Look, I play a lot of games. In 2025, that included around 95 new games… well, new to me games. That’s lower than usual – it was approximately 160 in 2024, 145 in 2023, and 150 in 2022. I’m privileged and blessed to have two gamer sons as well as a number of small invitational events that give me exposure to new games – as well as the review writing I do here as a part of the OG site.

On the other hand, I did manage 966 plays of 329 different games… including 134 games of Memoir ’44 and 38 solo play sessions of Arydia: The Paths We Dare Tread. (Much thanks to Fraser, my Australian Memoir nemesis, and to BoardGameArena, the site that lets us keep playing though halfway around the world from each other.)

So, for the last fourteen years, I’ve intermittently published my Best New (to me!) Games list… and, when I missed a year or two, I added the missing lists to the most recent post.

• Best New (to me!) Games of 2011
• Best New (to me!) Games of 2013
• Best New (to me!) Games of 2016
  • Includes lists from 2014 and 2015
• Best New (to me!) Games of 2019
  • Includes lists from 2017 and 2018
• Best New (to me!) Games of 2020
• Best New (to me!) Games of 2021
• Best New (to me!) Games of 2022
• Best New (to me!) Games of 2023
• Best New (to me!) Games of 2024

However, before we get properly started with my list for 2025, we need to cover a few games that were excluded from the top ten list for various reasons but still warrant attention being paid to them.

Where appropriate, I’ve linked to OG reviews of the games I mention… please, take the opportunity to enjoy more of this wonderful site we call home.

Expansions of Note

Sometimes, I’ve put expansions under #10 on the list as a group… but it really makes more sense to break them out into their own category.

Dead Reckoning: Port of Call

In 2024, I recognized a Saga expansion for John D. Clair’s splendid card-building pirate game… and in 2025, I’ll give props to a non-Saga expansion that works just fine without any of the Saga stuff in the game. Port of Call adds asymmetric ships, new ocean boards, variable achievement goals, and alternate sailor decks. While I haven’t played with the new sailors (yet!), the rest of the box is top-notch and gives Dead Reckoning fans lots of interesting options.

Dice Realms: Trade

The addition of orange Trade dice, new dice paths, and a properly developed co-op/solo mode for Tom Lehmann’s dice-crafting game is a gift for those of us who love the game. It will not – sadly – change your mind if you didn’t enjoy Dice Realms to begin with.

Flamme Rouge: Grand Tour

I loved this one enough to write an entire OG article/review of it (and the other Flamme Rouge expansions). You can finally do your own version of the Tour de France!

Hamlet: By the Lake

I don’t think Hamlet works all that well with a full complement of players… but as a solo or two player game, it’s quite enjoyable. And By the Lake fills in the map (with lakes/ponds!) and speeds up the game with addition of boats.

Heroscape: Lots of Stuff!

I’ve written a good bit about new Heroscape stuff over the last year – suffice it to say that the team at Renegade Game Studios has picked up the ‘Scape torch and is running with it. Well done, y’all!

In the Footsteps of Darwin: Correspondence

I like In the Footsteps of Darwin a lot – it’s a non-gamer friendly set collection game with gorgeous production. The Correspondence expansion fixes the one problem I had with the design: the banality of the “Charles Darwin as Hot Potato” mechanic (whoever has Darwin at the end gets a few points) by replacing it with correspondence and classification tokens – both which add more interesting scoring opportunities.

Additionally, it does all that without making the game more difficult to teach or play. I’ve taught the game to gamers and non-gamers with the expansion in and it didn’t cause a bit of fuss.

Lost Ruins of Arnak: Twisted Paths/Adventure Box

The artwork for Lost Ruins of Arnak has always been stellar – but the two new maps are particularly beautiful. The increased size gives more opportunity for details that help bring the world of Arnak to life.

Both maps – Spider Temple and Owl Temple – are best for experienced players. They both add more complicated research tracks and other game elements that push the difficulty level up a notch. Both research tracks also incorporate the temple tile buying mechanic originally found on the new research tracks in the Expedition Leaders expansion. The extra elements are clever and won’t be particularly difficult to teach experienced players – but I’d hesitate to drag a newbie onto one of these maps.

As a solo player, I’ll also note that each of the maps from the Twisted Paths expansion have a specific solo tile that is mixed to the action stack each round. That allows the solo AI to interact with the board elements particular to that map.

I haven’t had a chance to play with the Rival Objectives solo module yet – that’s next on my list. (As is another run at The Missing Expedition solo campaign.)

Finally, the Adventure Box not only offers an excellent storage system for those of us who are Arnak completionists… but also fills out some missing solo pieces that were only available as print-n-play items prior to this.

Postmark Games: Waypoints & 52 Adventures

Both Waypoints and 52 Realms: Adventures received new maps and content this year free of charge to owners – one of the many reasons that the print & play games from Matthew and Rory are pretty much automatic purchases for me.

Waypoints is a roll’n’write that uses a topographic map and freeform line drawing; 52 Realms: Adventures is a solo dungeon crawl powered by a standard deck of playing cards. Both are well worth your money and time.

Zoo Tycoon: New Shores

Besides a wealth of new animal species (made even larger by the additional animals add-on Treecer Games created), the New Shores expansion adds a new Animal Exchange board that allows for a mixture of species between the base game and expansion. (That includes updated exchange sheets, new national park tokens, and the like.) With those new animal types comes new biomes – including water.

The expansion also introduces some new mechanics as well – including the cost of water enclosures, the addition of reptile houses, animals that produce eggs as offspring, and – most importantly – the Vivarium. (For those of us here in the U.S., think “reptile house” – or, as my wife used to call it when we took the boys to the zoo, the “creepy-crawly place”.)

The Vivarium is an extra snake draft that occurs at the end of Autumn – and animals you place there can gain you popularity as you collect sets as well as other benefits. (New creepy-crawly animals are revealed at the end of Autumn, so you have time to plan for what you’ll pay for… or if you’ll simply ignore it for a year or two.)

The expansion rules are not particularly more complicated, though there are new elements that I’m still learning. I wish they’d put a tile in the box to cover the “order of play” section of the scoreboard with an expanded order of play – but the changes are relatively minor, so I may just be spoiled by other games.

New Editions

A couple of games had new revised editions in 2025 that aren’t really “new to me” – but I’d feel bad if I didn’t give a shout out to them.

• Barbecubes – by the same folks who brought you Tinderblox, only with a much cuter theme and extra points for the excellent use of the game tin to create the barbecue.
• Star Wars: Battle for Hoth – Yes, it’s Memoir ’44 on the planet Hoth (from “The Empire Strikes Back”)… but with some nice twists that have won over some Command & Colors doubters.

Honorable Mentions

Here are eleven more “new to me” games that deserve a mention – but that didn’t quite make the top ten cut. They are in alphabetical order.

• Biddle – This is a smarter (and less-blingy) take on Last Chance/Yahtzee Deluxe Poker. Players bid “name that tune” style to attempt to roll a dice combination on six dice. Laughter and fun ensues. (Biddle’s bidding system is substantially better than Last Chance.)
• Bohemians – The artwork is gorgeous… but more importantly, this is a highly thematic deck-builder with some gamer-y elements that all worked together. The “day planning” portion of the game and the ability to spend banked points to negate bad cards or draw more cards are both interesting mechanics. And, to my amazement, the Bohemians rulebook from Portal is actually pretty easy to learn from.
• Dewan – My initial elevator pitch description of Dewan was “civ-building meets Ticket to Ride”… but with some more time to think about it, it’s actually closer to Web of Power/Kardinal & Konig with the combination of drafting cards and placing settlements on the map. This 40 minute game comes with five different scenarios and has very nice production… and falls solidly in the well-done super-filler category.
• Fair Enough – Let’s be clear – this is a game designed by Friedemann Friese to be the official Essen fair game, so it’s not the second coming of Power Grid. It’s a light 30 minute drafting game melded onto a push-your-luck showdown that mimics the process of making wishlists prior to Essen and then braving the halls and booths with limited time to get it back to your hotel room. There are a lot of Easter eggs for long-time gamers in the card art and both groups I taught the game to had a lot of fun with it. I do wonder if the best audience for Fair Enough is as a game night closer with folks who understand what game conventions are like.
• Luthier – With only one unfinished play under my belt, it seems unfair to put Luthier in my top ten… but I like what the game is doing and love the production quality. Granted, it’s going to run long – especially with any AP players at the table – but that’s a price I’m willing to pay for a game that carries the theme this nicely.
• Nature – I had mixed feelings about the original version of this game (Evolution)… the game worked but sometimes felt capricious and mean. The completely re-developed Nature still has some bite to it – but the redesign actually works really well and is fun/quick to play. The modules (expansions) are easy to add and combine – and offer some interesting twists on the base system.
• Sanctuary – I’ll be the first to acknowledge that this is streamlined Ark Nova… and being an Ark Nova fan, I knew I was likely to enjoy this before I got it to the table. Even with that, I was impressed at how well-done this version was. The solo game of Sanctuary was great (incredibly simple to manage the system) and my two & three player games have been enjoyable as well. I do think that downtime could be an issue at the higher player counts (4 and 5) and would likely suggest something else with that many folks.
• Sniper Elite: The Board Game – As a multi-player “one vs many” game, Sniper Elite is a bit like playing Scotland Yard if Mr. X had a gun and could shoot the people chasing him. It’s a lot of nail-biting fun, for both the Allied sniper/spy and the Axis soldiers trying to hunt him down. The solo mode works as a puzzle but doesn’t capture the high-stress feel of the multi-player game.
• Tipperary – I’m not sure how I missed this really nifty drafting/tile-laying game… but I really enjoyed my play of it and look forward to playing it again. (And not just so I can sing “It’s a long way… to Tipperary…”)
• Unstoppable – This is my most recent “solo-only” game purchase… and I’m happy that I plunked down some of my hard-earned cash to put it in my collection. Unstoppable has a rather extensive backstory that boils down to “bulk up your team to keep plinking away at the big bad” – but you do so by deck-building AND card-crafting. More importantly, the cards you put in your deck also are creating new adversaries for you to deal with as the game progresses. My first game went smoothly – and I eked out a win. The next four games showed how vicious the system can be: one was “close but no cigar” while the other three were “hasta la vista, baby”.

Best New (to me!) Games of 2025

While I’ve put the following games in a countdown order, there’s a lot of flexibility in the ratings… with the right crew of people, I’d be happy to play any of them.

#10: Natera: New Beginning

Natera scrapes in at #10 based on one absolutely wonderful play and a deep admiration for the production quality/love poured into this design. Thematically – in what should be no surprise to us here in 2025-26, humans did something stupid and manage to kill themselves off… leaving behind animals getting smarter & smarter due to the “something stupid”. Which means that each of the players is part of an animal group (I played the Mole Band) trying to gain dominance by utilizing the stuff humans left behind. Natera is not that dark in its theme – it’s closer to Everdell than to Watership Down. It does remind me of Everdell in some ways – worker placement with resource management and tableau building – but with some interesting twists and its own rhythm. I’m actually looking for a personal copy of this now. (I didn’t play the solo system, but it looks easy to manage and enjoy.)

#9: World Wonders

I am a sucker for well-made components… which is different, by the way, than wanting every game to have plastic miniatures. (Example: while I enjoy Monumental, the thought of trying to read the board with scads of plastic minis covering each space gives me hives.) World Wonders has a plethora of very classy wooden structures of various ancient wonders – and while they play a key role in the game, they are not the only reason to enjoy this drafting/tile-laying super-filler.

The solo mode for the game uses a card deck to “act” like a second player – drafting pieces from the lineup to both score resources and keep you from getting them. It’s not a particularly sophisticated solo design – but it has an annoying tendency to screw up your plans, which is exactly what you want a solo bot to do. It’s also very easy to administer.

I have some small gripes: I wish there was a better storage system for the game (I ended up 3D-printing one); I think some of the icons used on the cards (particularly in the Mundo expansion) are confusing until you look up the text in the rules; and I don’t understand how a five player game only comes with three player aids.

But overall, I’ve enjoyed this immensely both as a two-player & solo game. (And it looks great once you’ve got your city built.)

#8: EGO

I’ve always liked Reiner Knizia’s Beowulf: The Legend… but it has been a polarizing game. Some folks love the push-your-luck nature of the challenges, while others find it distasteful and frustrating.

EGO is the re-imagining of Beowulf… in which he modifies the push-your-luck element, adds additional variety to the game system, and does away with the weirdly L-shaped board. Most importantly, the push-your-luck mechanism now rewards players who have 100% success and lets players who utterly fail off the hook – only punishing players who have partial success. This leads to some different decisions as you manage the anger of the alien races you’re negotiating with… all to the good.

In general, I like the new art style, though it does introduce some UI issues (the weird 1, 2, and 3 coin icons, for example) and the boards are awfully busy. But the game plays slightly quicker with additional variety to keep players from locking into a particular bidding pattern – what’s not to love?

We haven’t written up EGO yet here on the OG… but Dan Thurot (aka Space-Biff) has done a very helpful review that I highly recommend.

#7: Magical Athlete

I was NOT a fan of the original edition of Magical Athlete. After a couple of excruciating plays, I gave it a “4” on BGG and was happy not to see it hit the table again for nearly 20 years. I actually wrote a fellow OG writer at one point: “I hated Magical Athlete. Really. Wanted to gnaw off my own leg to stop playing it. High level of whimsy coupled with SLOW play. Grrrr. I like whimsy, if the game rips right along. This didn’t.”

So it was with much trepidation that I approached the new re-developed/re-imagined version of Magical Athlete… based mostly on the good track record of CMYK with getting the tone/presentation of Hot Streak right.

Three games later, my mind is changed… at least about the new version. Once again, the production helps (example: the Huge Baby piece literally takes up the entire space), the art style has a weird retro aesthetic with some Crumb/Bakshi vibes, and the interactions between character powers are pretty well spelled out in the rulebook. (We had one issue – but we just house-ruled it and went on.)

It’s not a serious game – do not mistake it for any of the other games on this list. But with the right crowd, it delivers whimsy at a cracking pace.

#6: Vantage

I struggled with where to place Vantage on this list. I think it’s a brilliant piece of game design that manages to capture the scope of games like The 7th Continent without becoming a time sink of epic proportions. Both games I played of it this year were a lot of fun and it was clear that we were only scratching the surface of the world Jamey Stegmaier had created. I was particularly impressed with the dice pool mechanism that allowed players to help each other.

At the same time, the last 20-30 minutes of each game (one 2 player to an epic win, one 3 player to a goal win) fell a little flat. It’s like the game doesn’t quite stick the landing – but the 2 hours or so to get that “flat” point was a wonderful adventure.

Which leaves me still putting it on my top ten list. I’d encourage you to play (though not with a full table – whoa, downtime city!) the game and explore the vast world stuffed into this box.

#5: Tales of the Arthurian Knights

One of my highlight gaming experiences of 2022 was playing the prototype of Tales of the Arthurian Knights with designer, Andrew Parks. It took three more years for me to get an actual published copy (thanks to my sons!) and play this game again.

The wait was not in vain –  Andrew took the original bones of Eric Goldberg’s Tales of the Arabian Nights game (first published in 1985) and created a richer and more coherent game experience by combining his deep love for Arthurian legend with clever game design improvements. It’s still a “choose your own adventure” game – but one that offers more control to the players and more depth to the storytelling.

Sadly, I can’t recommend this as a solo game. Mechanically, the solo system works… but part of the charm of the game is telling your stories together and that’s absent when you’re alone.

#4: Ticket to Ride Legacy: Legends of the West

My sons and I played Ticket to Ride Legacy over the Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks… all twelve games. The combination of the strong underlying game (Ticket to Ride) plus a variety of clever side “quests” made for a really enjoyable legacy experience. I’d highly recommend this to fans of Ticket to Ride.

Some folks have noted that the later games feel too long – with three players, that wasn’t a problem for us. (The final two games took about an hour each.) And the eleventh game was a fantastic nail-biter, with Collin (my younger son) and I locked in a battle to get huge tickets finished to the northeastern part of the board… and Braeden (my older son) claiming routes in the northeast just to mess with us!

#3: Endeavor: Deep Sea

The top three games on my list share four elements in common:

• integration between game mechanics and theme
• top-notch user interface (UI), iconography, and graphic design
• well-thought-out storage systems that make setup and play easier
• great game design

My copy of the deluxe edition FINALLY arrived just before Thanksgiving. (Braeden & I had played it at Gulf Games this summer and I promptly came home and ordered a copy from Game Steward. BTW, a unsolicited plug for Game Steward’s customer service – they dealt with my questions and concerns quickly and kindly as the waiting dragged on.)

The production of Endeavor is top-notch, the puzzles inherent in the game are interesting, and I like the rhythm of how the game plays out… with two or three players or as a solo game. As I dig deeper into the included scenarios, there are a number of clever twists on the system just by changing the Impact chart and the scoring goals.

The real measure of how much I like Endeavor – it took me eight games to finally beat an opponent (yes, the solo system or a real live human). And I still enjoyed each and every game.

#2: Galactic Cruise

Galactic Cruise isn’t a huge step forward in gaming innovation – it’s a worker placement game with a variety of ways to score in-game and end game points. But the design accomplishes that with such style and thematic integration that I was instantly won over. 

Your workers are placed on the board to enable you to do various tasks – though the cost for using the same spot as another player is giving the other player a bonus rather than taking something away from you. Additionally, you can use your developments to create connections to other worker placement spaces and use those to take actions (even if you’re not physically on the space).

The solo mode is – despite multiple pages of rules – actually pretty easy to administer. The automa works much like World Wonders or Lost Ruins of Arnak or GWT: New Zealand – flip a card from the solo deck and do what it says. (No, it’s not quite that simple – some of the actions are a bit tricky – but it doesn’t require extensive lookup tables or protocols.)

Interestingly, Galactic Cruise seems to slip past the defenses of folks who “don’t like long games” – I’ve had the experience multiple times of teaching someone who was surprised by their enjoyment of the game. For me, the combination of great game design, thematic fidelity, and impeccable UI/graphics makes for an excellent gaming experience.

#1: Arydia: The Paths We Dare Tread

I predicted back in March that Arydia would be my #1 game of 2025… I was not wrong. As good as the rest of the list is, I spent over 60 hours immersed in the world of Arydia this year. Cody Miller and
Ira Fay managed to capture all of the surprise and adventure of a really great role-playing campaign in a tabletop board game – and to do so with intelligent game systems that make it easy to play. (The combat system is really good, y’all – it’s detailed without overwhelming the narrative sweep of the game.)

I’ve played all but one session as a solo game – and the game doesn’t just work, it sings. I’m not sure it’s possible to exaggerate how much fun I’ve had with Arydia… and how much I look forward to putting it on the shelf to wait a couple of years so I can go through it again with different characters!

Five & Dime

I got curious – how many of my top new-to-me games were in my Five & Dime lists for 2025?

Quarters

• Arydia: The Paths We Dare Tread 38

Dimes

• Ticket to Ride Legacy: Legends of the West 12

Nickels

• Endeavor: Deep Sea 9
• Galactic Cruise 9
• World Wonders 7
• Tales of the Arthurian Knights 6

So… six out of ten. That’s a decent batting average. (And, for reference, one better than in 2023 or 2024.)

Looking Ahead

There are a number of games on my radar for this list in 2026… most of which were on my “Looking Ahead” list for last year: Forsaken, Revenant, Race for the Galaxy: Xeno Counterstrike, and Dungeon Alliance: Paragons. (Here’s hoping all of these will finally see the light of day!)

I will add some other games to this list: my own copy of The Game Makers (which I’ve enjoyed playing in prototype form), Battle Monsters, and expansions for Endeavor: Deep Sea, Return to Dark Tower, Galactic Cruise, Distilled, and Tenpenny Parks.

In the meantime, let’s play some games!

I received review copies of the new Heroscape sets and a discounted review copy of Galactic Cruise. The rest of the games & expansions on the list were purchased by me, belong to one of my two sons, or were played with copies owned by other OG writers.

Collage picture at beginning of the post…
Top row: Galactic Cruise, Dewan, Tales of the Arthurian Knights
Middle row: Lost Ruins of Arnak: Twisted Paths, Arydia: The Paths We Dare Tread, Flamme Rouge: Grand Tour
Bottom row: Hamlet: By The Lake, Natera: The Beginning, World Wonders