78 – The Family Gamers Podcast – Top 10 (or so) Games of 2017
We’re back! As the first show of 2018, we wanted to share our top games from 2017. Return of special guests Claire and Asher, who share their favorites as well. Note: These games are our favorites of the year, not necessarily the most critically-acclaimed.
But first, what we’ve been playing! We had some concentrated tabletop game time in the week between Christmas and New Year’s, and it shows.
Flip City (review coming soon)
Okey Dokey (adorable co-op puzzle)
Crosstalk from Nauvoo Games
– a prototype dice game –
PDQ – a speed word-building game from Gamewright
Untold: Adventures Await – we interviewed Rory O’Connor when Untold was in Kickstarter and also interviewed Michael Fox at PAX Unplugged.
Rack-O – with special powers added to the prime numbers! An interesting minor change to the game.
Our Top 10 or so Games of 2017
On to the favorites! We start with our special guests.
Asher’s favorite: Untold: Adventure Awaits (and Mouse Trap). His top 5 would also include Viral and Chimera Station.
Claire’s favorite: BLANK (as mentioned above), and Batman Fluxx.
And now, the top ten(ish), in no particular order:
- Downforce (Corey’s review) – wonderfully approachable. Great for adults, kids, or both.
- Magic Maze – the simultaneous movement with little-to-no communication is so different from all the other games out there. The way the scenarios build up the game rules bit by bit keeps it fresh and keeps players from being overwhelmed all at once.
- Silly Street (Anitra’s review) – the best game for families with little kids. All about your family getting together and having fun.
- Purrrlock Holmes: Furriarty’s Trail (Andrew’s review) – co-operative and we love that it helps teach deductive reasoning and logical progression while being approachable at a young age.
- Kingdomino (Anitra’s review) – simple enough for a non-reader to play but interesting and challenging for adults. Simple, fundamental rules, with very little head-to-head competition.
- Through the Ages: A New Story of Civilization, specifically the digital version (iOS / Android) – asynchronous gameplay, and the app removes all the fiddly bits so that you are simply faced with your choices of what to do. The AI challenges have made Andrew a better player. $10 for a whole lot of gameplay.
- NMBR 9 – a great, simple abstract game. Each player is doing their own individual puzzle. Approachable as long as a kid gets the concept of multiplication. Biggest downside: too easy to shift the pieces accidentally.
- Viral – area control with a fun theme and bright colors.
- Bärenpark (Andrew’s review) – This is the only game that was in the top five for both Andrew and Anitra. It’s a cute theme, play is independent but connected, and as engineers, we love fitting the pieces together. The optional achievement system makes it possible to adjust the difficulty up or down when playing with kids.
We asked our community about their favorites, and got a lot of great responses too.
As always, you can find us @FamilyGamersAA on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, as well as our website and our Facebook community. Don’t forget to leave us a review on iTunes or your podcast catcher of choice.
Until next week, play games with your kids!
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:02:30 — 42.9MB)