A board game is a type of tabletop game Alt URL that involves small objects () that are placed and moved in particular ways on a specially designed patterned game board, potentially including other components, e.g. dice. The earliest known uses of the term "board game" are between the 1840s and 1850s.
While game boards are a necessary and sufficient condition of this genre, card games that do not use a standard deck of cards, as well as games that use neither cards nor a game board, are often colloquially included, with some referring to this genre generally as "table and board games" or simply "tabletop games". Alt URL
Eras
Ancient era Board games have been played, traveled, and evolved in most cultures and societies throughout history. They have been discovered in several archaeological sites, and there are several contenders for the oldest game, depending on the exact requirements applied and the accuracy of dating.
Archaeological finds of game boards exist that date from as early as the Neolithic period, including, as of 2024, a total of 14 sites reporting 51 game boards, ranging from the early 7000s BC to the mid-6000s BC.
Some of the oldest discovered gaming pieces have been discovered in southwest Turkey, including a set of elaborate sculptured stones in sets of four, speculated to be designed for a chess-like game, which were created during the Bronze Age around 3000 BC.
Senet has been argued to be the oldest known board game in the world, with possible game board fragments () and undisputed pictorial representations ( – ) having been found in ancient Egyptian Predynastic and First Dynasty burials dating as far back as 3500 BC. However, while Senet was played for thousands of years, it fell out of fashion sometime after AD 400 during the Roman period; the rules were never written down, therefore they are not decisively known.
Similarly, Mehen, also from ancient Egypt, is one of the oldest games dated with reasonable confidence, at – , with some estimating it dates back to . The rules, scoring system, and game pieces, however, are also unknown or speculative.
The Royal Game of Ur is estimated to have originated around 2500 BC in ancient Mesopotamia, with specimens found in royal tombs.Alt URLAlt URL It has been claimed to be the oldest playable board game in the world, with well-defined game rules discovered written on a cuneiform tablet by a Babylonian astronomer in – .
Another game similar to the Royal Game of Ur was discovered in 1977 by the Italian Archaeological Mission in grave no. 731, a pseudo-catacomb grave at Shahr-i Sokhta, a UNESCO World Heritage archaeological site in Iran. This board game set, comprising 27 pieces and 4 different dice, dates to 2600 – 2400 BC. The set has been scientifically analyzed and a reconstruction has been proposed by researchers. It has similarly been claimed to be the oldest complete and playable board game ever discovered.
An example of a game with highly uncertain age is mancala, which includes a broad family of board games with a core design of two rows of small circular divots or bowls carved into a surface. It has had numerous estimations of its generic age due to the many variants that have been discovered in different locations across Africa, the Middle East, and southern Asia. These are dated across many different periods at different sites, from – (Roman Settlements); to – (Egypt); and even – (Jordan). The latter is based on divots carved out of limestone in a Neolithic dwelling dated to ± 240 BC, although this has been disputed.
Furthermore, when considering Neolithic period game board discoveries, caution has been given against considering these finds as representing the definitively earliest human game playing, as the absence of evidence of such games in earlier periods does not equate to evidence that no games were played.Alt URL
Golden era
The 1880s–1920s were a board game epoch known as the Golden Age, a term coined by American art historian Margaret Hofer, where the popularity of board games was boosted through mass production, making them cheaper and more readily available. The most popular of the board games sold during this period was Monopoly (1935), with 500 million games played as of 1999.
Renaissance era
In the late 1990s, companies began producing more new games to serve a growing worldwide market. The Settlers of Catan (1995) is often credited with popularising German-style board games outside of Europe and growing the hobbyist game market to a wider audience. The early 21st century saw the emergence of a new "Golden Age" for board games called the "Board Game Renaissance". This period of board games industry development, of which board games such as Carcassonne (2000) and Ticket to Ride (2004) were a major part, saw a shift away from the 20th-century domination by well-established standby Golden Era board games like Monopoly (1935) and Game of Life (1960).
Regional history
Europe
Board games have a long tradition in Europe. The oldest records of board gaming in Europe date back to Homer's Iliad (written in the 8th century BC), in which he mentions the Ancient Greek game of petteia. This game of petteia would later evolve into the Roman game of ludus latrunculorum.
+ British Empire Games Game title Release date Creator Description Ref A Tour Through the British Colonies and Foreign Possessions 1850 John Betts This board game was a race game that consisted of a board with 37 numbered pictures, each correlating to a British colony, arranged in four circular levels, numbered 1 (Heligoland, Germany) to 37 (London, England), three concentric ones and an inner fourth level of London ("Metropolis of the British Empire"). A teetotum was spun with a player's piece correspondingly moving ahead through the spaces of the game board, upon which a corresponding description to the space the player lands was read out aloud from an accompanying rule booklet by the presiding player (a player abstaining from directly playing the game), except when directed in the book. The descriptions included commentary about the various colonies and occasional game board movement directions to the player. There winner would be the player to reach London first. Alt URL A Voyage of Discovery, orThe Five Navigators 1836 William Spooner A race game where five players ('sailors') follow distinctly colored tracks, on a board decorated with islands, seas, and ships, with each player restricted to the path of their own color. The players followed the instructions printed in circles along the tracks, which contained sailor-themed dangers and advantages.
Americas The board game patolli originated in Mesoamerica and was played by a wide range of pre-Columbian cultures such as the Toltecs and the Aztecs.
Asia
Africa
In Africa and the Middle East, mancala is a popular board game archetype with many regional variations.
Luck, strategy, and diplomacy Some games, such as chess, depend completely on player skill, while many children's games, such as Candy Land (1949) and snakes and ladders require no decisions by the players and are decided purely by luck.
Many games require some level of both skill and luck. A player may be hampered by bad luck in backgammon, Monopoly, or Risk; but over many games, a skilled player will win more often. The elements of luck can also make for more excitement at times, and allow for more diverse and multifaceted strategies, as concepts such as expected value and risk management must be considered.
Luck may be introduced into a game by several methods. The use of dice of various sorts goes back to one of the earliest board games, the Royal Game of Ur. These can decide everything from how many steps a player moves their token, as in Monopoly, to how their forces fare in battle, as in Risk, or which resources a player gains, as in Catan (1995). Other games such as Sorry! (1934) use a deck of special cards that, when shuffled, create randomness. Scrabble (1948) creates a similar effect using randomly picked letters. Other games use spinners, timers of random length, or other sources of randomness. German-style board games are notable for often having fewer elements of luck than many North American board games. Luck may be reduced in favor of skill by introducing symmetry between players. For example, in a dice game such as Ludo (), by giving each player the choice of rolling the dice or using the previous player's roll.
Another important aspect of some games is diplomacy, that is, players making deals with one another. Negotiation generally features only in games with three or more players, cooperative games being the exception. An important facet of Catan, for example, is convincing players to trade with you rather than with opponents. In Risk, two or more players may team up against others. Easy diplomacy involves convincing other players that someone else is winning and should therefore be teamed up against. Advanced diplomacy (e.g., in the aptly named game Diplomacy from 1954) consists of making elaborate plans together, with the possibility of betrayal.
In perfect information games, such as chess, each player has complete information on the state of the game, but in other games, such as Tigris and Euphrates (1997) or Stratego (1946), some information is hidden from players. This makes finding the best move more difficult and may involve estimating probabilities by the opponents.
Software
Many board games are now available as video games. These are aptly termed digital board games, and their distinguishing characteristic compared to traditional board games is that they can now be played online against a computer or other players. Some websites (such as boardgamearena.com, yucata.de, etc.) allow play in real time and immediately show the opponents' moves, while others use email to notify the players after each move. The Internet and cheaper home printing have also influenced board games via print-and-play games that may be purchased and printed. Some games use external media such as audio cassettes or DVDs in accompaniment to the game.
There are also virtual tabletop programs that allow online players to play a variety of existing and new board games through tools needed to manipulate the game board, but do not necessarily enforce the game's rules, leaving this up to the players. There are generalized programs such as Vassal, Tabletop Simulator and Tabletopia that can be used to play any board or card game, while programs like Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds are more specialized for role-playing games. Some of these virtual tabletops have worked with the license holders to allow for use of their game's assets within the program; for example, Fantasy Grounds has licenses for both Dungeons & Dragons and Pathfinder materials, while Tabletop Simulator allows game publishers to provide paid downloadable content for their games. However, as these games offer the ability to add in the content through user modifications, there are also unlicensed uses of board game assets available through these programs.
Market
While the board gaming market is estimated to be smaller than that for video games, it has also experienced significant growth from the late 1990s. A 2012 article in The Guardian described board games as "making a comeback". Other expert sources suggest that board games never went away, and that board games have remained a popular leisure activity which has only grown over time. Another from 2014 gave an estimate that put the growth of the board game market at "between 25% and 40% annually" since 2010, and described the current time as the "golden era for board games". The rise in board game popularity has been attributed to quality improvement (more elegant mechanics, , artwork, and graphics) as well as increased availability thanks to sales through the Internet. Crowd-sourcing for board games is a large facet of the market, with $233 million raised on Kickstarter in 2020.