1) Agricola(53 plays | 64.5 hours)
It is insane how much I played this game this year. For comparison's sake, last year's number #1 most played game was Dominion at 28.8 hours played. Karen (my wife), and I play this all the time. We started 2012 by making a board game rotation to ensure that all of our different games that we like to play would get played. We, no joke, got 4 games in. Every time we had time to play a game, Agricola usually won over any other choice. All the time. And now here we are at 64.5 hours played. I play this primarily as a two player game, but there's definitely times I break it out with the board game group.
2) Thunderstone (102 plays | 56.1 hours)
I played my first game on Thunderstone on Yucata.de in April, and over the course of the year racked up a total of 102 plays. The thing that impresses me most about Thunderstone is how still, 102 plays in, I have by no means perfected the strategy of the game and Yucata only has the base game and half of an expansion in it. I love Dominion, but I find this far more replayable with just its base set. I did get a copy of Thunderstone: Advance (included in the plays above), but I by far have played this most online. Offline, the game plays a little slow, so I can see why people might not pick this up, but for me, I've by no means finished playing this game. Maybe in 2013 I can learn how to use Banish properly.
3) Crack the Case (37 plays | 27.8 hours)
Yes, 1993's Crack the Case is my #3 most played game of 2012. We got a hold of Karen's childhood copy and played each and every case in the entire game together. I'm told, by the gentlemen of Building the Game, that this game is a variation of a popular game that people play around a campfire. For those who aren't aware of this game, one player reads the case and its solution and the other players get to ask Yes or No question to try and figure out what happened. We played a lot of this game on our road trip to West Virginia: it's one of the few games we own that can be played in the car. Sadly, without any further cards to play, we have played this game out.
4) Battlestar Galactica (9 plays | 24.8 hours)
I will never get tired of this game. I now own the Exodus expansion which improves the base game, and I'm excited to add the new characters to the mix.
5) A Few Acres of Snow (30 plays | 22.5 hours)
This is another game I played on Yucata. This is a game that I stumbled through with my Dad. My record, according to Yucata, is 11 wins and 19 losses, so I'm by no means great at this game, but my dad and I certain enjoyed trying out new strategies and seeing what worked and what didn't. I know that people say this is a broken game, but after 30 games, we are far from discovering how to do well at this game.
6) Ticket to Ride (all versions) (36 plays | 12.6 hours)
I have to attribute this game's resurgence on the charts to it appearing on Steam. Playing it on Steam just reminded me of how fun the game was in person, and so we racked up a lot of plays. I played this game more than 4 times as many hours as last year.
7) Arkham Horror (3 | 10.5 hours)
I'm glad to see that Mansions of Madness hasn't completely replaced this game. This always makes my top games list each year after my FLGS recommended t 3 or more years ago.
8) Dominion (62 plays | 10.3 hours)
Hooray for Dominion! I still love this game, but admittedly it saw less play due to the appearance of Thunderstone. I don't own Dark Ages yet, but I'm still curious to see what Dominion's final set will be. A year without Dominion in my top plays would be a sad year.
9) Zooloretto The Dice Game (59 plays | 9.8 hours)
This is a great two player game. I don't care for it all that much with 4 players, but I love all the decisions of the two player game.
10) Lords of Waterdeep (7 plays | 8.8 hours)
What a great game. One of the things that I appreciate about this game is that, even with more players, it still has the same play time. I love Agricola as you already know, but given 5 players, I think I would usually choose 90 minutes of Lords of Waterdeep over 180 minutes of Agricola. I'm excited to see what the new 2-in-1 expansion brings come August.
11) Friday (22 plays | 8.1 hours)
I really enjoy this 1-player deckbuilding game and admittedly, I'm not much of a solo gaming person. It's quite convenient that I can play a game in 22 minutes which happens to be the length of a standard TV episode without commercials. If you haven't tried this and are interested, it's certainly worth a try. I get how this might not be for everyone, but I'm really impressed with this design. I've enjoyed getting better at this game over time.
12) Nefarious (14 plays | 7.0 hours)
I got this in a BGG trade this year and I'm quite happy with this game. There are plenty of haters out there, but I'm a fan. Yes, it relies on those plot twist cards but I really like how they make each game different.
13) Mansions of Madness (2 plays | 6.9 hours)
I've had a lot of fun with the extra print-on-demand modules, and am excited to see the new (to me) Forbidden Alchemy and how it plays out. Mostly, I'm excited for the fact that my attack decks now have doubled in size.
14) Space Alert (15 plays | 6.8 hours)
Continues to be a fun game. I don't understand why people buy the expansions that make it harder because this is plenty difficult enough for us.
15) Clubs (12 plays | 6.4 hours)
I was a playtester for Clubs and really enjoyed introducing this game to a variety of different people. I've always been on the lookout for a ladder-climbing game that's less complex than Tichu and I'm here to tell you that this is it. I expect this to make a big splash when it comes out in 2013.
16) Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective (3 plays | 6.0 hours)
I just bought this for Karen for Christmas and already we've played it enough to get it into the top 20. Sadly, the fact that we have played 3 times already means we're 30% done with playing this game, but realistically, it would be amazing if we found the time to complete the remaining cases with all the time that raising a two year old takes. Still, don't be surprised if this is one of the most played games of 2013.
17) Forbidden Island (12 plays | 6.0 hours)
These plays come form a mix of solo games and group games. It's a great game to play between other games, and I still like this game more than Pandemic. In my solo games (which, conveniently, also take about 22 minutes), I've been working my way through all the addition tile layouts and roles offered in the official/fan expansion that I printed up through Artscow. I play each layout until I beat it.
18) Reverse Charades (7 plays | 5.8 hours)
The Dice Hate Me podcast pushed me over the edge on picking this up. i've had a lot of fun with this game in the last few months of the year. We were in need of an additional large-group party game and this definitely fits the bill. It sounds lame, but it's really fun.
19) Can't Stop (41 plays | 5.5 hours)
A game that I have played exclusively on Yucata. It's a great game to play when you're in the middle of other games. Oddly enough, I feel like the more rules I understand, the worse I do.
20) Risk Legacy (7 plays | 5.3 hours)
This game is wonderful; I really like how the world persists from game to game. I'm sure that in 2013, we'll see games that do similar things. I hope that we get to finish our world's plays this year.
___________
The year in review
Last year, I played an estimated 473.5 hours of games, which is a huge increase from last year's 281.5 hours of games in 2011. A lot of this (maybe 80 hours worth) I can attribute to Yucata, but even still, that's a decent increase since last year. It's nice that, as I look through the stats of games that I didn't play this year, that most of them are games that I traded away. So, in other words I have good success with playing just about everything I own.
In total, I played 114 different games across 870 plays.
A few other highlights:
22) Incan Gold (14 plays | 4.7 hours)
27) Wits and Wagers (10 plays | 4.2 hours)
36) No Thanks (10 plays | 3.3 hours)
38) Nuns on the Run (3 plays | 3 hours)
40) Galaxy Trucker (3 plays | 3 hours)
45) Fluxx (15 plays | 2.5 hours)
50) Bohnanza (3 plays | 2.3 hours)
It's nice having some games (these being a few) that I've owned for a while that still continue to see play, still filling a roll in my collection. Incidentally, that's more Wits and Wagers than I played in 2011 and 2010 combined.
47) Flying Fortress (3 plays | 2.3 hours)
This is my own game. I've made good progress on it and I hope to finish it in 2013. I think I've got a winning idea: I just need to execute it.
Last year's top 24 games were games that I played 3 hours or more a piece. This year, there were 40 games that met that criteria.
Games that made the top 20 for 3 years in a row:
Dominion (54 hours | 28.8 hours | 10.3 hours)
Arkham Horror (17 hours | 17.5 hours | 10.5 hours)
Battlestar Galactica (11 hours | 19.3 hours | 24.8 hours)
Forbidden Island (9 hours | 8.5 hours | 6 hours)
Space Alert (7.7 hours | 4.3 hours | 6.8 hours)
Data/Link
This year's full data (along with 2011/2010) available as a spreadsheet: http://tinyurl.com/mikehulsebusgamesplayed2012
2011's post: http://boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/7548/the-top-games-i-playe...
2010's post: http://boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/971/a-year-in-gaming-loggi...
My theory on keeping/trading games: http://boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/7202/bus-theory-buying-mor...
2012 pie chart:
![]()
It is insane how much I played this game this year. For comparison's sake, last year's number #1 most played game was Dominion at 28.8 hours played. Karen (my wife), and I play this all the time. We started 2012 by making a board game rotation to ensure that all of our different games that we like to play would get played. We, no joke, got 4 games in. Every time we had time to play a game, Agricola usually won over any other choice. All the time. And now here we are at 64.5 hours played. I play this primarily as a two player game, but there's definitely times I break it out with the board game group.
2) Thunderstone (102 plays | 56.1 hours)
I played my first game on Thunderstone on Yucata.de in April, and over the course of the year racked up a total of 102 plays. The thing that impresses me most about Thunderstone is how still, 102 plays in, I have by no means perfected the strategy of the game and Yucata only has the base game and half of an expansion in it. I love Dominion, but I find this far more replayable with just its base set. I did get a copy of Thunderstone: Advance (included in the plays above), but I by far have played this most online. Offline, the game plays a little slow, so I can see why people might not pick this up, but for me, I've by no means finished playing this game. Maybe in 2013 I can learn how to use Banish properly.
3) Crack the Case (37 plays | 27.8 hours)
Yes, 1993's Crack the Case is my #3 most played game of 2012. We got a hold of Karen's childhood copy and played each and every case in the entire game together. I'm told, by the gentlemen of Building the Game, that this game is a variation of a popular game that people play around a campfire. For those who aren't aware of this game, one player reads the case and its solution and the other players get to ask Yes or No question to try and figure out what happened. We played a lot of this game on our road trip to West Virginia: it's one of the few games we own that can be played in the car. Sadly, without any further cards to play, we have played this game out.
4) Battlestar Galactica (9 plays | 24.8 hours)
I will never get tired of this game. I now own the Exodus expansion which improves the base game, and I'm excited to add the new characters to the mix.
5) A Few Acres of Snow (30 plays | 22.5 hours)
This is another game I played on Yucata. This is a game that I stumbled through with my Dad. My record, according to Yucata, is 11 wins and 19 losses, so I'm by no means great at this game, but my dad and I certain enjoyed trying out new strategies and seeing what worked and what didn't. I know that people say this is a broken game, but after 30 games, we are far from discovering how to do well at this game.
6) Ticket to Ride (all versions) (36 plays | 12.6 hours)
I have to attribute this game's resurgence on the charts to it appearing on Steam. Playing it on Steam just reminded me of how fun the game was in person, and so we racked up a lot of plays. I played this game more than 4 times as many hours as last year.
7) Arkham Horror (3 | 10.5 hours)
I'm glad to see that Mansions of Madness hasn't completely replaced this game. This always makes my top games list each year after my FLGS recommended t 3 or more years ago.
8) Dominion (62 plays | 10.3 hours)
Hooray for Dominion! I still love this game, but admittedly it saw less play due to the appearance of Thunderstone. I don't own Dark Ages yet, but I'm still curious to see what Dominion's final set will be. A year without Dominion in my top plays would be a sad year.
9) Zooloretto The Dice Game (59 plays | 9.8 hours)
This is a great two player game. I don't care for it all that much with 4 players, but I love all the decisions of the two player game.
10) Lords of Waterdeep (7 plays | 8.8 hours)
What a great game. One of the things that I appreciate about this game is that, even with more players, it still has the same play time. I love Agricola as you already know, but given 5 players, I think I would usually choose 90 minutes of Lords of Waterdeep over 180 minutes of Agricola. I'm excited to see what the new 2-in-1 expansion brings come August.
11) Friday (22 plays | 8.1 hours)
I really enjoy this 1-player deckbuilding game and admittedly, I'm not much of a solo gaming person. It's quite convenient that I can play a game in 22 minutes which happens to be the length of a standard TV episode without commercials. If you haven't tried this and are interested, it's certainly worth a try. I get how this might not be for everyone, but I'm really impressed with this design. I've enjoyed getting better at this game over time.
12) Nefarious (14 plays | 7.0 hours)
I got this in a BGG trade this year and I'm quite happy with this game. There are plenty of haters out there, but I'm a fan. Yes, it relies on those plot twist cards but I really like how they make each game different.
13) Mansions of Madness (2 plays | 6.9 hours)
I've had a lot of fun with the extra print-on-demand modules, and am excited to see the new (to me) Forbidden Alchemy and how it plays out. Mostly, I'm excited for the fact that my attack decks now have doubled in size.
14) Space Alert (15 plays | 6.8 hours)
Continues to be a fun game. I don't understand why people buy the expansions that make it harder because this is plenty difficult enough for us.
15) Clubs (12 plays | 6.4 hours)
I was a playtester for Clubs and really enjoyed introducing this game to a variety of different people. I've always been on the lookout for a ladder-climbing game that's less complex than Tichu and I'm here to tell you that this is it. I expect this to make a big splash when it comes out in 2013.
16) Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective (3 plays | 6.0 hours)
I just bought this for Karen for Christmas and already we've played it enough to get it into the top 20. Sadly, the fact that we have played 3 times already means we're 30% done with playing this game, but realistically, it would be amazing if we found the time to complete the remaining cases with all the time that raising a two year old takes. Still, don't be surprised if this is one of the most played games of 2013.
17) Forbidden Island (12 plays | 6.0 hours)
These plays come form a mix of solo games and group games. It's a great game to play between other games, and I still like this game more than Pandemic. In my solo games (which, conveniently, also take about 22 minutes), I've been working my way through all the addition tile layouts and roles offered in the official/fan expansion that I printed up through Artscow. I play each layout until I beat it.
18) Reverse Charades (7 plays | 5.8 hours)
The Dice Hate Me podcast pushed me over the edge on picking this up. i've had a lot of fun with this game in the last few months of the year. We were in need of an additional large-group party game and this definitely fits the bill. It sounds lame, but it's really fun.
19) Can't Stop (41 plays | 5.5 hours)
A game that I have played exclusively on Yucata. It's a great game to play when you're in the middle of other games. Oddly enough, I feel like the more rules I understand, the worse I do.
20) Risk Legacy (7 plays | 5.3 hours)
This game is wonderful; I really like how the world persists from game to game. I'm sure that in 2013, we'll see games that do similar things. I hope that we get to finish our world's plays this year.
___________
The year in review
Last year, I played an estimated 473.5 hours of games, which is a huge increase from last year's 281.5 hours of games in 2011. A lot of this (maybe 80 hours worth) I can attribute to Yucata, but even still, that's a decent increase since last year. It's nice that, as I look through the stats of games that I didn't play this year, that most of them are games that I traded away. So, in other words I have good success with playing just about everything I own.
In total, I played 114 different games across 870 plays.
A few other highlights:
22) Incan Gold (14 plays | 4.7 hours)
27) Wits and Wagers (10 plays | 4.2 hours)
36) No Thanks (10 plays | 3.3 hours)
38) Nuns on the Run (3 plays | 3 hours)
40) Galaxy Trucker (3 plays | 3 hours)
45) Fluxx (15 plays | 2.5 hours)
50) Bohnanza (3 plays | 2.3 hours)
It's nice having some games (these being a few) that I've owned for a while that still continue to see play, still filling a roll in my collection. Incidentally, that's more Wits and Wagers than I played in 2011 and 2010 combined.
47) Flying Fortress (3 plays | 2.3 hours)
This is my own game. I've made good progress on it and I hope to finish it in 2013. I think I've got a winning idea: I just need to execute it.
Last year's top 24 games were games that I played 3 hours or more a piece. This year, there were 40 games that met that criteria.
Games that made the top 20 for 3 years in a row:
Dominion (54 hours | 28.8 hours | 10.3 hours)
Arkham Horror (17 hours | 17.5 hours | 10.5 hours)
Battlestar Galactica (11 hours | 19.3 hours | 24.8 hours)
Forbidden Island (9 hours | 8.5 hours | 6 hours)
Space Alert (7.7 hours | 4.3 hours | 6.8 hours)
Data/Link
This year's full data (along with 2011/2010) available as a spreadsheet: http://tinyurl.com/mikehulsebusgamesplayed2012
2011's post: http://boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/7548/the-top-games-i-playe...
2010's post: http://boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/971/a-year-in-gaming-loggi...
My theory on keeping/trading games: http://boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/7202/bus-theory-buying-mor...
2012 pie chart:
