Awesome Board Games

This eensy-weensy version of the classic board game Battleship is small enough to carry around in your pocket. It comes with game boards for two players and more than 240 pegs and tiny ships for you to sink. They also make tiny versions of other board games, including Hungry Hungry Hippos, Jenga, and Operation.

The Bazaar is an upcoming free-to-play auto battler with a delightful board game-like interface. Pick from one of six heroes, each with a unique ability. Each round, you’ll shop for items or weapons to arm yourself. Then pick an NPC enemy to beat for gold and XP. Finally, you’ll go up against the loadout of another player who played that round.

Dead Cells was the gift that kept on giving. And now, with the release of its board game, you and up to three other players can enjoy the game’s infinite replayability in a new format. The roguelite board game lets you journey through the four original biomes with hundreds of weapons, mutations, and skills to unlock.

Chess rules allow players to promote a pawn to a queen or other piece when it reaches an opponent’s back row. Inspired by Polyfjord, Works By Design engineered a chess piece that transforms from a pawn to a queen in an instant. Each pawn is made from 3D-printed parts, a spring, and magnets that trigger its mechanism. DIY templates are for sale on Patreon.

We always enjoyed playing the game Connect 4. Maker AzureFilm3D shows off an awesome, 3D-printed variant of the classic game that uses twisted pieces of plastic instead of checkers and a matching rail system which makes the pieces twirl satisfyingly into place. Created by evets17, the Connect 4-Tex vortex model is available for download on MakerWorld.

A fun alternative to Jenga, Round Tower Tumbling Blocks give the classic rectangle stacking game a curvy twist. The bright box contains 54 colorful wooden blocks in two different shapes (rectangular and semi-circular) that build a circular tower. Take turns removing one block at a time — by color for added difficulty — until the tower topples.

Keep your board games and gaming accessories organized in these modular bags from Plei Design. The oversized Dragon’s Hoard backpack holds multiple game boxes. The Arcanist Case is ideal for card games and accessories. The Cache Cube is great for carrying a couple of your favorite games, and the Rogue Pouch is best for dice and other small game pieces.

Slay the Spire was made for short solo sessions. But if you have more time and want to conquer RNG with friends, check out its official board game. It has two maps, plus all four classes and their customizable decks. Strategize and pool your resources to overcome hordes of enemies and the roll of the dice. More on One Stop Co-op Shop’s review.

The War-Ganizer 3.0 from Custom Collectibles Co. lets you take your tabletop gaming gear on the road. The 3D-printed case comes with slide-out trays for organizing and carrying miniatures, cards, tokens, dice, and more. The case measures about 10.6″ w x 9.2″ h x 6.3″ d and includes your choice of four trays. Based on models licensed from 3 Five Design.

The latest geeky creation from 3D designer Colby, aka ForgeCore, is a chess board that you can quickly tidy up simply by leaving the pieces on the board and rolling them up into log form. Colby designed the pieces using scans of actual mushrooms. If you sign up for a paid membership, you can download the 3D files for this set and his other creations.

“Jumanji is a series of jungle emergencies! And we, sir, are not prepared for that!” Kristen Wiig returned to host Saturday Night Live for the fifth time this past weekend. One of the episode’s skits sees Wiig refuse to play board games because of what happened in the movie Jumanji. And yeah, Beverly, we’re talking about the true Jumanji. Jumanji Jumanji.

Here’s an unconventional way to generate random numbers for board games. This unique gaming accessory packs a complete polyhedral dice set onto a zinc alloy wand. Instead of rolling these dice, you spin them, and the number is indicated by a blue pointer. In addition to the six dice on the wand, its spinning base functions as a D20.

Forgecore’s playful take on Battleship replaces ships with picnic foods and torpedoes with ants. The 3D-printed prototype has tiny sandwiches, hot dogs, watermelon, and other eats, hundreds of ants, a tablecloth playfield, and a faux wicker picnic basket for its pieces. Sign up here if you’re interested in buying one. Hopefully, Hasbro won’t stand in the way.

Yarro Studios’ mechanical dice spinner is a modern spin on a vintage gadget. Push its button, and its flywheels go spinning. Let go, and two random numbers appear in its windows. The Dice-o-Matic is made from aluminum and comes in D20/D20, D10/D10, D12/D8, D6/D4, and D6/D6 with pips. There’s also a Zoltar Dice-o-Matic decision-maker.

Wyatt & Ashley’s GAMMN portable backgammon set packs the popular board game into a rugged case ready for all your adventures. Made from durable polystyrene, the slimline briefcase packs cork gaming surfaces and molded cutouts for storing checkers and dice. It’s small enough to fit in your backpack and has its own carrying strap.

Love colors and design? Hues and Cues is a great party game that challenges you to pinpoint a specific color based on one- or two-word clues from other players. The closer you get to guessing the exact color from the 480-hue grid, the more points you earn. It’s a fun, family-friendly game for 3 to 10 players.