Hi everyone,
This post is a little bit different, and you may notice it has been a while since our last post. In this post we're going to discuss playing board games and their impact on our lives and health, and our personal experiences during the process of developing YNC Games, including the reason for the gap in posts and news.
Scrabble board showing the words 'board', 'games', 'life' and 'health'
I started playing board games at a young age, but had no idea the wealth of games available! As most families, not part of the wider gaming world, we had all the usual suspects - Chess, Ludo, Monopoly, Scrabble, Game of Life and for family events, we would make up some of our own custom-made Charades, Pictionary and more! It was a brilliant way to unwind and socialise with family (especially when some of the events got as large as 50 people; gaming at this point is a little like organised chaos!). We didn't realise it as kids, but whilst we were being entertained, we were gaining vital cognitive and memory formation skills as well.
They bring us together, we bond and laugh, and develop our critical thinking even further with more complex games
While spending time with school friends and over the years, I found myself looking forward to new games that my friends bought. We would play all the regulars like Catan, Carcassone, Pandemic and Ticket to Ride. They bring us together, we bond and laugh, and develop our critical thinking even further as the games got more complex.
I didn't start seriously buying my own games before the pandemic, when I realised that at home, I was limited by the old family classics I had, plus a few card games I'd bought like Uno and Fluxx. Still, the first games I bought were still 'classics', like Risk. During the start of the pandemic lockdown, we wanted to buy some new board games, but didn't know where to start, so we opted for a Zatu mystery box - unaware of what type of games we would enjoy, what was our there and good to play. We can say this was a really successful haul - the mystery box included Jaipur, Point Salad and Doppelt So Clever. I feel like these were great transition games too to get my family more involved in playing board games - easy to set up and relatively quick to play. It really helped us to get through the difficult times of being stuck at home for months, and we can't express how grateful we were to discover these new games.
I imagine board games do more for people than sometimes their designers and publishers realise!
I enjoyed playing so much that I started to make up my own board games, and found it a really wonderful way to rediscover my creativity, apply my logical thinking, get lost in designs and concepts and a whole new world. I imagine board games do more for people than sometimes their designers and publishers realise!
This started a wave of new game purchases, and 3 years later, we have a collection of almost 40 board games (money well spent - I think so!). We've made new friends through playing board games, enjoyed countless hours and days around the table - especially when playing longer games like Terraforming Mars and Brass Birmingham, but also discovering great 2 player games like 7 Wonders Duel and Targi.
Currently obsessed with Terraforming Mars
We also started YNC Games last year, and it's been an incredible journey so far, the learning curve has been immense, and we've also met some amazing people along the way. Unfortunately, last summer I caught Covid, and luckily I didn't have such bad symptoms at the time compared to what I'd seen others go through, but it manifested itself in November at the end of last year, when I started to get severe brain fog. I was forgetting words and sometimes was not able to complete sentences, but the worst part was not being able to process information; I could not understand the instructions for Quacks of Quedlinburg, having got a great deal for the Mega box just at the beginning of November. This was an incredibly scary time, when I was not sure whether I would be able to game again properly, let alone run a business and be an engineer. You may have noticed the blog posts stopped suddenly - I did not have mental capacity to be working on YNC Games at the time.
Luckily I can say that I am on the road to recovery now and I even played Terraforming Mars this weekend to put my critical thinking skills to the test! Although I didn't win the first game, it was so nice to be able to get back to it, and feels like a huge relief that nothing was permanent. November was a busy time for me, and the doctors reckon it was also stress-induced, which made it worse. I took the decision to take a few weeks off from both YNC Games and engineering, to give myself the rest I needed. I've been back to engineering for a few weeks now, and I'm hoping to ease back into YNC Games again.
There will be another break coming up after Easter though, as I take a 2 month Interrailing trip I have been keen on doing for a long time. I'm very excited to say that I'll be visiting some destinations on the cards I have developed for Under and Over, and I've included a few of these below.
Rådhuset Station, Stockholm, Sweden and Erasmusbrug Bridge, Rotterdam, The Netherlands
Turda Salt Mine, Turda, Romania
No doubt we will be taking some games with us (although we are undecided which as yet)! I'm sure that the trip will provide me with plenty more inspiration for new games, and will also give me a renewed energy to get stuck in to Accidental Possession in the summer and get it to completion.
Finally, thank you for your patience and continued support on our journey at YNC Games. Happy gaming!
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