BGG Top Games – 3901-4000

We’ve reached the 4000 mark in the BGG top ranked games list, and this century I have to say is one of the worst as far as my familiarity with any of the games goes.

We haven’t hit the “I don’t know any of them” stage yet, so we’re still keeping on!

Don’t all cheer at once now.

Last week’s post began a bit of discussion among my friends, which was very cool, and I was introduced to a few games that I had skipped over because I had no idea what those games were.

It’s funny how there are so many games out there that we all have our different areas of knowledge about them, even if some of the opinions are just “I like that one.”

This week’s list can be found here, but that old caveat still applies: if you’re reading this in the future, Thanos may have removed one of the games I was talking about from all existence (because he’s a bastard that way).

My numbers for this week are really thin. I’ve only played two of them and own three (those two and one more).

Thankfully one of the two I’ve played is an amazing game if you have the table space for it.

Also thankfully, there are some actually interesting-sounding games in this list, so I’ll have stuff to talk about.

So let’s begin!

Let’s start with the awesome game.

Skies Above Britain (#3964) is a solo wargame about the Battle of Britain, the German constant bombing of Great Britain during World War II.

This takes Jerry White’s other “Skies Above…” solo air war games and makes it much more thorough (co-designer Gina Wilson probably had a lot to do with that).

Once again you are a fighter squadron trying to destroy enemy bombers before they can rain death on the country, but this time you’re plucky British pilots instead of German ones, and the mechanisms are a lot more complex (though in a good way).

The dogfighting mechanism for if you’re jumped by enemy escorts is massively changed, and even though most dogfights will take you out of the action as far as hammering bombers go, they are still interesting.

However, the biggest change is that there is no map.

Instead, you roll to see what the bomber formations are once you have discovered them and you place bomber tiles out in that formation.

There is a big board, though, because that’s the intercept map.

This is where you will chase the bomber formations to try and make contact, all while trying to avoid the enemy escorts.

Once you’ve made contact, that’s when you’re assigning your individual fighters to bombers in the formations, trying to isolate the tiles.

There’s just so much good in this one, so you can read my review (linked above) to find out more about it.

The system still uses cards for effects rather than rolling dice, though you still will be rolling a lot of dice for other things.

I played a few games of this at work on lunch when I was by myself, and I’m just not sure how I can manage the table space to play it more.

But I want to.

There’s also a programmed instruction booklet that will take you through all of the mechanisms one by one, which is very handy.

The other game that I’ve played and own, which I have not played in centuries (ok, it feels that way) and I probably won’t play again because it’s a product of its time (i.e. pretty racist with some of the art) is Cafe International (#3996).

This is a game where you are trying to match cafe patrons of the same nationalities at tables in order to score points.

I guess back in 1989, it wasn’t a goal to meet as many fascinating new people of different nationalities as possible.

The board has a bunch of tables where each nationality of people can sit, with some chairs bordering two tables, so a customer with either nationality can sit there.

In one forward-thinking aspect, though, gender equality is a must!

Each table must have an equal number of men and women, or at least be working towards that.

So you can have two men and one woman, but then the fourth must be a woman, or vice versa (two women and one man, with the fourth having to be a man).

If you have placed a man or a woman alone, then the next one has to be the same gender.

If you can’t seat a guest, then you have to sit them at the bar for an increasing amount of negative points (though the first five spaces actually give you positive points before going way negative).

The game itself isn’t that bad. With a different theme (or at least better artwork), the game might actually be fairly good for an “old-style” game.

But the artwork is so stereotypical (with the Chinese being the worst of an already bad lot), I can’t play this game with a good conscience any more.

Even worse, the 2018 Amigo version apparently has the same artwork.

Was nothing learned since 1989?

Since it’s basically just symbol matching (with nationalities as the symbol), this could be rethemed as an abstract game of some kind, or make it an animal matching game or something (so you can still use the gender equality for placement) and you might have a cool game!

The game is a Spiel des Jahres winner back in 1989, so there’s definitely something there.

But not this edition. This one is hidden away on my shelf.

The other game I previously owned, I won in a contest but it’s not really a game that I’m interested in so it got traded away (still in shrink) for a copy of Thunder Alley (also in shrink).

That was definitely a win for me.

A lot of people love Railways of the World (#244), but its sister game, Railways of Nippon (#3906), doesn’t seem to have caught on nearly as much.

I’m not sure why that is, but maybe one of you can tell me!

Lots of wordcount space to talk about games that sound interesting, so let’s start with one that I have to mention because I’m a Dr. Who fan (though the game doesn’t sound that amazing).

Doctor Who: Time of the Daleks (#3954) is a semi-cooperative game where players are different incarnations of the Doctor, joining up to thwart the evil Dalek plan of removing the Doctor from all of Time.

I’m not even going to bother trying to blurb this one, since the BGG description doesn’t mention anything about the mechanics of the game.

I know there are dice involved!

Here’s the back of the box, which also shows you a little bit of what it looks like.

And here it is on the table.

I still really can’t get a feel for what the mechanics are, but it looks interesting enough to try out.

At least for this Doctor Who fan.

How about a roll and write game based on a popular board game?

We haven’t had that before, have we?

That sounds like a totally brand new and unique concept.

7 Wonders Dice (#3936) came out in 2025 and is the dice version of the the classic card drafting game where you are attempting to build a better civilization than all of your opponents.

Let’s blurb this one since I’ve never played it.

“Guide one of the seven largest cities of antiquity to prosperity in 7 Wonders Dice. During the game, you will construct a wonder that defies time, make scientific advances, develop commerce, manage your resources, and handle your gold reserve prudently — all while keeping an eye on neighboring cities since ignoring them has a heavy price!”

It looks interesting, with you using dice rolls to build your stuff (like any other roll and write, I guess) and it has the pedigree at least.

It also looks nice!

I’d like to try it once just to see if it sucks.

Then we’ve got 2014’s roll and write, Roll Through the Ages: The Iron Age (#3907).

Oh, I guess that wasn’t that unique, was it?

Well, this isn’t a roll and write, but more of a “roll and peg?”

Actually, it’s both.

I’ve played the original Roll Through the Ages: the Bronze Age, but not this one.

The game was designed by Tom Lehmann, so you know it’s going to be interesting at least!

This one adds some interesting variations to the original, so let’s blurb that.

“Roll Through the Ages: The Iron Age, a sequel to the highly-awarded Roll Through the Ages: The Bronze Age, lets you build an Iron Age civilization in under an hour! Do you build provinces, raise armies, and conquer barbarians or build ports and ships to gain trade goods? Explore the strategies of Greece, Phoenicia, and Rome as you erect monuments, fend off disasters, and strive to feed your people.

Roll Through the Ages: The Iron Age gives players different ways to build their empires: the Trade and Naval strategies of the Phoenicians, the conquests of Alexander the Great, and the engineering prowess and gradual absorption of new provinces by the Roman Republic.”

I remember liking the original well enough, for a roll and write at least.

Funny how both of these are civilization games, isn’t it?

Anyway, I’d be up for this one, at least once.

How about another one?

Lanterns Dice: Lights in the Sky (#3975) is a roll and write (kind of) version of the really cool card game Lanterns: the Harvest Festival (#1117), which I played a number of years ago.

There also appears to be a bit of tile placement on your sheet, at least from some of the pictures that are on BGG.

Let’s blurb this one:

“In Lanterns Dice: Lights in the Sky, players act as artisans, decorating the palace lake with floating lanterns and launching fireworks to light up the sky. The player who earns the most honor has made the best impression on the emperor and wins.

In more detail, roll dice and choose which colored lanterns players can fill on their scoresheets. Earn gifts to perform special actions, fill in additional colored lanterns, and create powerful combinations. Cover completed shapes with fireworks tiles to score points and put on a spectacular show!”

It wouldn’t be a BGG Centuries post without talking about at least one war game, so how about Pacific War: The Struggle Against Japan (#3935)?

This 2nd Edition is an epic wargame (seriously, this is huge) that covers the entirety of the fight between the Allies and Japan in the Pacific in World War II.

It has everything from Pearl Harbor to China and Burma, Guadalcanal, and all of that goodness.

Let’s blurb this one:

“Pacific War is also a time machine back to the halcyon days of the monster game. However, despite what you may have heard, Pacific War is NOT a monster game, but rather an operational World War II air-land-sea game system that lets you fight EVERY Pacific battle and campaign of significance. The original game came with 21 scenarios. This new edition will add at least half a dozen more. The game gains its monster game reputation from the fact that in order to fight all of these campaigns, you need a large number of counters (over 2000) that represent individual capital ships, cruiser divisions, destroyer squadrons, aircraft groups, and land units ranging from battalions to divisions to corps, with all units individually rated based on their historic performance.

The game map is an equal area map (two mounted maps) which is the grandfather of the Empire of the Sun map. Each hex is 100 miles and covers the entire Pacific from Hawaii to India and Alaska to Australia. The game will also come with a separate map focused on the Solomon Islands where many of the interesting and balanced scenarios occur. What made Victory Games’ Pacific War unique in 1985 remains true in GMT’s 2020 edition. The design integrates strategic/operational intelligence into a telescoping time mechanic that allows campaigns to progress in a logical asymmetric flow, accompanied by tense game play. Pacific War is a deep historical simulation, so if this is not what you are looking for in a new purchase, please read no further. So, how is this level of simulation achieved?”

With a playtime of “60-6000 minutes,” you pretty much can do everything you want.

(6000 minutes? That’s 100 hours!)

Yeah, it may say it’s not a monster game, but that is a monster game, at least as far as table presence goes.

Dinner in Paris (#3945) is a game that I just now realized I played asynchronously on Boardgame Arena a few times (so I don’t count it as officially “played” for stats purposes).

I had completely forgotten the name!

In this game, players are restaurant owners in Paris who are opening new restaurants and trying to spread out their terraces into this new outdoor square area.

However, terraces from different players cannot be orthogonally adjacent at all, so there’s not room for everybody!

The restaurants you open go on the outer row, and then you start building terraces from them out towards the centre and spreading wider, though you can’t go over fixtures like lamp posts and stuff like that.

It’s an interesting puzzle and I would love to try it on the table one day.

It’s a 2020 game, so sadly it’s probably out of print.

But maybe one day?

Finally, I have to mention 1066, Tears to Many Mothers (#3993).

I mention this because it’s another historical game (hopefully Andrew is liking that!) as well as because I had to share this picture.

This seems to be the poster child for the “why the fuck is your box so big?????” questions that some gamers have.

This game is about the Battle of Hastings in 1066, “an asymmetric, competitive, tactical card game in the style of Magic the Gathering, but non-collectable” (from BGG).

Apparently the game was a runner up in the Golden Geek Awards for 2014 and was nominated for the “Best Historical Board Game” award at Origins the same year.

So some positive buzz!

But yikes, that box.

Let’s do a slight blurb:

“Every card in the game is inspired by a real person or event from the time. With a focus on quick, tactical play and a thematic re-imagining of the events of the time, there is no deck building required, each player simply grabs their deck and shuffles, then play begins.”

So that’s kinda cool.

It also looks very neat.

Posting this for Eric to comment on, there’s also Tiny Epic Defenders (#3948).

I enjoy Tiny Epic Galaxies, and don’t mind Tiny Epic Quest, but he’s the expert on these!

I’d try it once, though.

Finally, a short but sweet entry about an (apparently) short and sweet introductory entry to 18XX.

18AL (#3950) bills itself as “a shorter 18XX game set in Alabama” and the tagline says “beginner set.”

So maybe this is a good introduction?

Better than Lilliput?

This came out in 1999, so maybe not?

I don’t know, 18XX makes no sense to me.

I’ll see if anybody has a comment about it.

That’s a lot of “games not played yet” this time around.

What do you think of any/all of these?

Let me know in the comments.