“Winning” the game becomes an afterthought once you start a session. (It really does feel at times like the tabletop equivalent of an open world video game like Assassin’s Creed.) There are also monsters that you have to fight using an inventive damage system. It’s part game, part experience as you traverse a map that can be used across multiple campaigns and decipher clues that lead you to other destinations or on side quests that can unlock achievements. Sleeping Gods is the culmination of years of world-building and design progression by Ryan Laukat and as such might be his magnum opus. It’s point salad to the max and still remains one of my favorite overall games, even if it doesn’t quite fit into the more modern “bling for bling’s sake” style of Kickstarters. Players utilize a nifty cube tower to select their actions to move ships, guard against pirate attacks, or lay tiles down Tetris-style. The game has a questionable theme involving vague Colonialism but is mechanically one of Feld’s most straightforward and engaging designs. This is one from the way back machine, but 2013’s Amerigo was actually a Kickstarter-first project from designer Stefan Feld. A slap bracelet! How is this not even higher than ninth place?!? 1-4 Players Plus: My Kickstarter copy came with a slap bracelet. It combines a little bit of worker placement with resource management in a pretty straightforward fashion. For me, however, Dinosaur Island is the best of the bunch. There are a lot of these “build a dinosaur park” games on the market these days-Dinogenics, Draftosaurus, Tiny Epic Dinosaurs, as well as spinoffs of this one like Dinosaur Island: Rawr ‘n’ Write, Duelosaur Island, and Dinosaur World. (Maybe not the gambling one since the game overcharges you at the buffet tables just like in Vegas.) There’s a lot of content for Western Legends and adding everything in at once can make remembering and teaching the game difficult, but it’s something that needs to be played at least once just to experience how it all comes together so nicely. All of the options are viable strategies, and all are more or less equally fun. Players can basically do anything they want to win this game play as a sheriff or an outlaw or a gambler or a cattle driver. It still sneaks onto the list because it’s probably the best true sandbox game out there. If this list was highlighting games simply based on the total number of separate Kickstarter campaigns, then Western Legends would be the clear number one. Both games are definitely worth a look even if they didn’t quite crack the actual (and internet official) top ten. The Search for Planet X is a gamer-level deduction experience that is part logic puzzle and part efficiency puzzle as you try to stack turns to collect the best information before your opponents do. Baseball Highlights: 2045 is something of a forgotten gem in the deck-building genre that combines simple mechanics with a neat take on board game baseball. Two games that are close to making the list are Baseball Highlights: 2045 and The Search for Planet X. Or-at the very least-I’ve briefly considered playing them at some point in my life.) Honorable Mentions And to preemptively combat negative feedback on this piece, let me be clear that I have indeed played all 13,116 qualifying crowdfunded games. (Disclaimers: This list isn’t an endorsement or criticism of the Kickstarter format in general, which I either love or loathe, depending on what side of the bed I wake up on. What you will find, however, are ten superior games (12 if you count the honorable mentions) that don’t get as much press. But you won’t find those games anywhere on my official list, and that’s just something you’re going to have to come to terms with. Games like Zombicide, Spirit Island, and Gloomhaven, the last of which is considered by many to be the best game on the planet. I can see the eye rolls already as you predict which heavy hitters on the board game campaign trail will be at the top of this list. And, since I always feel like my opinion is the only one that matters, I’ve decided that this list is not only my personal Top 10 Kickstarter Games, but also the Official Top 10 Kickstarter Games. While that number is inflated by entries that appeared as a campaign after their original release, the number inspired me to think about what games I’d put at the top of my personal Kickstarted games list. According to Board Game Geek, there are currently 13,116 games that fit under the “Crowdfunding: Kickstarter” category.
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