Shut Up & Sit Down

I've been enjoying Paul Dean's work for a while and I'm pleased to see some writing from him pop up here. Part of his work in the last 10 years has been on the website Shut Up And Sit Down (http://shutupandsitdown.com), which does excellent videos, reviews and articles about board games. He's recently moved on from that project and I'm very interested to see what writing project he'll work on next.

A website that recently rekindled my love of boardgames is http://www.shutupandsitdown.com/ I'm not affiliated in any way - I just really enjoyed it as an entity that is created out of a genuine passion for the medium mixed with a great "nuts & bolts" discussion of the mechanics of the games they review. Enjoy!

Oh there are so many; it'd be great to know what kinds of thigns you're into, but here's a generic list of modern classics that are tried and true: Carcassonne - Really simple and elegant tile-laying game that is full of strategic decisions for players of all levels. (If you like the tile-laying, continue on to Castles of Mad King Ludwig or Suburbia) Dominion - Introduced the "deck-building" mechanic where you buy cards for your own personal deck over the course of the game and manage probabilities of drawing what you need (this later blossomed into a HUGE genre; good next steps are Valley of the Kings, Arctic Scavengers, or Star Realms). Pandemic - Cooperative game about battling disease outbreaks across the globe. In some ways it can be easier for new gamers because you're all working together to solve the challenge. Spawned many expansions, as well as the aforementioned "Legacy" version, which is effectively a campaign mode with permanent changes game-to-game. (Also check out Flash Point: Fire Rescue, and Forbidden Desert/Forbidden Island.) Coup/The Resistance - These are social deduction/bluffing games where players have hidden roles. They offer slightly different experiences: Coup is slightly more strategic and about selecting the right roles to come out ahead, while The Resistance is a little simpler but brings out more tension (because it's team v team). (Also check out Avalon a Resistance spin-off. If you want a little more tactical structure behind the…

I don't think there is an universally agreed standard of which games are worth starting with. Different people like different things. However, I did find some success browsing the ShutUpAndSitDown recommended list: https://www.shutupandsitdown.com/games-page/ It's not guaranteed you'll like the game just because it's on that list but: 1. it's a good initial filter 2. they have pretty entertaining review videos for most of the board games Sadly, I think you just have to try playing the games to see which ones you'll like. By the way, if you're in a reasonably populated area, you can try an in-person board game group on meetup.com (or something similar). I've had good success with that, but I do live in an European capital, so YMMV.

Shut Up and Sit Down is a good resource for this sort of thing. https://www.shutupandsitdown.com/videos/15-great-games-to-fill-your-ta… If you'd like far more information than you need to know, https://boardgamegeek.com/ is the definitive online board game community.

Also this video from their first time playing it (1 year earlier), which I found a bit easier to follow (it's also only half as long) http://www.shutupandsitdown.com/videos/v/susd-play-megagame/

A fantastic "1960: The Making of the President" video review http://www.shutupandsitdown.com/videos/v/review-1960-the-making-of-the…

Shut Up & Sit Down: Board game review show and secret project. http://www.shutupandsitdown.com/ http://penny-arcade.com/patv/show/shut-up-sit-down

I enjoy crunchier board games, but the fun from games usually comes from playing them with others and most of the people I know don't enjoy games that take a non-negligible time to set up and explain the rules. When playing with others, I'll grab games like Tsuro - https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/16992/tsuro - put down a tile, move tokens along the path, try to stay on the board the longest Skull - https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/92415/skull - a bluffing game where you can see the moment people grok the need to lie to win Monopoly Deal - https://smile.amazon.com/Hasbro-B0965-Monopoly-Deal-Card/dp/B00NQQTZCO - A questionable quality board game turned into a great pub card game I have Long Shot - https://www.perplext.com/long-shot-the-dice-game - on backorder at the moment, but it seems like a simple roll & write game that people can quickly pick up. I'm solo playing Bruxelles 1897 - https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/275913/bruxelles-1897 - before asking my partner to try it. The rules are dense and it seems hard to explain the phases at the moment. If you are looking for tons of board game reviews, https://www.shutupandsitdown.com/ and their youtube channel do a great job IMO of covering a wide range of game types.

in a better world, every family would not have the traditional copy of monopoly on the shelf, but would instead have a copy of chinatown https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/47/chinatown https://www.shutupandsitdown.com/videos/review-chinatown/

You'll want to pick up citadels or hanabi. https://www.shutupandsitdown.com/games/citadels/

This looks like a lot of fun. Here are some entertaining videos from shut up and sitdown that seem to capture what its all about. http://www.shutupandsitdown.com/videos/v/susd-play-megagame-2-pt1/ http://www.shutupandsitdown.com/videos/v/watch-skies-2-pt-2/

The boardgame review website Shut Up and Sit Down wrote the definitive explanation of why Cards Against Humanity is junk in 2015. It's at https://www.shutupandsitdown.com/review-cards-against-humanity/ Paul Dean: "The latest edition, which I bought to try very recently, omits some of the cards that have caused the most upset, white cards that have made punchlines of “Passable Transvestites” and “Date Rape,” hopefully because the creators realised that, for some people, “Date Rape” is not the conclusion of a joke, but the conclusion of the worst night of their life. It still includes cards that say “African Children,” “Poor People,” “The Jews” “AIDS”, “Child abuse” and “Amputees.”" Quintin Smith: "To fix this you could try and prune all the offensive cards out beforehand, but it’s no less depressing to imagine someone hunched over a coffee table trying to make their purchase function as a normal game. Or two: you could only play the game with close friends who you know well. Secretly, though, that’s just as terrible. You bought a game you can only ever play with your coolest of cool buddies who don’t get worked up about this kind of thing. And when you finally get it to the table? It can’t offer the giggle-laced panic of Pictomania, the actual wit of Funemployed, the absurdity of Telestrations. It can offer a limitless stream of pseudo-jokes, lacking either player creativity or the guiding hand of a designer."