Boardgames make smiles. Smiles make friends.
If the mention of boardgames makes you wince with thoughts of Monopoly, Clue, and Risk then this article is for you. Since those days boardgames have grown up. They’ve thundered out of their parents’ basements with talk of changing the world, and now they’re calling home with tales of adventure, cheer, and community. It’s time to have another look at what modern boardgames have to offer. In this tech-laden era it’s much more important than mere entertainment.
By DAREN STEBNER
There aren’t many things I get effusive about, so when I say that modern boardgaming is the best thing to come along since chili-lime sheep dip, people sit up and take notice. Well,… in truth the look I’m generally given is more apropos to my having suddenly sprouted a second head. This is often followed by a patronizing “Oh?” as you might humour a small child after it announces that a spaceship landed on the front lawn while you were in the bathroom.
But I am completely serious.
I regard boardgaming as the latest in social networking platforms, but with one crucial difference: It’s actually social. (I use the term “boardgaming” in this article in the broadest sense to include card and role playing games – anything played together at a table). My aim here is to convince you that boardgaming has become a formidable antidote to the vortex of social isolation tools with which we’ve become so morbidly enamoured. Why do I believe that? Because boardgames provide a simple and accessible means for creating authentic connections with other people in real life. I think that as a society we are beginning to recognize that our growing collective malaise is the result of the things that electronic friends and distractions can’t provide. After more than a decade of smart phones and the rise of Facebook and the like (pun intended), the damaging consequence has been the active unravelling of the social fabric. Compounding this, computerized technology in general has made it easy to get things done without actually having to interact with anyone at all. We now buy tickets, pay bills, bank, shop, and watch our movies online. Some of us even telecommute. But the human psyche was shaped over aeons through life in social groups. Is it any wonder that people increasingly report feeling disconnected and depressed?
What is clear from all this is that software – as much as we so obviously love it – is not a valid substitute for real human contact. It just isn’t. And boardgames with their tangibility, low barrier to entry, and implicitly social agenda have the requisite elements for directly addressing that problem.
But boardgames are boring, you say. They’re “bored” games (ho-ho) and I think I’d prefer to just sit alone in my corner here and binge-watch something on Netflix. Well let me whisper you a secret, my groggy young cub: You slept through the revolution. To disabuse you of the notion that boardgames are boring, allow me to direct you to this video by one of the hobby’s foremost personalities and critics, Quintin Smith. Quintin (AKA “Quinns”) is the founder of my favourite boardgame review site, ShutupAndSitDown.com.
Wait, what? There are boardgame critics? Yes, that part I didn’t make up. There are now boardgame critics. Lots of them. And you should take that as an indicator of how much the hobby has grown, and grown up.
Now, boardgaming is social, sure, but I’ll do you one better: It’s not only social, it’s inclusive. And in case you’re still in a post-hibernatorial fog wondering what that bright yellow ball in the sky is, social plus inclusive equals that elusive and quickly disappearing thing we call community.
If, like me, you lament the fact that you don’t know who your neighbours are and you pine for the days when sitting in front of a screen wasn’t the soul-consuming pastime it is now, then I’ve got good news for you. If you would just like to have something engaging to do with other people that doesn’t cost an arm and a leg, then I’ve got good news for you, too. Read on.
Boardgames are right now in the throes of a burgeoning Renaissance. Look around your town and take note of the number of game stores and cafes quietly popping up (hint: Google for them, they’re there). Chances are good you don’t have to go far to find one now, whereas only ten years ago they were nowhere in sight. This isn’t a fad. The hobby is catching on and growing, and I believe it’s here to stay. I see at least six good reasons for this revival:
People are coming back to boardgaming for the reasons I talked about above. Newfound community is why they’re staying.
I believe that the more boardgamers there are the healthier our society will be. Understand that it’s not the act of playing boardgames in and of itself that makes me feel this way. Rather, what I see in boardgaming is that it has the necessary ingredients for bringing people from all walks of life together – all genders, ethnicities, ages, socio-economic statuses, intellectual and physical capacities, religious leanings, sexual orientations, and whatever else you care to name. It is able to do this because a game establishes a framework for interaction between two or more people. It creates a safe space for everyone, because the rules of engagement are understood and implicitly accepted by all of the participants, and nothing but the game needs to matter while it’s in progress. At the same time, this focus by everyone on the same thing and in the same physical space lends itself unavoidably to learning about one another, subtly but surely bridging the gaps that separate us in daily life. In other words, without having to apply any additional effort or move outside of the game’s framework, players begin automatically to relate to one another, recognizing what they have in common, and minimizing their differences. Boosting that capability, co-operative games actively promote teamwork rather than competition, making working together and understanding each other a core element of the experience.
If you are sport-minded you may have noted that the above description could just as easily be applied to sports, since they also provide a framework of rules through which individuals and teams interact. This is true to an extent. However, accessibility is an important area where boardgames by far have the upper hand, particularly when you consider the financial, physical, and time demands that sports often impose. Boardgames don’t have those limiting requirements, again making them the more inclusive activity with the far larger potential for creating a diverse community. For example, a friend of mine used to regularly attend a game night with someone who was a quadriplegic. While this person did require assistance to execute the physical tasks, they were still a fully engaged and equal participant in playing the games.
Speaking to accessibility again, unlike most video games the pacing of boardgames is controlled entirely by the players. This allows the opportunity for leisurely conversation and discussion if desired. It also accommodates people without highly attuned hand-eye coordination, and those for whom games of frenetic, pressured activity aren’t appealing or approachable. Not everyone knows how to use a video game controller, whereas everyone understands the physics of the real world and the vast majority are capable of picking up and moving tokens and pieces around on a board, or holding a hand of cards.
Sometimes a boardgame simply becomes filler for breaks in a conversation. For the socially awkward or shy, the game can serve as a convenient launching point for broader conversations which might otherwise be difficult for them. An agent for creating camaraderie, players will often point out to an opponent a better move that could be made over the one they’re considering, or offer help if someone is struggling. Boardgaming is often more about gaining a deeper shared understanding of a game’s mechanics in order to enhance and better appreciate the experience than it is about besting your opponents.
Through all this interaction with different people, players learn consideration and tolerance. They learn to judge less and accept more. It’s all very civil and frequently supportive, which tends to create bonds of mutual respect if not outright friendship across diverse groups of people. Contrast this with social networking technologies and ostensibly social media, which have shown themselves to be highly adept at dividing people into self-affirming echo chambers, reinforcing the concepts of “us” and “them”, and all but destroying the potential for rational, civil discourse and for learning about one another.
While I was writing this article, my sons and I visited a local game store for a drop-in evening of Dungeons & Dragons. This was my desperate attempt to finally find something all three of us could enjoy together. They both had an interest, but I hadn’t played since I was a teenager in the early 80’s and wasn’t sure I was going to enjoy it at my current age (I’ll let you do the math). Of the eight of us at the table, most were strangers to each other, and the pair of young men sitting together at one end stood out immediately. Both of their heads were shaved in a short Mohawk style with colourfully dyed hair. Ordinarily these were people I would have had no compunction or reason to interact with, and I wasn’t sure what to make of them at first. But as we started playing, we began to interact through the game and any reservations that had been there in me rapidly melted away. We sat and played together for four hours. Adventure was had, daring rescues were made, legends were born, and we all had a raucous fun time working together to save a town and survive the baddies. During a short break I ran into one of them at the snack counter and it was a completely natural thing to strike up a conversation with him. It occurred to me later that that whole evening was proof of what I had already intuited about the community-building nature of boardgaming. Oh, did I mention it became clear early on that they were a gay couple? Nobody cared. We were all just human beings looking to connect and have a good time with other human beings, and we did that with the game gracefully doing its job of facilitating a bonding experience.
I game with people who I never would have met or interacted with in anything resembling circumstances, and many of those people have now become my friends. We’re all different, we all have our quirks and our struggles, but we’re all working together to try to increase the amount of joy in our lives. I love that this hobby is so inclusive. Once I recognized it, I found myself proud to be a part of it and eager to share it with others. The capacity that boardgaming has for allowing you to meet and enjoy the company of people who are not like you (or, more correctly, who appear to be not like you) is where I think it really shines, and why I think it could be such an important tool for rebuilding our much-needed sense of community.
If you already boardgame, and your group consists only of your family or long-time friends, then I strongly encourage you to branch out. Impose yourself on some local boardgaming groups for a broader experience. Not only will that group be into different games than yours − providing new learning opportunities and happy discoveries on both sides − but you will also be investing in, growing, and availing yourself of the benefits of community that I’ve been so eagerly describing.
If I have achieved what I set out to do − convince you that maybe it’s time to take another look at boardgaming as a worthwhile hobby and pastime − I’ll be very happy indeed. It’s not an exaggeration to say that boardgaming – or, rather, the boardgaming community – has changed my life. I feel like I’ve been saved in a way. It’s no coincidence that at a time when the social fabric lies in tatters, the scientific literature is littered with research highlighting the critical importance of having strong social and community bonds both for emotional and physical well-being. And the physical health benefit isn’t solely related to being involved in physical activities, no. Physical health is literally improved just by being engaged socially with other people – the mind affects the body. As well, of course, belonging to a community combats feelings of loneliness and isolation, reduces the occurrence of depression, and speeds recovery when it does happen. None of these positive benefits can be reaped merely by having a collection of friends on an electronic social media platform.
Whether that information makes you stop and think or not, the real upshot is simply this: If you can increase your engagement in a real life community by even a small extent you’ll be a happier person, full stop. That’s irrefutable. And who wouldn’t like to be happier?
As an introvert I didn’t have anything resembling a social life, nor a social network that I felt like I could lean on when I needed to. Even my kids were worried about me and how I would end up – some poor old hermit with no friends and a sad pointless life, waiting for my time to shuffle off. It’s not like I was ever bored. I thought I was happy, because I had lots of hobbies and interests to keep my mind engaged. They were like a warm blanket on a snowy day. But after a full day of indulging myself – and especially as evening set in – I’d often look up and suddenly feel deflated and empty. What was that all for? If I die tomorrow, what will this matter? That sinking feeling was my cherished aloneness transforming into the far less welcome loneliness. I was beginning to understand what my former fiancée meant when she said I spent too much time inside my own head.
Maybe my situation was a little unique, but I suspect not. Maybe you recognize echoes of your own life in mine and are struggling to cultivate some semblance of belonging and connection, but can’t quite figure out how to do it. Fortunately I was able to find others that shared my unrequited interest in boardgaming. It took some sleuthing and some stepping out of my comfort zone, but I’m happy to say it has paid off in spades. Now I know I’m not ever going to become that sad, lonely old man.
There are a lot of people out there (admit it, maybe you) who have been living in an ever-shrinking personal world and who could do with some re-connection to other members of their species, building bridges instead of walls. At my boardgaming meetups I’m always thrilled to see a new face – somebody who’s realized what they’re missing and have taken the leap to try and find it here. I always do my best to provide a warm welcome and a handshake, sometimes hosting or teaching a game or two in order to help them feel comfortable. It’s one of the ways I contribute to and participate in my newfound community. More than once during a meetup I’ve heard the words “I’ve found my people!” The joy and the relief expressed in that outburst is palpable, and it makes me so happy every time it happens. I know that feeling. That’s one more person who has found a place they belong, and that is truly a good thing for all of us.
But after all of this, what it really comes down to for each and every one of us is a choice. What kind of a world do you want to live in? The modern convenience of doing your banking and paying your bills online is wonderful, yes, but make no mistake it comes with a high cost and we are all suffering for it. If we want to keep our tech but preserve our humanity, then we need to engage in alternative ways to build community that replace the ways that are being so rapidly extinguished. We must have compelling reasons to interact with all manner of people in person in order to build those cross-group connections that make a community whole rather than divided. Boardgaming, in my opinion, is a surprisingly powerful enabler for weaving those kinds of connections. If you don’t already have something that connects you to a real community, then boardgaming may well be your gateway to a more fulfilling and meaningful life. Don’t hesitate to take your first steps toward it.
You may now be wondering how to get your feet wet. The next article will be dedicated to assisting you in breaking into the hobby with the greatest chance of an enjoyable initial experience so that you’ll want to continue exploring it. Happy boardgaming!