Daniel J Isom

It's been six and half years since I posted some version my top 10 all time board games and I figured it was time to do a new update. I have written a top 10 New to Me Games list each year since 2023, but it's been too long since an all time list was written. This is technically the third update from  the original list , which had  one update  in the standard Top 10 format. The  second update  followed the format I'm using for this post, which is 3 categories with 5 game each. The rules from previous lists still apply:      1) I must own the game      2) I must have played the game more than once I've played A LOT of games since the last version of this list, both in number of unique titles and total plays. This is all in thanks to starting a new in-person game group that meets publicly, the kids getting older and interested, and really embracing online play on Board Game Arena . My collection has also grown substantially...

  The shortest month of the year had quite a bit going on including Ben's first band concert, 2 snowstorms that granted me days off, a game day with the kids, and seeing Kansas in concert. All in all it was a pretty good month overall, but it felt almost too busy with drama practices and various doctor's appointments sprinkled on top of everything else each week. Sticking with the shortest month, this might be the shortest opening to a wrap-up post all year. Blah Blog Log Didn't find time to write anything outside of the monthly Wrap-Up post. January 2026 Wrap-Up  - A trip to Disney, a new Ryan Murphy show, and some board gaming. Bored  Board Games Between a full afternoon of games with the kids that had 9 total plays and a lot of BGA time, February had 26 games played a total of 144 times. Snow storms forced a cancellation of an in person meetup but I rescheduled it to yesterday, so March will end up having 3 in person meetups. I also have started selling some games from...

What a month to start off the year. I was still fighting off the flu or some sort of respiratory virus that kicked my ass during the first week. Through that I had two new employees start and I had a lot of grant related work to do. Thankfully I was back to 100% before we took the kids on their first trip to Disney World over the Martin Luther King Jr. weekend. I could probably write an entire post covering all the details but to sum it up:  We flew direct using Avelo Airlines out of Wilmington, which was the least painful airport experience ever. It also saved us a bunch of money both in airfare and parking. With the amazing help of my sister-in-law, we visited all four parks in 3 days. Ben and I did miss half of the day at Magic Kingdom because he was sick, but he bounced back for our last day at Animal Kingdom and Epcot. Rode a bunch of rides thanks to lighting lane passes. Grace and Ben are thrill ride seekers with Tron , Tower of Terror ,  Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic...

  December had spurts of slowing down a little and then lots all at once. We returned from Thanksgiving on the last day of November, so we went from that straight into our regular routine the next day. The first week was a little slow but then at least one person had something going on every single day during the second week. We got to watch Grace at her winter band concert and Ben at his winter chorus concert. The following week was much more chill. It started with some snow on Sunday that I used as the perfect day to do chili and cornbread for dinner. Then it was all about getting ready for the onslaught of people coming during Christmas week. That meant baking cookies, planning meals, and straightening up the house. It was nice having people in and out of the house, but everything just felt a bit off this year. If I had to guess why, it was due to scheduling changes so we didn't follow our traditional routine. As the month came to a close, I got sick with some non-flu, non-covid...

This is the third annual version of this list and I really looked forward to writing it as I reflected on the last year of board gaming. If you're interested, you can go back and check out the previous two lists for 2024 and 2023 . Without any intention, I set a new personal best for plays with an astounding 1877 plays across 134 games. Last year I had set a goal of 600 plays across 150 games and ended with 892 play across 162 games. So while I played a smaller number of unique games, largely impacted by my 100 Games 100 Plays Project , I still had many new to me games to pick from for this list. As with previous years, most (possibly all) of the games on this list were not published in 2025. After my most successful year of gaming, these were my favorite New to Me Games of 2025: #10 - Sheriff of Nottingham I'm not typically a fan of party games, but if bluffing is involved then there's a good chance I'll find some enjoyment in it. In Sheriff of Nottingham, players tak...