No one game is for everyone, but for every person, there’s a game out there that they will probably enjoy. (Odds are more than one, but I’m hedging my bets with terse generalizations.) Board games are incredibly diverse, as are the tastes of people who play them.
That’s what made Vlaada Chvatil’s Codenames such a big surprise—there’s a consensus, and a positive one at that. There were a ton of great games released in 2015, but if you ask anyone what the best party game was, or filler game, or word game—or just about any category that can reasonably describe this game—people will say Codenames is one of the best in class. Not only is it the top-rated party game as determined by the users of BoardGameGeek, but it’s the nineteenth best game period.
So, now that I managed to play a game, careful to manage my expectations, I can confidently say—I get it. It’s really good, and just about everyone ought to try it. Continue reading “First Impressions: Codenames”