I’ve said this a lot in the past, but I don’t really play a ton of games in the year they come out. Between my impressive backlog and my unwillingness to go to any board game conventions, I’m usually a year or two behind when it comes to playing the hot new games. In fact, I usually do this list around July, but this year, I’ve been much more active on Board Game Arena, and more and more games are launching on BGA close to their physical release date. It also helps being on the Alpha test list, so I can play lots of games as they’re being added to the site, with the caveat that there may be bugs. ANYWAYS, I’m not here to talk about BGA, I’m here to run down my 10 favourite games that released in 2024 (so far)
Also, side note for myself. Next year I really need to complete this list before my kid goes on Christmas break, because, I was completely unable to get ANY writing done during the last 2 weeks!
10 – Harmonies
Photo Credit: Wizzy Parkerir via BGG
Harmonies was incredibly popular when it hit the scene in March. Pitched as a cross between Azul and Cascadia, it felt like everyone was talking about this little game. Now, I’ve only had the opportunity to play Harmonies on BGA, but I can see why this game had everyone so excited.
Designed by Johan Benvenuto, Harmonies tasks players with building specific shapes in their personal ecosystems to satisfy the demands of the fauna cards. Each animal wants something different, perhaps a lion wants a mountian 3 discs high, with 2 plains discs adjacent, while the boar wants a tree thats only 2 discs high next to a 2 disc high building. The name of the game (literally) is finding the animals that can exist harmoniously, as each of their requirements compliment each other.
While luck plays a major factor in which discs are available to you each turn, and you’ll quite often be forced to take discs you don’t want or can’t use just to claim the few that you really need, Harmonies remains a calm, enjoyable experience. I really look forward to fleshing out my thoughts in a full review, once I can get a few more plays under my belt.
9 – Castle Combo
Another game introduced to me via Board Game Arena, Castle Combo, designed by Grégory Grard, Mathieu Roussel, is a fast, simple tableau builder about trying to squeeze the most points out of a courtyard of servants.
The cards you’re drafting come in two rows. The servants, and the nobles. All cards cost money to bring into your tableau, and once you take possession of the card and slot it into your 3×3 grid, they’ll offer some immediate benefits, as well as offer some end game scoring. After 9 rounds, you evaluate all the cards in your grid, and whoever has the most cards wins!
The artwork by Stephane Escapa is colourful and full of funny caractures, and the gameplay is so fast and butter smooth that it fits the role of ‘filler game’ perfectly. There are still satisfying decisions to make, as a lot of the end game conditions will depend on where each card is, and how many of the other tags are in the rows and columns next to each card.
It’ll remain to be seen if Castle Combo will stand the test of time, but it’s worth at least a dozen plays or so!
8 – Stalk Exchange
Photo Credit: W. Eric Martin via BGG
An area control and stock market game about the ever increasing value and presence of flowers was a bit of a surprise hit for me. Another BGA game, Stalk Exchange by Christopher Ryan Chan, gives players some hidden information that will inform their final score, then tasks players with swapping the flowers they have behind their screen with the ones that are able to go onto the board.
When flowers are on the board, they start off as bulbs, after a single turn if they have an open side, they grow into flowers. If a cohort of flowers are ever fully contained by the borders created by other flower varieties, they’re removed from the board, and the value of that flower goes up 1 spot for every flower token removed from the board. At the end of the game, you score your portfolio. But before you do that, the bubble bursts on the most valuable flower, its value gets cleaved in half.
Stalk Exchange is clever, quick, and simple to teach, making it a pretty appealing game. I’ve enjoyed the few plays I’ve gotten of this one, and if I can source a physical copy, I’ll be sure to push it onto my local game group.
7 – Wyrmspan
Building off the core gameplay mechanics of the massively successful Wingspan, Connie Vogelmann crafted a new game in which players hew homes for dragons out of caves, then entice those dragons into your sanctuary, all in the effort of building an engine by chaining together powerful abilities, and turning those abilities into victory points.
In classic Stonemaier Games fashion, Wyrmspan is a beautiful product. The art is lush and fanciful, the eggs are speckled, the components have a premium finish, it’s a wonderful production to hold in your hands. Gameplay wise, Wyrmspan is much more complex than Wingspan, there’s a lot more interactions between the dragons and caves and the resources you hold that players need to be aware of. The potential to craft a runaway combo feels greater in this rendition.
Personally, I’d be much more willing to play Wyrmspan over its predecessor, but I’d also be much more reluctant to introduce newer players to Wyrmspan, at the very least without the Wingspan background. It’s a great ‘next step’ game, where it has some familiar mechanisms to ease the learning burden, but offers a more satisfying gameplay experience.
6 – Draft & Write Records
A prototype was provided by Inside Up Games
I was fortunate enough to receive a prototype copy of Draft & Write Records to review from Inside Up Games back in the fall of 2023, but it was officially released this year, so I’m including it on this list!
Draft & Write Records by Bruno Maciel, is as the title indicates, a draft and write game. Each player gets a large sheet of paper and every round, they’ll draft a card from their hand, cross off the appropriate resource from their sheet, and pass all of their unchosen hands to the next player. After each hand of cards has been picked down to nothing, there’s a short weekend, where players evaluate goals, and play continues in this fashion until someone triggers the end of the game.
In 2024, Draft & Write Records came to Board Game Arena, and I decided to hop into a couple friendly tournaments for it, which ended up putting another 10 games of it under my belt. Draft & Write Records is the perfect async game, as on your turn you just need to quickly assess your board state and the few cards passed to you, before making your choice. And the combo-tastic nature of the game is really satisfying when you manage to stretch a single action into 5 or 6 resources getting crossed off.
5 – Nucleum
While I haven’t reviewed Brass or Barrage on this site (yet), I’ve touched on how much I enjoy Brass: Birmingham as it sits at number 18 in my top 100 games of all time list. Nucleum by designers Simone Luciani and Dávid Turczi has players erect power plants, build links between urban buildings, and completing milestones. Each player has asymmetric technologies, and throughout the game the action tiles you’re using to take actions are spent to establish links, giving the game a really great feeling of tension.
If I’m being really honest, I suspect that when I look back at all the games on this list, Nucleum will have the most staying power. That said, I didn’t like it more than Brass, so I’d be more inclined to return to that game if my group is in the mood to play a heavy economic euro game. Not to diminish how great Nucleum is as a game, it’s really amazing! It just has some close parallels that evoke similar feelings to other games that I already love.
4 – Fromage
Coming in right at the end of the year on BGA, Fromage was a really enjoyable euro game that played fast and offered intresting decisions. With simultainous worker placement, and 4 different scoring areas to play in, I had a really good time exploring this french cheese game.
I enjoyed it so much, I felt compelled to give this one a full review, which you can read here!
3 – Kinfire Delve: Callous’ Lab & Scorn’s Stockade
All 3 Kinfire Delve games were provided by Incredible Dream for review purposes
Are these technically expansions? They can be mixed with the previous Kinfire Delve games, but each box is stand-alone. While the core gameplay is the same between all sets, each character and boss are wildly different. Mixing characters to address specific challenges for each boss is a real treat.
In 2024 I transitioned to being a stay at home parent, and solo gaming suddenly became much more of a reality for me as my child napped during the day. My time with Kinfire Delve was a delight, and I’m very much looking forward to exploring the rest of the Kinfire universe, whenever that opportunity arises.
Kinfire Delve: Vainglory’s Grotto
Kinfire Delve: Scorn’s Stockade
2 – Lord of the Rings: Duel for Middle Earth
Another game that got the full review treatment, The Lord of the Rings: Duel for Middle-Earth is a reworking of the 7 Wonders Duel system. Folding in both the Pantheon and Agora expansions, then streamlining the whole package down into something that is just a joy to play, LotR:DfME is an achievement of game design.
That said, when all is said and done, I find more fun in the 7 Wonders Duel experience, especially with the Pantheon expansion. I don’t mind the dozens of little calculations you need to do every time you want to buy a resource that you don’t have, and the engine building powers of the yellow cards is something I dearly missed in this new edition.
1 – Bullet: Paw & Palette
How dare an expansion take up the number 1 slot? Well, the answer is easy. Bullet remains one of my favourite games, especially the solo mode, and getting 8 new characters and bosses was a highlight of my board gaming year. Bullet: Paw focuses on animals, while Bullet: Palette puts the emphasis on heroines with an art pursuasion. I have indepth looks at both of those expansions, linked above, so if you want to read about those games specifically, please check out those reviews.
As for the new year, Bullet Cubed is coming to Gamefound with two more expansions, which means Level 99 Games is going to continue to get more of my money. Dang, I hate it when companies give me what I want!
And those are my top 2024 games. Soon I’ll have a couple more lists out, my top 10 best new to me games that aren’t from 2024, and my top 10 BGA games from last year. Let me know if you’ve played any of the games on this list, and what your favourite games of the last year are! See you again soon!
