2023 - Books and Board Games
I read about 54 books this year, ranging from children’s literature, adult graphic novels and non-fiction micro-histories. Here are a few highlights that tie into my board gaming habit:
Everybody Wins: Four Decades of the Greatest Board Games Ever Made by James Wallis - while the title is misleading, this is a great microhistory of the Essen Spiel award, Germany and the world’s top board gaming award. The book traces the origin and history of the award along with a look back at the winners over the years - which ones stood the test of time and which are long forgotten (and which, I noticed, have mechanics that are resurfacing in new games today). This book is a great gift for a board game enthusiast, especially someone who might take it as a challenge to play all these old games.
Manifest Destiny by Chris Dingess, Matthew Roberts and Owen Gieni - this comic book series is going to be the next theme of Off The Page Games board game in 2024. Expect a Kickstarter soon.
While I really enjoyd both Mind MGMT and Harrow County, the two series Off The Page focused on for previous games, Manifest Destiny just didn’t grab me. I read two of the trade paperbacks and found myself speed reading through them to get to the end. Some of it might have been the art style - I had a hard time telling them all apart. But I just found it to be full of a lot of tropes I’m just not a fan of or have seen done better. Curious to know what kind of game they are going to make out of it, but probably won’t back it since the story wasn’t my thing.
Those were the two titles that directly related to board games. Did you read anything board game related/adjacent in 2023? Let me know in the comments!