A rare treat

Wow. Someone wrote a really good article about boardgaming on Long Island. The article not only mentions a bunch of Eurogames, but discusses how to play a couple.

It is so rare that a major publication (in this case, the New York Times!) deals with hobby gaming, much less does a good job of it that I thought I should share this.

Masters of the (Tabletop) Universe

Here's just a bit:

It is true that the boardgamers on their own will tackle video games, but for the most part they care less about nanosecond-swift reflexes than they do about strategic thinking. They relish shoving pieces around a board, picking cards, striking deals, studying their opponents’ mortified faces as they are demolished. Meet-up groups like theirs exist here and there throughout the country.

They don’t play grand old staples like Monopoly or Life, games they dismiss as glaringly short on brain-consumption and too heavily reliant on dice throws or wheel spinning. Instead, they find sybaritic pleasure in possibilities most people have never heard of, especially the relatively recent influx of so-called designer or Eurogames, many of German origin: Settlers of Catan, Tikal, the Da Vinci Game, Hammer of the Scots, Yspahan, Zombietown, hundreds more.

Edited to add: By the way, the Da Vinci Game sucks. Apparently they said they played Vinci and the writer misheard.