Board Games!

Making -and maintaining- friendships at university can be a big challenge. If you're looking for activities that could help build bonds and allow you to meet new people, why not try board games? And no, I'm not talking about Cards Against Humanity for the fifth time this week during pre-drinks. How about something a little more engaging/ challenging?

Here are some of my personal recommendations to folks who are looking to get into board games, or introduce your friends to them. I've left games like Cluedo and Monopoly because, let's admit it, we're probably all a little sick of them at this point in our lives,

1. Catan

This one is probably going to be instantly recognisable to a lot of you folks, and it's fame is well deserved. Catan is unanimously regarded as one of the best designed, engaging, challenging and yet simple to learn board games of the past two decades. It revolves around building and expanding your territory on an island and emphasises strategy (with a little bit of luck) as you build, trade and rob your friends to victory! 




2. Dixit

This one is for the more creative of you, with a strong emphasis on storytelling as you try to get your friends to guess images based on vague stories/clues. The beautiful abstract artwork on the many, many cards is a huge plus as well. This is also a great game to get to know people and the way they think better, as it really gives everyone equal chances to speak. One of my personal favourites for sure.




3. Carcassone

Last but not least among my personal recommendations is Carcassone, which brings things back to the strategy side of things. Part luck, but mostly based on skill, the game revolves around you and other players slowly revealing a landscape by flipping tiles over at random and piecing together a map as you choose. All the while, you position your people on different parts of the board to score points in different ways, a knight, a robber, a priest etc. This game really shines in it's replayability, as you never end up with the same landscape upon replay.

And that's it from me! I really recommend giving these games a try, why not join the UEA board game society and try them out if you're not sure about buying them at this point? There's a whole world of great board games out there, and these three are just the gateway!

Chris
UEA International Student Ambassador