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Frequent readers will know of my obsession with food. The hashtags #greedygamer and #greedyeater could have been made for me! Haha So the treats and indulgences of Christmas definitely help to make it my favourite time of year.
With the wealth of themes and settings of modern board games, I thought it would be fun to showcase some games which inspire or feature key ingredients used in Christmas dinner. So settle back, tuck your napkin under your chin, and prepare to want seconds, thirds, and even fourths!
Roast potatoes – Herd Mentality by Big Potato Games
Big Potato are the kings and queens of party games, and what could be better at Christmas? The roast potato is after all the most coveted of all elements! There’s a veritable crop of brilliant BP titles from which to choose, and Herd Mentality is one of them. Even when overeating causes brain fog to kick in, the purpose in Herd Mentality is simple enough to understand: think like everyone else or get lumbered with the angry pink cow! To get a happy cow token, each round, your answer to the common question has to match the answer of the majority. If you are out there on your own, the prickly porker will be yours until you can offload it. Sounds simple, but the colourful interpretations and unique mind-workings of you and your fellow players will be eye opening! The first player to collect 8 happy cows is the winner.
Gravy – Furnace
We live ooop north and we serve gravy with practically everything. When gravy flavoured crisps were recently released, my husband thought he was in heaven! Even custard is just sweet gravy to us. And so, Furnace, with its industrial theme, makes me think of the big bustling factories of old for which our largest Northern cities were once know. Furnace is an auction based engine builder that plays fast and furiously over two phases. Bidding for buildings first, and then production second where those buildings pump out various resources that convert into money. The really clever thing about Furnace is that you don’t always want to win an auction. If you don’t get the building, you get compensation based on the value of your losing bid, and that can be even more valuable at times. Ooh! Dilemma! With a brilliant two player mode (and an excellent expansion, Interbellum) we lap up games of Furnace like bowlfuls of the brown gold!
Roast Turkey – Wingspan
We couldn’t really miss Wingspan when working though the main ingredients comprising our delicious Christmas dinner. After all, there is a turkey or two nested inside every box. And to be fair, we wouldn’t want to anyway, because Wingspan is excellent! And for us, any version of Wingspan (OG, Duel and/or spiced up with an expansion or two!) makes every family celebration even more special. Elizabeth Hargrave and Beth Sobel have made a design and illustration power house in this beautiful engine building, tableau creating, set collection, hand and resource management game. Collecting the right foods to play birds to three different habitats in order to trigger unique powers is the process. But the finesse and skill come from finding a perfect symbiosis between the birds you place and the timing of their effects and abilities.
Two Veg – Point Salad
Although it’s Christmas, it can’t all be meat and carbs – well, it can (and all foods technically break down into carbs!) – but you probably should smuggle some greens in there somewhere. And there’s
a wealth of delicious plant-based meal options to rival the best turkey feast anyway! So Point Salad is a great choice for your big day vit v injection. A fast playing open drafting, set collection card game, Point Salad presents delicious dilemmas each turn – take a card for its veggie value, or swipe it for its scoring objective. You can flip a card prior to taking it if you need to, but the cards you take will also affect what remains available from the market for the next player! I love games with multi-use cards, and Point Salad is a super fun filler with bright and bold illustrations!
Yorkshire Pudding – Raiders of the North Sea
The county famous for the tastiest pudding around is bordered by the North Sea. So whist Vikings may now be few and far between, Raiders is a great choice to celebrate the co-king of the dinner plate. This worker placement, dice rolling, hand management euro-style game is an early one from Shem Phillips and a great opening gambit to his series. Compile your crew, gather provisions, and head north to commence raiding. If you impress the Chieftain, you’ll gain VPs and be one step closer to victory. With actions limited by the types of workers you have, you’ll need to tailor your HR needs and upskill to suit the job at hand!
Stuffing – Drop It!
How many pieces can you stuff into a frame? Drop It! is all about dropping and letting shapes land in (hopefully) spaces where you’ll gain points! Gameplay is super straightforward and simple to learn. On your turn, you drop a piece of your choice into the slot at the top and watch it make its way down until it settles on whatever is below it. Your score is based on the highest level your piece reaches. If it also covers any special zones embossed on the clear sides of the game board, you’ll get those bonus points too. At the end of your turn, you total your points earned for that drop, and move your counter along the score track. But if your chosen piece lands on any other piece of the same colour or shape, it scores nothing. Plus if it touches a matching colour on either side of the game board, then that’s zero points too!
Christmas pudding – Century: Spice Road
Like the fruity, boozy pud itself, Century: Spice Road is an oldie but a goodie. It kicked off a game series that has introduced new themes and mechanisms (and can be combined if you’re brave!), but for us spice is nice! Playing traders, the resource management in this game is as easy to understand as it is essential to claiming victory. Each scoring card has a spice cost, and you need to balance claiming resource cards with cards that will convert the cubes (cardamom, cinnamon, saffron, and turmeric) you are collecting into money (i.e. VPs). But it won’t always be a straight swap. Sometimes you’ll need to collect cards that turn spices into others before the final cash in can come. Cardamom is the most elusive and expensive spice to convert, but often features on the cards that will make it rain money wise! So you need to collect plenty of others in order to get those greens! Century is a lovely spicy end to a feast of gaming fun!
Wow, I cannot wait to stuff myself silly with Christmas gaming fun now! Wishing you all a wonderful, healthy, happy, and delicious festive celebration!
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