I watched a couple of TV shows about the history of certain board games, like Monopoly, Game of Life, Mouse Trap, Operation, etc. It was pretty interesting. Like the original Monopoly board was round! I have a hard time getting into most board games myself.
It's All a Game by Tristan Donovan
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 On 04/06/2023 at 09:36 AM by KnightDriver See More From This User » |
I read this book about the history of board games recently. It was very well done.
Each chapter covers a popular game and goes into great detail on its creation and cultural influence. The stories are really interesting. Notable among them was the story of Backgammon, whose up and down popularity within elite private clubs could easily be the subject of a film. Scrabble had a fascinating origin tied closely with the creation of the crossword puzzle. Inspiring was Ungame's attempt to bring people closer together instead of set them against each other. Insightful was the creation of Brain Benders, a study method for children that used board games to increase math skills. And Trivial Pursuit's grass roots beginnings, which was a common origin of many of these games.
The book's subtitle says "... from Monopoly to Settlers of Catan" but it goes back further than that. I made a list of the main games written about in this book in the order they appeared. There were many more mentioned in passing but these were the ones most described.
1. Senet
2. Royal Game of Ur
3. Mancala
4. Chess and Checkers
5. Backgammon
6. The Game of Life and Chutes and Ladders
7. Monopoly
8. Risk
9. Clue
10. Scrabble
11. Mouse Trap and Operation
12. Twister
13. Ungame
14. Go
15. Trivial Pursuit, Scrupples and Pictionary
16. Pandemic, Twillight Struggle, Labyrinth: War on Terror
17. Catan, Carcassonne, Ticket to Ride
Tristan Donovan also has a book on the history of video games called Replay: The History of Video Games I'd like to read next.
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