjoy and love and seeing that spark creativity in folks. Uh, wanting to take things next level, especially with something like Sleeping Gods, which is a big story and and taking, you know, the opportunity to immerse yourself further in the story with things like these cool boats and stuff.

So, you really kind of feel like you're running around uh and exploring these maps as you go through the tail. I just am always in awe of people that do that with their games. It always gets me inspired to like, oh, I want to I want to bling out a game in this cool specific way. Maybe someday I'll get the uh the initiative to do so.

But uh it's always really fun and I just love that we have the ability to share it so easily here on Board Game Geek. And this is one that I found in the hot images area of the site. If you scroll down on kind of that main page, you can find really cool things like this as well. All right, so those are some mer picks.

At the very end of the video, we always talk about our personal favorite game of the month. Sometimes it's new, sometimes it's old. Uh, mine's going to be new. Actually, both of us have played this this month. It was new to us. That's going to be Covenant. >> Figured that beer. >> Uh, yeah. I really, really liked Covenant a lot.

Covenant is a new game by Deve Games. I love dwarves. Dwarves are like my favorite fantasy race by a mile. I'm always a dwarf in a game where I can be one. I love dwarfs. And you're doing dwarf stuff. You have um dwarf little workers who start off at one strength. They can go all the way up to four strength.

Um, and you're doing kind of various different things. You're like, um, digging out the kind of cavern to like build halls. In those halls, there's going to be enemies that you'll discover. You can go and fight those enemies. You can kind of big build big pillars and gates and buildings kind of out in the halls.

You can work on the king's throne by delivering things. There's a whole bunch of different stuff you can do. I've played this game a couple times now and every time I've played it, the people I was playing with, we all played very different games, but it was ultimately a very close game each time. So, it's really cool because you can kind of do what you want in the game and there's a lot of different ways to do strategies and I just really really like it.

I like the look of it. I love dwarves. Uh D'Ve does great stuff and it's just it's really really fun and it's like again kind of what seems to be very common nowadays where it's like you get 12 turns of the whole game >> and it's like we were just playing Speak Easy the other day and that's another game where you have like 11 turns.

It seems to be a thing. It's like you have like 10 to 15 turns and you've got to do as much as humanly possible and Covenant is very much that. >> Definitely. There's a lot of ways to like combo and get basically more turns worth of stuff than you combo. >> What's yours? Uh, for me it's going to be a game that I played at BGcon uh, just a couple weeks ago.

Uh, Covenant was way up there as well. I played that at BG Con. Had a great time. But it's gonna be Star Trek Captain's Chair. >> I here I'm not a Treky and neither are you, but man, everyone seems to and we love Imperium. >> Yes. And so it's based on the Imperium games, Imperium Horizons, uh, Legends Classics and stuff.

uh same designers, but this time now you're in the Star Trek universe and you have character, you know, freaking Luke Skywalker, you know what I mean? Uh there's Hufflepuff is just like >> uh chilling. Um and so you're in the Star, you know, the various iterations of Star Trek and stuff, playing as >> a different captain.

So, Picard is who I played as. Uh, and you have different folks and stuff. And like Imperium, you are going to be kind of working through uh your own personal deck of action cards. >> I guess you're all asymmetric like the other ones. >> Yes. Um, and there are kind of different focuses like Bard was very much about like diplomacy and stuff and Earl Grrey Teague.

That's he's like other people are more aggressive and there's of course all these different cards you can buy in this kind of deck building game >> uh to try to generate points and stuff. So, we really like Imperium and as you're kind of developing a civilization and here there's like locations. You can have ships that fly to locations and like put out influence to game control.

So, did a lot of like stuff Imperium with the deck building aspect, >> but uh you have a player board with certain tracks to bump up and different ways you can sort of unlock scoring and it felt very cool. It felt very much like Imperium 2.0. >> Yeah. 1.5 2.0. Which is great because we love those games and this is just like another one.

So, even though I'm not super wellversed in all of the iterations of Star Trek, >> uh >> I've not watched a single episode. Yeah. >> I really like the game. And I think that's always like the biggest uh testament to something being good is like you don't have to be a Treky >> to enjoy the game. There's a lot of fan service and stuff for you if you are.

But I would get this game and any expansion that came out for it purely based on how fun it is to play. So, that's my pick of Star Trek Captain. >> Really want to play it. Yeah. >> I want to pick it up. >> All right. down in the comments below. Let us know what your favorite game of the month is. Put it down there and uh let us know what you've been seeing on BGG.

Um and we'll see you next month. Have a good one. >> See you next year. >> Oh, it's right.