Ramsey Kincannon
We live in a time where it’s not cool to just have a Xbox, Playstation or Nintendo product. It’s a time where we need the latest versions of all of these products, whether that be an Xbox 360, Playstation 3 or even an iPhone 4S. These new machines have huge products attached to them — “Skyrim,” the latest craze in video games, sold seven million copies the first week it was out. At one point on Jan. 2, over five million people across the country were fighting dragons online at the same time.
I write here to push for a return to the board games we casted aside so rudely. Well, maybe not all of them. Keep Sorry!, Axis and Allies, Risk and Monopoly in those infrequently frequented areas of your house; none of those games are worth resurrecting. What’s the point of playing Risk? To watch you and your friends roll the dice over and over again, hoping that you get lucky and roll a six when you’re down to your last man defending Irkutsk? In Monopoly, why do I want to buy Boardwalk when all I have is a motherf***ing copper boot? Comedian Louis C.K. is afraid of playing Monopoly with his daughter, because “a Monopoly loss is dark … I have to look at her little face and say, ‘here’s what’s going to happen now: all of your property — everything you have, your railroads, your houses, all your money — that’s mine now … Now see, you can’t play anymore, because all of that doesn’t even touch how much you owe me.’”
We need a game that presents us with an even, fair opportunity where we can forge our own success by more than just rolling the dice. We need a game that’s sleek and efficient, where games don’t take much longer than an hour and everyone is affected by each roll of the dice. We need a game like Settlers of Catan. Many Americans have started to catch on to the European strategy game, where players try to maximize resources in order to settle the fictional land of Catan. In 2010, the game’s sales grew 35 percent (according to The Atlantic), tournaments have started to increase in size and frequency, and Mark Zuckerberg apparently plays it often with his girlfriend.
It’s a game that forces you to cooperate with your peers (sometimes you really just need some sheep, as wild as that sounds), just like one needs to in life. A variety of strategies make it so that there isn’t just one way to win. Most importantly, it puts the responsibility of winning the game solely on your shoulders — unlike Monopoly or Risk, where a dice roll decides your fate. The world is no longer a zero-sum game. Now tell me, why are we playing board games that force us to live like that?