My Top Five Board Games (2025 Edition)
Truthfully, I wasn’t really into board games for most of my childhood or in my teens. I thought that board games were boring and lame, but, upon playing Hasbro’s RISK: The Lord of the Rings Trilogy Edition (2003) in late high school and university, I eventually became hooked on (some might say addicted to) ‘the hobby’, as my board game collection snowballed. In more recent years, I’ve even had the opportunity to playtest a couple of games (Arydia: The Paths We Dare Tread and another upcoming game). There are so many great board games out there nowadays that it can be hard to find the time to table all of the exciting options out there. As a note, my top board game selections below generally assume that while playing I am including several expansions.
1) The Lord of the Rings: Journeys in Middle-Earth by Nathan I. Hajek, and Grace Holdinghaus (Fantasy Flight Games, 2019)
I started playing this one during the Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns of 2020. Until this time, I wasn’t really into dungeon crawlers, with the only other example of the genre that I had played being HeroQuest (1989). However, I was growing my board game collection. I knew that my wife loved dungeon crawlers and this one was based in Middle-Earth, so it soon joined my collection. The game sat on my shelf for a while because I was intimidated by the idea of solo gaming at the time and we couldn’t play with friends since we were in the thick of Covid-19 lockdowns.
Eventually, however, as the pandemic lockdowns continued, I eventually decided to dive in and started to play with my wife and then on my own. I absolutely fell in love with the game. Eventually, I would also get the chance to play the game obsessively with several friends. This game requires the use of a free app to play, and, in theory, I didn’t think that I would be fond of combining a physical board game with an app, but I was wrong. The app adds so much variety to the experience, with hundreds(?) of randomized ‘events’ that bring an enormous amount of variety to the game. Inmost missions, the monsters and map tiles are also randomly generated. You can choose between about seventeen different heroes with all of the expansions, so there is a ton of replayability here. The scenarios also link into larger campaigns with in between mission upgrading, which means you are playing for the long game here—seeking not just to win individual missions but rather to strategize and plan for the final mission. I’ve long attempted to find another game quite like this one, and so far nothing quite compares.
2) Star Wars: Imperial Assault by Justin Kemppainen, Corey Konieczka, and Jonathan Ying (Fantasy Flight Games, 2014)
The closer equivalent to Journeys in Middle-Earth that I have found so far has been Imperial Assault. Now I should mention that there are technically three ways to play this game (skirmish, through their app, and in a one versus all mode). My favorite mode of play for this game, incidentally, is not the app version but the one versus all mode, so that is what I will focus on here.
In the one versus all mode, the game essentially plays much like a dungeon crawler, but with the game master (here the Imperial player) taking control of all of the imperial and mercenary forces (i.e. the enemies to the rebels). The main difference here from being a traditional dungeon crawler is that the imperial player truly is attempting to play the game against the rebels (whereas usually a game master in other dungeon crawlers simply facilitates game play or the other players). The game is played through several campaigns, with a plethora of side missions available to incorporate into campaigns, as well as several branching narratives based on whether the imperial or rebel players win or lose a given level. Also, the enemies’ actions in the game tend to be a bit more interesting here than in Journeys in Middle-Earth. Then, why do I still prefer Journeys in Middle-Earth? First, I am admittedly a much bigger fan of The Lord of the Rings over Star Wars. Second, I think that the heroes’ gameplay is more interesting in JiME than in AI. In the former you upgrade by building up a concentrated card deck between scenarios, whereas in AI you have a more limited card selection to choose from in upgrading between missions, and the weapons that you acquire at the shop are randomly generated (so there is less strategy in planning out your weapon’s tech tree). Also, there is more randomness to map tiles, monsters, and events in JiME, meaning that there is a lot of replayability built into that system.
3) Twilight Imperium (Fourth Edition) by Dane Beltami, Corey Konieczka, and Christian T. Petersen (Fantasy Flight Games, 2017)
Beyond dungeon crawlers, I also love war games and 4X games. Twilight Imperium is a bit of a combination of those two game genres, with a bit of a heavier emphasis placed on the latter. This game is certainly not for the faint of heart and often takes about eight hours to play through a six-player game (longer if you have new players or 7-8 players). In other words, you really need to invest in this game to be able to enjoy it fully.
Essentially, each player controls a system of planets, bases, and starships. While many new players are tempted to play the game as a mere conquer and destroy all of your enemies sort of game (and that is technically possible), that is often not the ideal strategy here. You will need to expand your reach into different planets, gain resources, politic, and upgrade your tech to thrive in this game. There are so many different factions in this game that the variety of gameplay is just absolutely fantastic. One thing to note here is that the game is very deliberately meant to set up political drama between players, so you want to make sure that in game politics don’t spill into real life! If you can compartmentalize that aspect of the game, however, it makes for an amazing and rewarding experience.
4) War of the Ring (2nd Edition) by Roberto Di Meglio, Marco Maggi, and Francesco Nepitello (Ares Games, 2011)
Before I got into dungeon crawlers, this was my favourite game for a significant portion of time. It is a 2-4 player game, but really the ideal player count is 2. The players each play as either the Free Peoples of Middle-Earth or as the Shadow. Both sides technically control several sub factions within the game (for e.g. the Shadow controls Mordor, Isengard, and the Men of the South). You can spend much of your time combatting over particular famous strongholds and other sites in Middle-Earth, but there is also another side of the game—the journey of the One Ring!
While players attempt to keep each other distracted in battles, they are also attempting to maneuver and influence the One Ring. The Free Peoples player attempts to destroy the One Ring in Mount Doom, while the Shadow player attempts to corrupt all of the members of the Fellowship of the Ring (and thus prevent the destruction of the ring). This is also a long game, taking many new players up to eight hours get through it (not to mention about an hour of set-up). I can proudly say that I have played this game so many times with my brother that we have gotten it down to a slim four hours, including set up and take down. Our parents must be so proud of the skills exhibited by their adult children!
5) Dune: War for Arrakis by Marco Maggi, and Francesco Nepitello (CMON, 2024)
This is a relatively new game, having only just been released last year (2024). As you can see, two of the key designers from War of the Ring (Second Edition) are the credited designers of this game, and you can see the DNA from War of the Ring very heavily influences this game. In fact, the two games run on very similar game engines, with of course a change in IP. However, there are some significant differences in Dune: War for Arrakis, including its randomly generated military figures based on the flipping tokens and the much smaller play time (just to note a couple). Some of the differences here actually make Dune: War for Arrakis a little bit more comparable to another spin-off of War of the Ring, The Battle of Five Armies: The Hobbit (a game which would rank sixth on my list).
Similar to the War of the Ring, this is a two-player game, with one player playing as House Atreides and the Fremen and the other playing as House Harkonnen and House Corrino. By and large, the Harkonnen player is trying to gain a military victory through conquering a set amount of Fremen sietchs that grant the player points. The Fremen player’s objective is always a bit different, depending on the particular cards that they draw. Essentially though they are always attempting to gain a certain amount of points in three different areas (Kwitsatz Haderach, Sand Dwellers, and Military). After gaining some experience, you can play this game in about two hours, which makes for a fun evening. The theme is also great, and does a great job of capturing the ethos of the first book in the Dune series.
Runners-up:T he Battle of Five Armies: The Hobbit (Ares, 2014), and DCeased: Gotham City Breakout (CMON, 2024)
As noted above, The Battle of Five Armies: The Hobbit (Ares, 2014) is a close runner up for my fifth/sixth place in my favourite games list. It is essentially a slimmed down version of War of the Ring that is based on The Hobbit rather than The Lord of the Rings. There are also some gameplay differences from War of the Ring, which help to differentiate the game (such as both players flipping tokens to discover which units they deploy). Depending on my mood, I sometimes even prefer playing The Battle of Five Armies over War of the Ring. Its also worth noting that there is an expansion that allows you to play The Battle of Five Armies and then War of the Ring subsequently, with lasting effects from the first game influencing the latter!
One more game worth mentioning here for me is DCeased: Gotham City Breakout (CMON, 2024). This is a funny game to include here because this is a slimmed down version of the much larger full crowdfunded version of DCeased, which is set to release later in 2025. This sort of ‘teaser’ version of the game, however, is really fun. Its DINA is very similar to that of Marvel Zombies, meaning that it is similar to a dungeon crawler. In DCeased, you have a small team comprised of heroes and villains who attempt to ward off hordes of zombies (including some with super powers) and attempt to fulfill various missions on varying maps. DCeased however adds weapons and allows you to save more bystanders than does Marvel Zombies, and these minor gameplay improvements make DCeeased notably more fun. Also, I am a fan of the much map darker tiles used in DCeased. Overall, I am also a bigger DC fan than a Marvel fan. But good news, you can combine both games together to have a massive DC/Marvel crossover event! I honestly can’t wait for the full version of DCeased to release and would not be surprised if it works its way up my top five list. I should also mention that I have read both the Marvel Zombies and DCeased comic book runs (I want to make sure that I’ve done my research for these games), and I also think that DCeased is a much stronger story.
There you have it my top 5-7 favourite board games. You’ll notice that three of the games come from Fantasy Flight Games, two come from CMON, and the other two come from Ares. In other words, I clearly play favorites when it comes to board game publishers. Thematically, I love games that are heavily immersed in rich literary environments (Middle-Earth, and Dune), story driven play is an asset, and campaign play is generally preferred for me.
Take care and see you soon!
AK-M