Buy 100 Board Games for Christmas

Imagine if you could buy 100 new board games for your family this Christmas. Wouldn’t that be so exciting for your kids to see the huge stack of presents under the tree?

Ok – we’re not suggesting that you really spoil your kids in such a way. But let’s just imagine it for a moment.

Your first question might be – how much would that even cost? Let’s consider that the average family board game costs $30. Sure some will be $10 card games and others might be $70 elaborate board games. But we’ll estimate the average cost of the board games at $30. For 100 board games, that would be a total cost of $3,000. Wow.

Your next thought might be – “If I had $3,000 to spend on Christmas would I really spend it all on board games?” I don’t think you would. Neither would we. But we’re imagining here, so let’s keep going.

While we’re at it then, let’s pretend that we were just given the $3,000 from a kind stranger. And it was in the form of a gift card that we could only use at a game store. So now with $3,000 to spend at a board game store, what would you buy?

The first thing you could grab would be the 12 that we recommend in our Top 10 “Must-Have” Family Board Games article. But what about the other 88?

Well, you’re in luck. Every year since 2005, Tom Vasel (a board game industry icon) puts together his top 100 games list. That may sound like a lot, but when you consider he owns thousands of games, and every year hundreds of new board and card games also pass his way, getting down to a top 100 is a daunting task.

So for some great suggestions on those other 88 games to buy for Christmas, check out Tom’s list as well as his daughter’s top 100 list. He creates both a video series as well as publishing the list itself on The Dice Tower web site. The list is broken down 10 games at a time (5 of Tom’s picks and 5 of Melody’s). In each video they show the games and explain why they love them. The written list is also presented 10 games per page with the video segment at the bottom of the page. So go check it out.

We’ve also posted his introduction to his list here so you can get a taste of it.

Now if only that $3,000 could also cover all the wrapping paper that you’ll need to wrap your 100 family board games.