The New Breed of Gamer

I think I am considered a new breed of gamer. I have not always been a fan of strategy board games. As a matter of fact, for most of my 38 years of life I was not even aware they existed.

Like many of you, I was raised on Risk, Monopoly, Sorry, Life, Clue, and Trivial Pursuit. I played Dungeons and Dragons as a kid and was aware of Magic, the card game while I was in college (but never played).

But, I do have a healthy love for PC games. My favorite, by far are strategy games. We are talking about games like Age of Empires, Warcraft, Starcraft, Rise of Empires, Civilization,  Rollercoaster Tycoon, Sim City, Sid Meyer’s Pirates, etc. Does this sound familar to anyone? I knew the game companies, I knew who the developers were, and I read the magazines. I would snap up the next ones as they came out. I still find myself wandering those isles at Best Buy and WalMart.

However, there is a problem with this addiction…it is very time consuming. It is very hard to have any kind of family life and actually finish a game. It becomes even harder when you have a family (I have two children). So, I needed to find something new.

My daughter is 10 years old and fairly bright. I figured I would try to get her into some board games. Where do you think I started? With the standards…Clue, Monopoly Jr., and Disney Trivial Pursuit. She got the hang of them and it was great. We had something to do, and I had games to play.

I thought about pushing the envelope and while I was at Toys ‘R Us, I saw a few games by Avalon Hill that looked interesting, but had never heard of them. One was about monsters that take over America (could be interesting), another was about a constantly changing house that was haunted (again promising – but for a 10 year old?), and a third was a pirate adventure (now you are talking my game). So, before I bought it, I went home and researched it on Amazon – they have great reviews. While doing that, I kept seeing a game called Settlers of Catan. What was this game that had everyone so enthralled? I had never heard of it – but I seemed to be the only one. It was in everyone’s Favorite Family Board Game list.

I figured I would come back to it, and ended up buying the Pirate game (Sword & Skull). It was alright, but not the big hit I had hoped it would be.

Now, about a year or so later, I get around to checking out Settlers of Catan and find that it completely feeds the strategy game addiction I have and we can play it in about 1-2 hours. HOME RUN!

Now I am hooked on this genre of gaming, so much so that I started an online store hoping to introduce everyone I can to these great games. They are currently in an underground sort of state (at least they seem to be in the US), but I believe they are going to become extremely popular. If you have not checked out these games, you owe it to yourself and your friends to give them a shot.

Two funny and related stories…

My manager at my last job is a big gaming fan. He was not in the day that I announced to our graphic artist that I was going to sell strategy board games online. My manager came to me and said I needed to sell a game called Siedler. I said “OK, but what is that in English?” He says “Settlers”. I gave him a blank stare and said “…of Catan?” It was the same game. He said his family had been playing it for years and they had all the expansions and versions.

Shortly after that, I went to lunch with several old friends…one of which had recently gone to Germany. When I mentioned that I was selling games online, she asked which ones. I said “Designer board games like Ticket to Ride, Carcassonne, and Settlers of Catan”. She screamed in the restaurant and said “Oh my god! We played that when I was in Germany! I LOVE THAT GAME!”

This leads me to believe that you need to try these games out for yourself. If you don’t you are missing some of the best games around. 

By the way, we had a hit. My daughter totally loves Ticket to Ride, Carcassonne, and Settlers of Catan…