I first came across modern board games at Beatrix Potter’s House.
I’m not kidding. My wife and I were on a bus tour all over the United Kingdom and one of the stops was at the famed author’s house for tea and crumpets with jam.
Again, not kidding.
It was a lovely home with a lovely dog. They packed all 30 of us into small tiny rooms obviously built for a small author, her husband and the random hedgehog or two.
This home was not a museum. An actual family lived there, living on the premises, welcoming people during the day and sleeping upstairs at night.
Being a British Heritage site, they could not change ANYTHING without government permission and reams of paperwork. So, they lived a very old fashioned life as well. I’m not even sure if they had indoor plumbing.
What they did have was shelves and shelves of board games.
I had never seen such a sight. Boxes upon boxes of different sizes and colors. These were not the games I knew from childhood.
I was curious.
A couple of months later, I came across a board game meet-up in the side room of a restaurant. I couldn’t stay but I was at least able to see some of the games in action.
Again, I was seeing colors and pieces I was not used to. These games seemed to tell stories and be about very big things.
Heck, some of the ones I saw being played didn’t even have dice.
How did you play these things? What stories were these games telling? What was their secret?
I was intrigued.
A short few months after that, a co-worker at my job threw a board game night. I sat down and learned a game.
It was a heady experience. The dice roll didn’t move pieces, it brought things to you. There weren’t any tokens to move around. The few pieces that you did put on the board went IN BETWEEN the tiles?
There was negotiation. And strategy.
And an itch.
An itch to quickly play it again because I knew, I KNEW, I could do better next time.
I was hooked.
Thus began a six year long and counting love affair with everything Table Top. I dove headlong into board games and I have yet to come up for air.
8 comments
What a great beginning, made me ponder how I got started gaming…and I don’t recall there being any defining moment. It seems as though I have always had games in my life. Of course there was Clue, Scrabble, Shoots and Ladders way back…but then came Life, Risk, and some land development game (draining swamps, improving property, building farms, residential areas and even high rise office towers)…gosh what was the name of that game? Then there was nothing…for many years. I’m so happy I found a new group of like minded peeps to share in the fun that is board gaming.
I think for most people, it would be the typical thing of my third moment – someone brought a game to work or something along those lines. I just find it funny that life decided to “tease” me twice before I was able to properly sit down and play – and all within a couple of months from each other.
But like you, I love that I have found this hobby, the people I play with, and the art that is board games.
I love this, what a great way to be enticed into the hobby! Woud liked to have know what that first game you finally played was, that first experince can really make or break someones interest in the hobby I find. I can’t recall what got me to start playing…I think it may have been trying to make my own ‘game’ if you could even call it that, on paper, where is could look after animals – my dream as a kid! Then we got snakes and ladders and cludo and risk and I kept going from there! And yup, still attempting to design something too lol
So you can win future games of Trivial Pursuit – Catan: Seafarers Expansion.
And please, make your game. I waited far too long to create this website. The rush of creating and watching the incremental growth since it’s been up is addicting.
Thanks for reading!
My dad had a pretty good collection of board games when I grew up; Risk, Carrers, Pit, Can’t Stop, Master Mind are the main ones I remember. I used to love playing them as a kid, but moved towards video games as I got older. I was introduced to Catan at University, which I really enjoyed but I didn’t get that experience of seeing a wall full of games / possibilities until a couple of years later while living in Taipei and stumbling across my first board game cafe, The Witches Hut.
Thanks for your blog, nice to read. Do not stop.
Thank You Mark. That means a lot.
And I won’t. I like writing about games too much.
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