Gen Con 2022: Polygon’s best board games are also the most chaotic

Gen Con 2022 felt like coming home for me. After nearly two decades attending board gaming’s Super Bowl, I’ve developed some very close friends that I enjoy seeing every year. It was a long time ago that these friendships remained unrenewed for two years. This year, after the vendor floor closed, we weren’t interested in playing the latest Euro-style game, or a campaign in a box, or a big, sprawling Ameritrash strategy game. It was just a fun lark. The variety of available games perfectly met our requirements.

Actually, Gen Con was filled with the most lighthearted, frivolous games you can imagine. But more than anything, the best games this year were chaotic — including the title that might just be my own personal game of the show.

Photo: Charlie Hall/Polygon

Photo: Charlie Hall/Polygon

Psychic Pizza Delivery Goes to Ghost Town

Psychic Pizza Delivery Goes to Ghost Town This hidden-environment board game is for 3 to 5 players. Notice that I didn’t say hidden movement — like say Run for your life, Nuns, Last Friday, Whitechapel, LettersOr Spec Ops. Every player receives a large, laminated grid as well as a dry erase marker. You must find and deliver a Pizza to Ghost Town. How many pizzas does each household want? You won’t know until you’ve found a pizza, and then used your psychic powers to divine where it belongs. The concept is just as batshit as the name — especially when you accidentally stumble onto a teleport space and have to start making your ZorkYou can do it again and again, just like when you did mapmaking.

Buy it Psychic Pizza Delivery Goes to Ghost TownBoard Game Tables Dot Com is $39.00 direct from the publisher

Here’s a bit on the rest of the most chaotic new titles, presented in alphabetical order.

Photo: Charlie Hall/Polygon

Boop

The latest from Smirk & Laughter Games, Boop This Scott Brady designed small-box game is charming. Inside you’ll find a collection of wooden cat meeples and a plush comforter. Turn the inside of the box over, place the comforter on top, and proceed to boop your opponents in a match-three-meets-area-control fiasco.

BoopIt will soon be made available.

Photo: Charlie Hall/Polygon

Cat in the Box

Cat in the Box is a trick-taking card game — like Hearts, Spades, EuchreAnd Pinochle. Based on which card is the most powerful in each suit, players compete for sets of cards. All of the cards in this game are black. Players call out the suit that they are playing, then mark down the card they’ve played on a double-layer board with a unique token. If for whatever reason you break the logic of the board that you’re creating — by being unable to play a color or number of a card that’s missing, for instance — you create a paradox and all of the points you’ve scored so far turn negative. It’s an elaborate game of screw-your-neighbor, but also surprisingly fast and light.

Cat in the BoxAvailable now from the publisher at $29.95

Floodgate Games – Photo

Kites

A punchboard is what I first throw away when opening a boardgame. Second is the sandtimer, if it exists. The stress of that thing has contributed absolutely no fun to any game that I’ve ever played — except Kites. The timers are all different. One is at 30 seconds and another one at about a minute. Players take turns playing cards that correspond to the timers, cooperatively trying to keep all these “kites” in the air before their sand runs out. Again, absolute chaos — but also a great way to warm people up at the beginning of a long night of board gaming.

You can order in advance KitesNow only $20

All set to make a bet

I was lucky enough to get a demo of AEG’s All set to make a betRuel Gaviola was the one who designed it and also did voiceover work on the companion app. He described it as “a party game for board gamers,” which makes perfect sense. It takes the best of horse racing, roulette and other games, then mixes them together in a game that is real time. Finally, it gives you additional winning conditions with the addition of playing cards. It allows family members that enjoy playing at the casino to compete with players who are more familiar with trifecta and other math concepts. Get a Ticket for a Ride.

All set to make a betThe price will be $39.99. It is anticipated that it will become available later in 2014.

Photo: Charlie Hall/Polygon

Reality Shift

Academy Games are well-known for creating historical and strategic simulations. I am happy to report that Gunter Eickert’s Stellaris: Infinite LegacyThis is going well. The real star for me though was Reality ShiftThe design is clearly inspired by lightcycle racing. Tron. It’s just that this time around the the track moves, with cubes that rotate and pivot along their axes. You’ve not lived until you’ve taken turn four and brought it crashing down on the back straightaway, derezzing your opponent and sending them back to the starting line. There’s a deluxe edition, as well as optional rules to go full Mario Kart with shells, bananas, and more.

Reality Shift The deluxe set was $65, and it was on sale only this year at Gen Con. You will soon be able to purchase it.