It seems funny to think about now, but back in the day, this game blew my mind. Well, mine’s pretty much the standard answer: A friend of mine invited me over to play Settlers of Catan, and it all went downhill from there. Without further ado, here are the gateway board games from some of the Sprites and Dice writing team. Heck, there’s a very good chance that your first favorite game is very different from your current tastes! Hopefully by looking at some of our own original favorites, we can try to parse out what makes a good gateway game. It should be said that everyone’s gateway into board games is going to be different. However, taking that step back might help us learn something.

Most modern board gamers have their “gateway game:” the experience that took them from the previous generation of Monopoly and Sorry! and ushered them into the new world of worker placement games, deckbuilders, cooperative games, eurogames, and too many others to count - along with conventions that draw thousands upon thousands of players.įor those of us now in the thick of it, with walls covered in kallaxes and heads full of obscure rules, it’s a little disorienting to step back and realize that there was a time when we only knew maybe half a dozen board games.

Can a table top game contain dice