Before I start this blog post, I must apologise in advance for what I am about to do. I’m so sorry I am about to convince you to spend a good chunk of change on some new board games.
Because in this list, I am going to go through some top tier games you can get for under £100, or more precisely, games ranging from £60-£99 that all more than justify their heftier price tag.
In previous blogs in this series I have been discussing games that aren’t too costly, aren’t necessarily to big, don’t take forever to play, and are excellent additions to a collection. I stand by the fact that you don’t need to pay huge amounts of money to build an incredible library of fantastic board games to play with your friends and family.
But every once in a while, there is a game that comes along that might need a quick check of your online banking to ensure you can afford it, that might require a bit of rearranging of your board game shelves to fit it in, but a game that soon becomes your favourite of all time.
This is a list of 5 Great Games under £100.
All prices correct as of 30.09.25
1. Star Wars: Rebellion
The first game on this list is actually my most recently played game, Star Wars: Rebellion, a big old game set in a galaxy far far away, that is a must play for any fan of this ever expanding universe. Released in 2016 by Fantasy Flight Games, Star Wars: Rebellion is a head to head war game where you essentially get to play out the whole of the original Star Wars saga. From my experience taking about as long as the entire original trilogy of films as well!
One player will take on the leadership of the Empire, the evil power that has full control of the galaxy pretty much from the onset of the game right throughout its long play time, using their mightier troops and powerful leaders to rule the galaxy by force.
The other player takes charge of the Rebel Alliance, who has weaker forces and seemingly insurmountable odds, but with an ace up their sleeve. They have a hidden base that they must keep concealed long enough to win the game. Whereas the empire needs to find this base and destroy it.
Using cards and characters from the films each player has opportunities to seriously mess with the plans of their opponents, as well as exciting miniatures straight from the movies which players can use to go to war in battles on different planets.
Simply put if you like Star Wars, you will almost undoubtedly like this game. Like its predecessor War of the Ring did for the Lord of the Rings universe, Star Wars: Rebellion does an amazing job at bringing the story to life within its play time, whilst still giving room to somehow make your own star wars adventure and story out of it.
In my first game where I played as the Rebels, Luke Skywalker turned evil without much encouragement, Chewbacca went on a redemption arc Jaime Lannister would be proud of, and moments of sheer magic and storytelling happened at almost every turn.
The fact that from the start of the game the Empire already feels like its winning can feel frustrating and overwhelming if you’re the rebel player, but that is the point, that is how you’re supposed to feel. Likewise if you’re playing as the Empire, you might feel over confident, but grow increasingly frustrated with your efforts to pin point where the rebel base is.
It has its flaws, the battling in particular is extremely clunky, but I understand its greatly improved with the expansion, and it says it can be played in teams as a 4 player game, but for me this slows down an already quite slow game.
But as a lover of the franchise and any game that can create oh my god moments so frequently during play, Star Wars: Rebellion doesn’t feel expensive the moment you’re first big encounter takes place.
2. A Feast For Odin
Doing a complete 180 now and moving down from stars and galaxies all the way to earth and the Viking era with A Feast For Odin, a big box game in every sense of the term from Feuerland Spiele and designed by the legendary Uwe Rosenberg. An epic engine builder, in A Feast For Odin you will compete against your fellow players for points in a multitude of different ways, with many different strategies and paths to victory all to bring glory to your Viking tribe.
While a quick glance at a table of people playing the game may make it seem like quite a dry affair, A Feast For Odin soon comes alive after a few turns, featuring worker placement and tile laying mechanics to create a really varied experience. You can hunt, farm, craft and explore, living your best Viking life to secure your position in society and win the game.
At rounds end like a traditional Viking banquet you fill your table and create your feast, allowing you to live out your Viking fantasy in the best way possible, with an enormous amount of food. You slowly accumulate points and build your perfect engine to turn your feast into a wonderful, points gathering extravaganza. A Feast For Odin is very much a board gamers game, unlike something like Star Wars: Rebellion. For someone not familiar with board games it can look overly complicated, or even a little dull. But for gamers they love the fact its tactical and methodical. The way you build your engine can feel ingenious. It will have you sat down on a quiet Sunday afternoon planning and plotting your course to victory. For fans of these kind of experiences, there probably is no game better than A Feast For Odin.
3. Slay The Spire: The Board Game
This is a rather interesting recommendation from me, as I am actually only familiar with Slay the Spire as a video game, rather than its board form. However, seeing as I bloody love that video game, and have read the sheer amount of critical acclaim for the board variant, it’s an easy recommendation for you, and for myself. Slay The Spire: The Board Game is a co-op deckbuilding, dungeon crawling game as you craft a unique and increasingly more powerful deck to defeat enemies, the final big bad and ultimately, slay the spire.
It follows the recent trend in board gaming of quality video game adaptations, including cracking titles like Last Of Us: Escape the Dark, and The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim. However, Slay The Spire is looking like the best of them all.
The video game itself already played like a board game, so it was an easy transition, but developers Contention Games have done a masterful job of translating that onto the board.
While the video game was a solitary affair which I found could become repetitive after several hours of play, the board game, by transitioning it into a co-op game, adds extra layers of depth to the deckbuilding, while keeping the crunchy challenge both video and board versions present to the players alive.
It isn’t currently in my collection, I was initially put off as I felt if its just essentially the same as the video game, why buy it, especially when it is that much more expensive. But do what I have done, look at articles, videos, anything you can find about Slay the Spire: The Boardgame, and see for yourself why I am now so desperate to give this one a try.
4. Mice and Mystics
Mice and Mystics is now 13 years old, and doesn’t always get the love it deserves from the community, but this is a game that for me deserves its place on the pantheon of great board games.
In this game you play as, unsurprisingly, mice, or at least that is what you have been turned into, as you take on loyal subjects of the king while also trying to escape the evil clutches of Vanestra.
A co-operative adventure game like none other I have played, I just find this game beautiful and stupidly silly in the best possible way.
Whether you’re hoarding cheese to boost your mice and their abilities or having an epic battle with a housecat, Mice and Mystics is a game that whoever you introduce it to will immediately love it, as it’s just so hard not to get on board with its quirkiness. Like the problematic dice battle system of Star Wars: Rebellion previously mentioned the luck of it can feel annoying, and since its release other games may have surpassed it in terms of the quality of the co-operative elements, but Mice and Mystics will always be an absolute blast every time you play, that you can easily forgive any issues that might be apparent with it.
Its equal parts brutal to equal parts cute, it can be taught fairly easily, would probably be fine for even younger board gamers to play if you have a family you’re wanting to introduce board gaming to, and it always keeps its players engaged with the wonderful artwork and table presence. And did I mention you hoard cheese? Mice and Mystics is a great game, and on the cheaper end of this list, so its certainly worthy of your attention.
5. Spirit Island
I will begin my final game on this list with the caveat that if you don’t like hard games, I mean Dark Souls level of hard, then Spirit Island is not for you. Don’t be fooled by the colourful game box or the happy looking stone spirit on there that looks straight out of Moana, Spirit Island is not for the faint hearted, and is a game that despite multiple plays I still feel I haven’t mastered.
All that being said, I bloody love this game. Spirit Island is a co-op game where you all play as spirits, looking to protect your island from colonising forces. Each spirit has different powers and abilities which they can use to best protect the island, with the base game coming with 8 spirts who all play and feel different to each other.
But despite your almost godly powers, colonisation is a blight upon the earth, literally, and it can be difficult to contain as it spreads across your island building cities and towns, and polluting the earth you’re trying to protect. Wonderfully thematic, Spirit Island is a beast of a game to beat. I have played it several times now since I got it early this year, and am still yet to achieve a straight victory against the game (one mutual destruction win, which I count at the moment). Yet despite this, I relish the challenge every time and always want to get it back on the table.
It’s beautiful, evocative, thought provoking, a theme that could have been difficult to explore yet somehow the developers have done an incredible job transposing that onto a board game that takes just a few hours to play once you’ve wrapped your head around it.
When you do get to play your super strong cards, and you create these wonderful combos with your fellow spirits, you feel all powerful, even while you get overwhelmed by the vast numbers of colonisers against you.
It isn’t a game for everyone. Like I said its difficult, and surprisingly complex to learn. The rule explanations are pretty poor, especially when it comes to gathering and pushing mechanics, and really can only be shown to people who already love board gaming and are used to a big teach.
But if you’re up for the fight, and want to experience a co-op game where you truly feel like you’re all in it together in a justified fight for survival, then Spirit Island is a must purchase. And if the cost puts you off, do I want I did, and convince someone to go halves with you on the game!
About the author:
Paul Websell is a freelance contributor for Zatu who spends his time either playing board and video games or talking about them. While he’s not on social media, you can view his other blogs right here on Zatu!
