Board Game News

Each year, the Academy of Adventure Gaming Arts and Design (AAGAD) presents the Origins Awards recognizing the gaming industry’s top achievements and products released during the previous year. 2005’s nominee list included games from both large and small companies across the industry. Winners of the 32nd Annual Origins Awards have been announced and include the following:

Board Game of the Year

Parthenon: Rise of the Aegean - Immerse yourself in an exciting, competitive world filled with aggressive trading, perilous voyages, and the construction of grand monuments. Parthenon is a game of commerce for 3 to 6 players set in the islands of the Aegean Sea. The time is 600 B.C. and mainland Greece stands on the threshold of glory. The Aegean attempt to share in that glory and to thrive in an increasingly profitable (and dangerous!) world.

Gamer’s Choice Best Board Game of the Year

Shadows Over Camelot - A unique collaborative game featuring a malevolent twist! As the incarnation of the Knights of the Round Table, you join forces against the game itself in an attempt to protect Camelot. Your victory hinges on the successful completion of legendary Quests, such as the search for Excalibur, the Holy Grail, or Lancelot’s Armor; the tournament against the Black Knight; and numerous wars against the Saxons and Picts. But beware … all is not as it seems among these noble Knights. One of your number might yet turn out to be a traitor-in-waiting, biding his time while sowing havoc and destruction from the Shadows!

Read the entire list of award-winners in categories including Collectable Card Games, Traditional Card Game, Role-Playing Games, Miniatures Games, Historical Games, and many more.

In addition to this site, here are some other blogs that cover board gamers and the board game industry. Most of these blogs are fairly hard-core, covering German games and strategy games, rather than the traditional abstract and family board games we tend to favor here, but they’re all very well done, and well worth your time to explore.

• Best of Board Games - A collection of interesting links to various board game resources in the web: blogs, BGG threads, whatever.
• Boardgame News - Hey, that name sounds familiar! Good Resource.
• Chris Farrell’s Gaming Blog - Board game reviews and information.
• Gameblog - Mikko Saari’s blog on all things boardgaming.
• Gamer’s Mind - Thoughts on boardgames, boardgaming, and other goodness.
• inconsequential ruminations - A minimalist blog, with a pretentious title, about strategy board games.
• Pawnstar - The irrelevant ramblings of a gamer who works in his spare time.
• Rick’s Boardgame Blog - A blog about boardgames, board games, card games, their playing, and the people who play them.
• The Game Table - Ward Batty’s weekly blog about boardgames and non-standard card games.

Many of these were mentioned in the Board Game Internet Award Nominations from Gone Gaming, a darn good gaming blog in its own right. There is also a comprehensive listing of board game blog feeds available from About.com.