My top ten games of 2006 – by number of plays

These may not be good games, but they are the games that I have played the most in 2006, and even if I play a lot of games tomorrow I am fairly certain that all of them bar number 10 are quite safe.


1 Connect Four - 131 plays.
The scary thing is that this probably only covers the first quarter of the year until Daughter the Younger broke the bottom bar that keeps the counters in so we stopped playing it. Every single one was with Daughter the Elder. At the start of the year I could match her about 50/50. In our last session it was about 70/30 her favour. The kid is good at abstracts!

The weird thing is I am not even the person with the highest number of plays.

2 6 Nimmt! - 85 plays.
This was the lunch time game of choice early in the year, until a) the deck started to wear out, b) we found Tichu and Mü und Mehr. We played it from three to eight players generally and it was very popular.

3 Mü und Mehr - 84 plays.
Another day or two and work this year and this would have slipped into third place. Of the five games that come with the deck we played Mü for a while, but one of our group really hated it, so we switched to The Last Panther which is really just a variation on Spades or Hearts or whatever it is called in your part of the world. If there are not four players available at lunch time this is what has been brought out since the 6 Nimmt! deck was retired.

4 Tichu - 66 plays.
The four player game of choice at lunch time, also quite common at Gamers@Dockers sessions. We experimented with 6 players and a weirdo 5 player variant but now we just play it four player. Some times I go really well, sometime I do not.

5 Blink - 54 plays.
We only got this game in September, but both Daughter the Elder and Daughter the Younger love it. They play at different speeds, so I found that it is better to adjust the deck if all three of us are playing or just play against them individually. A very fast game.

6 Pick Picknic - 35 plays.
Another one of Daughter the Elder’s favourites, she invented terminology like “Foxy Loxies” and “Peck Offs” for playing the game. A very good family game, that can be played by adults and children alike and plays two or more.

7 Loopin’ Louie - 29 plays.
People who dismiss the game usually haven’t played it. It’s not a serious game by a long shot, but it is fun. Lots of fun.

8 Drakon – 3rd edtion - 27 plays.
This was brought along as a lunch time game sometime in late October or early November and has a got a lot of plays since. We usually play three to five players and can knock off two to three games in an hour. This has gone on my wishlist.

9 New Mastermind - 27 plays.
Much the same as the old Mastermind but with a funkier board which includes built in sliders instead of scoring pegs. I think the colour choices in this edition are quite poor with pink, orange and red all being quite similar. Daughter the Elder enjoys it and it helps her exercise her deductive powers. Nobody else on BGG is logging plays for this game.

10 Diamant - 18 plays.
Some friends brought back a copy of this from Germany for my birthday back in August. Unlike the BSW implementation you can play the physical game with three players. A good fun push your luck game and another advantage of the physical game is after you leave the cave you can peek to see what the next card would have been.

With the exception of Diamant pretty much all the games on the list are ones that I play either with my daughters or the lunchtime games crowd at work. That’s obviously where my volume gaming is.

If I counted on-line games Tigris & Euphrate would definitely make it on the list with more than 50 games this year.

Happy New Year all.

Gone Gaming Awards
Don’t forget that the nominations for the The Gone Gaming 2006 Board Game Internet Awards close real soon now. Click on the link for more details.