Getting into the board game hobby is an amazing feeling. For the last five years I have thrown myself meeple first into the cardboard and plastic of the tabletop world, experiencing epic sci-fi battles, incredible zoo creations and the majesty of the high seas, all within the joyous space that board gaming provides.
But I also found my first forays into the hobby quite challenging, as famously there are just so many amazing games out there, where do you even start! I knew I adored board games ever since loving my time with them as a child, whether that was at Christmas with the family or collecting Yu-Gi-Oh and Pokémon cards, I loved a good game. When in my late 20s I realised how many incredible new games had been made in the last 20 years, I wanted to experience it all, but didn’t have the first clue where to start.
What I really needed was a good guide to pinpoint me in the right direction, show me the ways of starting my collection and nurturing my love of the hobby. So when I was thinking about a new feature to write up for Zatu, I wanted to write about something I myself would have found incredibly useful five years ago.
This isn’t necessarily like a top 10 gateway games list you can find on YouTube or a best of list, but instead a deep dive into different genres, themes and mechanics you can find in board games, to highlight to you why it might be what gets you into the hobby, the best example of said thing to get you started, and a full exploration of what it can bring to your tabletop sessions.
And to start this Board Game Starter Guide I wanted to talk about the thing I desperately wanted more information on when getting into the hobby, legacy games, and what might be the best game for you to get you started in this experience gaining, card destroying, sticker placing world.
The Legacy of Legacy Board Games
When I was reading more and more about board games and doing my research to begin my journey into the hobby, the variant that really stood out to me was legacy games.
This idea that every time you play a new session of the game, the world, the characters, the theme, have all been influenced and affected by your previous sessions appealed to the storyteller and video gamer within me.
It sounded incredible, this ever changing story within some cardboard and plastic on your table. I was able to throw off my deep set worries of actually destroying the materials of the game as I went along, and the potential nature having to actually bin a game I own once finished. I simply wanted to experience this wonderful idea with my friends and family, and create new stories together like only board gaming can.
Since its 2011 beginnings, legacy games simply mean that after every play session something about the game changes. You might carry over some kind of experience like in a Dungeons and Dragons campaign, you might unlock cards with special powers, maybe a new character you can use whose super powerful.
And like I said previously, you can even destroy cards and resources that you no longer need, which can feel almost sacrilege at first, but actually when you own as many board games as I do, it can occasionally feel good to essentially complete a board game and give up some space for some newer and shinier games.
What I really struggled with though, was choosing my first legacy game.
Where to Begin?
The first truly popular example of a legacy game could have been a good place to start, that being 2011’s Risk Legacy. But as someone who grew up with Risk, and knew how utterly boring it can become, I wasn’t keen on that being my first entry point into something I just knew I would love in legacy games, so I avoided it. (Admittedly I have heard very good things since).
Then you have something like a Gloomhaven, the 2017 big box phenomenon that sounded incredible, but coming with a price tag I just couldn’t justify, especially when I was only just getting into the hobby.
I found it interesting that actually there wasn’t a huge amount of history with legacy games, so the game I landed on was simply a legacy version of a game I love, that being Pandemic Legacy Season 1.
And what a game Pandemic Legacy is. Taking the super simple but utterly brilliant formula of Pandemic, and transforming it into this overarching narrative of fighting global collapse and other horrible things (no spoilers) was a joy, and I quickly knew from my first game of it that I was right in my assumption that legacy games were perfect for me. But then the problem arose that arises in so many legacy games, the dreaded board game night organising.
With a full complement of four people, we haven’t even done half of the campaign of Pandemic Legacy in the three years I have owned it. Organising people to be free and available on the same day has proven so challenging that I just don’t get to play and experience the story like I imagined I would when I first read about legacy games.
And even when we do get to play, I find it a challenge to remember all the different rule changes and story beats that happened the last time we played, so that some of the flow and the story that is so important to what a legacy game is trying to achieve is occasionally lost. We could switch it to just two players, but Pandemic is very much at its best at four, especially in the story we have made with the legacy version, and I was saddened to run into the issue that so often rears its head with the genre.
So while I really do love Pandemic Legacy, I don’t credit it with the game that got me into legacy board games. No for me, it was something a hell of a lot different, as rather than trying to stop a horrible global pandemic, all I needed was to build up my own little city.
We Built This City
For this Board Game Starter Guide, my recommendation for a starter legacy game is 2020’s My City, designed by the legendary Reiner Knizia and published by KOSMOS.
I really wasn’t sure about this game before I got it for my birthday a couple of years ago. I had read a lot about it when looking into legacy games, and I foolishly dismissed it as not exciting enough and not providing enough story and theme to be worth a purchase. Yet hear I am, years later, recommending it to you just like I had researched those years previously, as your first step into legacy games.
So don’t do what I did and dismiss this amazing game!
While its certainly true it doesn’t lean as much on theme and storytelling as other legacy games, My City is the perfect introduction into what makes the actual mechanics of legacy games so effective.
In My City, you and your fellow players are placing tiles on your individual game board, following some simple placement rules while scoring points depending on where you put them and how, trying to maximise your score with astute placements, fitting your tiles together neatly like you would in something like Patchwork.
Over the course of eight chapters and 24 episodes, My City’s rules and mechanics slowly change and adapt, just like you would as you slowly develop your city from pre-industrial stages to fully fledged industrialisation. The changes are small, but each one adds something new to think about and new strategies, without altering the core aspects of the game, so that you can easily go for weeks without playing a game to quickly remembering what you need to do the next time you set it up.
It also subtly ensures that if one person is quite clearly in the lead, a helping hand or two is given out to the losing player, so that there is always a sense of it could be anyone’s game, perfectly levelling out the playing field.
My enjoyment of My City was in stark contrast to my expectations and particularly my skill levels. Tile placement games I can honestly say, I am woeful at. My brain just doesn’t work that way and I can never quickly figure out how best to place my tiles. At Patchwork, I am a perennial loser.
But with My City somehow this flaw of mine didn’t matter, whether it was the small boons you receive when losing or even just how it introduces its different rules and ways of winning, I just found myself going against type and loving a mechanic I am notoriously bad at and subsequently don’t always take to with similar games.
And while I might get more memories out of an overarching story from something like Pandemic Legacy, My City still offers enough to make your own little stories and ideas from the city that you have built, as the game guides you through these stages of industrialisation, adding fun new ideas and mechanics which I won’t discuss in detail here to avoid spoilers!
Ultimately, it felt like a perfect introduction to legacy games. There’s some stickers to place on your game board and you get to unlock new tiles, so that by game’s end your player board will look totally different to your opponents, and you can all discuss what led to this point.
It also overcomes that common issue with legacy games that its impossible to get to the table. It works perfectly at 2, I would even recommend it at that. It’s a cozy, Sunday afternoon head to head match where you do a few episodes, see what new ideas Knizia has got up his sleeve, and put the game away. And like I said, there’s no new complicated rules you need to figure out when you open it up again, and no organising of a big group of people required to get the most out of it.
I had my reservations, I thought it looked a little dry for my tastes. But honestly, as the saying goes don’t judge a book by its cover. It’s the perfect introduction to legacy games, with a base game available as well if you hate the idea of binning a game. Perhaps once you’ve done with My City, and cemented the idea you love a bit of legacy, you can then try and move on to the more thematic ideas of Pandemic Legacy or Gloomhaven.
Honourable Mentions
I am really surprised to be writing a starter guide for legacy games and to be talking about My City, but honestly I loved my time with it, its one that I have actually finished unlike all its bigger and badder cousins, and something I would recommend to anyone getting into the hobby, even if they wouldn’t usually be attracted by this kind of vibe.
If this sounds up your street but you’re not sure on the tile placement, then I have heard very good things about its sequel, My Island, which has you developing an island with connected hexagons instead of those pesky tiles.
Another fantastic option to start your legacy journey, especially if you fear the organising of one, is the incredible solo game Legacy of Yu, which offers everything a legacy game can without the issue of other people, and is something I have discussed in length before on this blog!
A final mention goes to Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion. While I can’t recommend its much bigger brother, Jaws of the Lion offers fantasy lovers a proper video game like experience as you level up your characters, defeat evil bosses and go on an incredible fantasy journey, with a campaign length you might actually have a chance of finishing. While I think it might be a bit complicated as your first legacy game, if you just want to go in at the deep end, Jaws of the Lion might be for you.
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!
