Gaming with Sidekicks “Best of 2019”

Another year of gaming has come to a near-end here as we wrap up 2019 and reflect on what it means to us. Here at Gaming with Sidekicks we are all thankful for all of you out there in the Board Game world who have come along for this ride with us. 2019 has been a great year of growth for us as we continue to share with those of you out there the “Games we like with the people we love.” We have attended the Cons, played the games and enjoyed every moment of them all!

Thank you to the publishers who have worked with us to share what we do and that have allowed us to review their games and share them with all of you. We have made an effort all year to continue to put our focus on the companies we love and working directly with them to share what good they are doing.

Thank you to the game designers who have put out some amazing titles this year. There is creativity, innovation and expression that has really shaped some amazing gaming experiences for all of us found in all of your games. I am continuously impressed by what all of you do and I look forward to seeing what the future brings!

Thank you to all of you who have followed us and look to us for our words. We here at Gaming with Sidekicks are gamers just like you and love sitting down to play games with you all or just having chances to talk to you about them when the moments arise. Thank you for coming alongside of us and let’s see where the next year leads us!

Finally thank you games. The board games that we like and sometimes even love are what brings us all together. So today we are going to present our newest award, The Gaming with Sidekicks “Top Shelf Award”. We will name our Top Shelf games for 2019 that we have had a chance to play. These are the “best of” for us this year and we want to share with you these games with you to encourage you to go out and try them also. So without further adieu, here are the top of the class for 2019!

(These top 20 games are presented in no particular order):

Barrage

This is a game of the year candidate for me. It’s so deep and tactical. One false move may look like it’ll cut you off at the knees, but can you recover and do the same to your opponent? The gameplay here is as amazing as any other I’ve played this year. Building dams, power plants and conduits, players have limited resources and money and will have difficult decisions to make for how to best create power as water flows from the mountains through the hills to the plains. The expansion has so much to offer in terms of replayability, and I’ve barely scratched the surface with it. This is an absolute hit in my book.-JT

City of the big shoulders

Solid worker placement but with an intro level 18xx style stock manipulation. That alone would be an incredible achievement, but it’s paired with great asymmetry across companies, especially when played with the expansion companies. Those expecting to find all the buttons and levers for stocks from their favorite 18xx are not likely to find them here, but the marriage of Euro worker placement and 18xx stocks has to start somewhere and in this case it starts with a solid, fun package.-JT

Wingspan

My most played game of 2019, Wingspan is everything I wanted in a game that I didn’t know I was looking for. Smooth gameplay, beautiful artwork and a new experience of interactions every time-Wingspan is one of the best games I have ever played. It has broken into the world of Ornithology, making bird-lovers gamers and gamers potential bird-lovers. I cannot say enough good things about this game, if you haven’t played it you need to get it to your table as soon as you can!-Isaac

It’s beautiful, simple, yet layered, easy to teach/learn, and has high replayability because of the shear value of bird cards and variable goals. I’m not sure how you can play this and not have a good time. -Stuart

Tapestry

This game came out of nowhere and ramped up very quickly when Stonemaier Games announced it. Once it hit the community, people went crazy to get a hold of it. I love that it is a Civ game that doesn’t care what you expect it to be-Tapestry is its own gaming experience and is new each time it hits my table. There are a few cards and interactions in the game that seem super strong but the highs and lows play out well over the long game. A tentpole moment and game for 2019, Tapestry is an experience to be had this year.-Isaac

This game is just fun! Having so many options and directions that you can go on a single turn is invigorating. I also enjoy that I can have a plan for a few turns but it can get completely blown up depending on what others are doing on their turn. The minis are gorgeous, the replayability is very high because of the variety of Civilization starting cards and the randomness of the Tapestry cards. I also enjoy that everyone playing can take a completely different path and still have a chance to win.-Stuart

Flotilla

For a unique gaming experience, Flotilla brings that and more to the table in 2019. There are some definite missteps with this game in the way the rulebook is written and the amount of corrections/clarifications that had to be made post-production, but that aside it is one of the more innovative games I have played in quite some time. There is deck building, tile placement, pick up and deliver, dice rolling, market purchases…the list just keeps going! This game really brought a sandbox open feel to it, and the ability to switch between Sinkside and Skyside completely changes your role and feels like a whole new experience.-Isaac

Pipeline

Potential game of the year candidate. Pipeline is as tight as economic game as I could want, while also being an incredibly rewarding experience to play.-JT

Pipeline felt like an upgrade to Power Grid in complexity and difficulty. The economics are so precise that a small miscalculation will send you spinning out quickly. High risk, high reward play will rise to the top here and I really enjoyed the challenge.-Isaac

Call to Adventure

I like to win games, but I’m beyond content with game night if I lose every game, but everyone had a great time. I have yet to play Call to Adventure with anyone who didn’t enjoy it. I can play with my peers where there’s more of a focus on the scoring aspect. Players will choose to complete quests simply to keep other players from getting a chance to add another piece to their set collection. I can also play this game with my children or casual gamers where there’s an emphasis on the story and character. In these situations, player will often think “what would my character do?” before choosing a quest. And then tallying up the final scores is just a formality. It’s a versatile game, regardless of the crowd, and scratches a creative itch that not many games do.-Randy

Power Rangers

This is one of my top games of the year or a few reasons. I’m a lifelong Power Rangers fan, and the game just stays so committed to the theme and offers up exceptional fanservice. Another is that it fits perfectly with my family right now. Playing competitive games with my kids can get old quickly. I like to play games that require strategy, but when my oldest opponent is 8 years old, it’s not exactly a level playing field. So, a fully cooperative game with a grand scope is perfect. I get to explain the strategy to my teammates as we play and help coach them along with their choices. Sometimes it is hard to let them make poor choices, but when we win/lose together, I don’t feel like I’m taking advantage of their bad decisions. For both gameplay and fanservice, Heroes of the Grid will be seeing the table in our home for a long time.-Randy

Shöbu

I have to give a shout-out to my man Bob over at One Board Family for introducing this game to men at Origins 2019. We played it one of the first evenings and I was hooked. This is the best 2-player abstract game I have played in quite some time. Onitama held this role in hobby gaming for a while but I think Shöbu takes the crown this year. It is so simple in design and gameplay but eloquent and challenging in every way as well. If you can only add one 2-player game this year Shöbu is definitely my choice for the best addition to your personal collection.-Isaac

Skulk Hollow

As far as two-player games go this one is the best asymmetrical game I’ve played. The tactical combat in this is so much fun whether you play as the Foxen or the Guardian characters. I love that there is a main board and the Guardian itself acts as another board. So innovative, fun and different enough each play. And the art is absolutely stellar-tbks is a can’t miss for sure.-Isaac

Gentes

I love me some Deluxified games off of Kickstarter from TMG, they have not disappointed me yet with any of their titles. Gentes was the newest in that line this year and continued to live up to my expectations. A Civilization game with tile/card drafting mechanics added a unique “timing” aspect that really made this game shine. I enjoyed the depth of this game and felt like it was a challenge every time we played, giving us a few different pathways to victory. Gentes may have hit early in the year but stayed constant throughout 2019 to be one of our Top Shelf picks.-Isaac

Tiny Towns

So many games scale to a large number but lose the “game” aspect. Tiny Towns provides a great gamer experience with young and old alike when has hit our table. The optimistic view of your town comes crashing down quickly as you build your small environment, but rest assured you will enjoy it every time!-Isaac

Cover Your Kingdom

Cover Your Kingdom builds on the mechanics and fun of Cover Your Assets and makes it even better. Every card has amazing and hilarious art on top of unique flavor text that is both full of hilarity and puns. The “take that” aspect of the game can cause riots in the household, but you can’t help but laugh at how it transpires. It’s easy to teach, tons of fun to play, and can travel with you easily. Wins all around!-Stuart

What can I say here that I haven’t said about all Grandpa Beck’s games? Easy entry level to play for both the gamer and the casual player, great gameplay and solid artwork and presentation- these are the expectations from anything with Grandpa’s smiling face on the cover. Cover Your Kingdom excels in pushing the take that notions of Cover Your Assets to 11 and successeds in “gamifying” the experience.-Isaac

Point Salad

This is the filler game of the year in my book. So quick and simple and yet it provides a legit game experience in a tight package. This is one of the games that makes me think “why couldn’t I come up with that!” Set collection and point scoring in a quick to learn and quick to play game makes this a definite long-term addition to my collection and a game bound to hit the table very often.-Isaac

Sorcerer City

A late addition to the lost as the Kickstarters started filling in, Sorcerer City is a tile laying game that is outside of the box in description. It’s set collection, hidden info, deck(tile) building-there are a lot of things going on here but it all adds up to a great time. The art is wonderful, the gameplay unique and the replayability is super strong.-Isaac

I love tile laying games. The first true board game my wife and I ever bought was Carcassonne, so it’s engrained in me. This game is a blast. It’s beautiful, has lots of replayability with the randomness of the tiles, monsters and influence rewards, and the timed element adds an extra layer of tension and excitement!-Stuart

On Mars

Vital Lacerda and Ian O’Toole have become synonymous with many “best of” lists over the last few years. On Mars is their latest masterpiece and one of the heaviest games I have ever played that pays off in many ways throughout the game. This economic and exploration game really digs in deep, giving you so many choices to make and really challenges you to think multiple steps ahead to achieve the best outcomes. If deep games are your thing, this is a can’t miss hit for the year and one I cannot recommend enough. The round mechanics of moving from the planet surface to space and back is so innovative as time passes on and presents another layer of depth and design that really shine. On Mars is a discovery you will want to make.-Isaac

Taverns of Tiefenthal

Dice drafting and deckbuilding combined with tableau upgrading and a couple decision trees thrown in for good measure. W W, the designer has been on an incredible room recently and this is another in that stretch. You almost have to play it to understand just how brilliant the design is, and how perfectly each module builds on the last. It’s a hit straight out of the box with everyone I’ve taught it to.-JT

Bosk

A neat take on area control with a beautiful theme in a package that will play quickly with anyone who’s played even once. Two very different rounds of scoring then it’s over. It’s beautiful on the table (what game from Floodgate isn’t?) and it begs to be played again right after you finish.-JT

Just One

Easily the best party game I played this year. My family, my wife’s family, coworkers, gamers, non-gamers, it didn’t matter with whom I played this year, they enjoyed it. An instant classic in my book. I don’t prefer party games, but I’ll gladly play the ones that are unanimous winners with everyone involved, and this fits the bill in a strong way.-JT

Great party game and an instant draw once people started playing this one at our table. Ease of learning plus ability to scale up to the group size easily makes this one of the best party style games out and one that is bound to have a strong place at my table.-Isaac

Funkoverse Strategy Game

I’m not going to lie here-I did not expect a lot of game here. I thought it was a good way to sell the Funko brand to a more causal gamer. I gotta confess-I was really wrong. This game is a super solid strategy combat game that is as innovative as it is familiar. The game has so many options of characters and abilities that you can smash together your favorites in ways you would only imagine possible.-Isaac