Players Have Crowned a New Best Board Game – And It May Be Tough to Topple
fivethirtyeight.com
fivethirtyeight.com
Wouldn't we expect the rating to degrade over time as more people other than the most passionate try it?
Although, if the game gets a reputation as a niche game, I can see how people would continue to self-select for playing the game, and it would continue to be a top-rated game, but with a significantly lower volume of ratings.
Second, rating decay from the voting population of a game doesn't seem to be that big an effect on BGG. To use TS as an example again, you'd expect that a two player wargame about the cold war would have huge problems as the more general gaming population started playing it. But as the voter numbers for Twilight Struggle increased from 7k to 30k over the years, the rating has actually gone up (8.18 to 8.20).
That isn't to say that there's no rating decay in place. But I think the source is when a game is perceived as "obsoleted" by newer games.
But yes, as the tail gets longer, we should expect to see more lower ratings assigned to Gloomhaven. What the author didn't do was compare to other top games early in their release cycle. I'm not sure how much effect this will have, though -- gamers are grognards, not so strongly influenced by the new and shiny as most people.
This is also what allows targeted attacks against products - annoy (instead of appeal to) a limited segment of the population, they all come and rate your book a "0", now your rating has dropped to near-zero despite it APPEALING (instead of disappealing) to most of the population.
Rating systems should try to figure out if a product is being boosted or attacked by a narrow slice of fans/haters.
That makes the ratings more useful, I think. The rating is only really interesting to those who don't know if they'll like a book, and those are the people in the niche.
BGG has an audience that is mostly interested in board games.
Personally, I write off Gloomhaven because it's a tactical miniatures game (something I've never cared for). There are other high ranked games, like Caverna, which I write off for similar reasons.
Entirely not what I suggested.
Amazon has a large registered user base (who can apply ratings), and only a tiny percentage of those are interested in religious books (or, these days, you could probably say only a v.small percentage of Amazon customers are buying books of any sort).
BoardGameGeek has a user based almost by definition exclusively of people who are interested in board games.
GP's suggestion that niche product ratings could / are skewed by people unfamiliar with the topic doesn't apply so well to niche communities, especially ones with effective moderation.
Disclaimer - I've been on BGG since 2012, own Gloomhaven (but haven't played it), and consequently haven't rated it.
I do think the boardgame community has enough subniches that it's not immune to this problem, though.
I wouldn't self-describe as a board gamer. I monitor the forums & reviews a bit, and have been going to a local meetup for a little while.
But it does feel like board gamers tend to be quite familiar with games outside their 'preference zone' -- perhaps more so than other work & hobby areas I've experienced. Anecdotal, to be sure.
They all look repetitive and limited in the possibilities (story, physical space,...). It would seem that they have no chance against video games (Civilization, Skyrim,...) and still this is, as the article pour it, a golden age.
The only one which was fun (with my father, not children) was "Concept" (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concept_(board_game)) where the board is merely a medium but everything happens outside it.
Board games have some advantages over videogames. They have shorter gaming-sessions, a healthier multiplaying and a far stronger flexibility for game-execution and rules-modifications. Boardgames are played with the family and friends on a table and it's up to the players how they handle things.
Monopoly: everybody hates everyone afterwards.
Settlers of Catan: very repetitive, I believe that we did not grasp the key intent of the game.
When they were younger games such as "Mille Bornes" ( a French board game) were OK, but these are really games for small children.
They read a lot, do not play videogames very much and do not watch TV, enjoy chess, etc. -- so they seemed like good candidates for board games.
I may try D&D (with a real MD) someday, who knowns.
And yes monopoly is terrible. Catan is mostly something to keep you occupied while conversations happen.
Doing that, found about a dozen that would work. Did a bulk order (way cheaper to buy from the US), and have been very happy.
Forced Monopoly references are the board game equivalent of "Bang! Zoom! Pow! Comics aren't just for kids anymore!"
I'm assuming Boardwalk is the equivalent of Mayfair or Park Lane in the UK/euro version of the game?
I guess it's even funnier given the way to consistently and reliably win Monopoly is to not go after the most expensive property, but rather simply hoard all the houses.