A board game shelfie is a beautiful thing. I love to see other people’s shelves — what games they’ve decided to own and how they’ve decided to organize those games. With my board game collection just recently reaching 500 games (with the purchase of Psychic Pizza Deliverers Go to the Ghost Town), I thought it was a good time to see how the collection has evolved over the past 20 years.

I started collecting in the late 1990s with the purchase of Settlers of Catan, followed by Lowenherz and Bohnanza, but my collection really began to grow in 2003 with the discovery of Carcassonne. The earliest photos that I can find though are from 2006 when the collection appears to have reached 50 games!

The photo on the left is from early 2006 and the photo on the right is from late 2006. The first thing that jumped out at me is that thankfully Age of Steam came out of that shrink wrap, and according to BoardGameGeek, I was able to play Age of Steam 8 times during 2006. I also vaguely recall uploading a bunch of mediocre photos of the game to BGG in 2006 (like this one) to earn that precious GeekGold to get an avatar of my spirit animal Opus.

Other meaningful games that arrived in 2006 were El Grande and Goa. Both had been out of print for a while, and both were games that I remember pre-ordering from Thought Hammer in late 2005, but having to wait until mid-2006 for the belated reprints to arrive. I was thrilled to finally get my hands on El Grande and Goa, and remarkably they have both stood the test of time incredibly well to this day. That being said, I can see at least 11 games (about 20% of the collection) that I’ve since sold or traded. Having sold or traded 252 games over the years, I’ve tried to be fairly open to getting rid of games — with the main test being: if someone visits and suggests playing a game on my shelf and I don’t like the suggestion then that is a good indicator that it’s time to sell the game. This also led to my A Penny Saved article in 2008 about games that I personally didn’t think were worth owning (many of which you’ll actual spot in the photo below).

The next year I moved into a new apartment, and I was able to buy two bookshelves to make room for more games (and some books). There’s lots of additions here that I ultimately sold, such as Gheos, Mammoth Hunters, Fifth Avenue, Taj Mahal, and Thurn & Taxis. Fortunately, while I originally wanted to collect the Alea games, I was eventually able to break myself of that habit or desire. And while I know that Taj Mahal is an all-time favorite of many, the game just did not click for me whatsoever even after trying it 8 times, so I was glad to sell it after a couple years.

I also spot some games in there that have gone on to be all-time favorites, including the oft-overlooked Kreta and In the Shadow of the Emperor — two of the best area control games of all-time. The eBay Electronic Talking Auction Game also makes an appearance, which happens to be an incredibly well-designed strategy auction game! I’m happy to see Nexus Ops join the collection, which has gone on to be one of my absolute favorite team games, as described in It Takes Two from 2009.

At the end of 2009, I moved from New York City to Virginia, which meant (among other things of course) having a lot more space for board games. So obviously I added a third bookcase and way too many new board game purchase!

There are so many games on these shelves that I no longer own. Just in the leftmost shelf, I’m seeing Quo Vadis, Elk Fest, Bridges of Shangri-La, Blue Moon City, Atlantic Star, Cuba, Dominion, Terra Nova, Perikles, Struggle of Empires, Midgard, Die Siedler von Nurnberg, Hamburgum, Tribune, Medici, Duel of Ages, RoboRally, and Chicago Express — all of which have since been sold or traded! It’s kind of fascinating to think about the excitement of getting those games, the exploration of trying them, and the eventual resignation to finding a new person to transfer the game to. I don’t think that any of those are bad games by any means, but many of them have analogues (often by the same designer) that I’d simply rather play instead. Instead of Perikles or Struggle of Empires, I’d rather play Wallace’s Byzantium or God’s Playground. Instead of Chicago Express, I’d much rather play Stephensons Rocket. Instead of Hamburgum or Medici, I’d prefer playing Gerdts’ Imperial or Knizia’s Ra. Looking at that 2009 photo is such a time capsule of gaming memories with friends and family!

The next shelfie that I could find was 4 years later after moving again. It seems that I usually take a shelfie when I move into a new place, and then forget to take another photo until moving again (as seen by the 7 year gap below to the next 2020 photo). This house had those beautiful built-in shelves, which made this naturally the game room. Although, I discovered Ikea Kallax shelves in 2020 (as seen below), and those actually work much better for fitting and storing games than these lovely built-ins.

The first thing that jumps out to me in this photo is Mord im Arosa, which I somehow lost or gave away or inexplicably don’t have. I need to get that game again. I always described it as calm Igloo Pop, which makes me smile. I also spot Mice & Mystics hiding in there, which brings me right back to a game group that I played through Mice & Mystics with 14 times in 2013 (and Descent: The Road to Legend as well). Both games that were a total blast because of the group of people, more than the game itself. Risk Legacy also jumps out at me, which I loved playing 30 times (with two sets) in 2012 and then again in 2014 with a different group. Lastly, the Alea collection continues to grow in this photo above before eventually being dismantled to only keep a few greats (like Princes of Florence, Notre Dame, and Louis XIV) rather than the set for the set’s sake.

The Kallax have arrived! What a perfect way to store board games. This is also when I started to organize my games not by box size / alphabetically, but instead by optimal player count. I’ve focused on (some might say obsessed over) optimal player count for many years, as described in my column on Player Count Cubes. Above you can see my favorite two-player games on the left, all the way to my favorite five-player games on the right. Obviously, there’s no such thing as a six-player game (with the rare exceptions of Dune, I’m the Boss, and TransAmerica).

The other new feature above is the appearance of Haba games. With my child being born in 2015, I had the joy of building a children’s board game collection, and writing about it in Raising a Game Geek. I spot Dragon’s Breath and Outfoxed there, which were definitely two of the biggest hits in my family!

There are some games here that you’ll remember from that earliest 2006 photo, like the incomparable Caylus, Tigris & Euphrates, Reef Encounter, and Through the Desert. What an incredible group of games, and ones that I loved in 2006, brought with me through so many moves, and still enjoy to this day! It’s funny think though that I hadn’t yet quite discovered most of my all-time favorites at that point, like War of the Ring, Netrunner, or Through the Ages that now have prominent places here.

This photo also shows the emergence of my use of board games as art, as described in my 2018 write-up The Art of the Game. My framed copy of Carcassonne doesn’t appear above, but it’s the first game that I bought a second copy of to use as artwork hanging on my wall (unless you count Crokinole), which you can see in The Art of the Game. This was followed by the beauty of Netrunner, Blokus, Dixit, and San Marco.

Looks like I did some re-arranging in 2021, got more children’s games, and went from 9 columns of grown-up games to 11 columns! Klask makes its first appearance here as a wonderful dexterity game. Looks like the Alea collection has finally been whittled down, with most of them now happily listed among my 252 previously owned games. I see that Oath has made its appearance, which I have then loved playing 32 times, with hopefully many more play of Oath to come, along with what has probably become my absolute favorite word game — Decrypto.

Finally, I moved one last time (hopefully) in 2023. The collection now needs a panorama photo to capture it. I’m still organizing the games mostly by optimal player count with the 3×4 kallax on the left storing my overflowing two-player games (obviously Ark Nova is only a two-player game). The 5×5 kallax inside the alcove stores my 3-4 player games, and the 2×4 kallax on the right stores my 5-player games, along with my cooperative games, dexterity games, and party games. The children’s games have mostly been moved upon request to the child’s room, although I kept Loopin’ Louie, Tier auf Tier, Cheeky Monkey, and Fireball Island here for ease of access.

Hopefully in 2025, I’ll get to add my first two designs to these shelves – First Monday in October from Fort Circle Games and Kangaroo Island from Rio Grande Games. It will be wild to see my own game on these shelves after 20+ years of collecting and enjoying these games! I even have a third design that I’m currently pitching to publishers, and which might just be my favorite design yet. I never thought I’d try to come up with my own game. I’m a game player and enthusiast first and foremost. Whether it’s a raucous game of Galaxy Trucker, a treacherous game of Imperial, a wild game of QE, a two-player battle of War of the Ring, or a thought-provoking game of Princes of Florence, I just adore these ingenious games beyond the measure of mere words. The cliche is not wrong, these photos are worth many thousands of words when it comes to capturing the joys of board gaming.