I Had No Idea the World of Board Games Was This Big

A while ago, I wrote about a YouTube documentary featuring a group of British tabletop gamers. These people spent an astonishing amount of time building miniature landscapes, painting tiny figures and creating entire worlds in which they could play their games. I don’t play these games myself, but I loved watching their enthusiasm. Some of those miniature worlds are incredibly detailed, and the people building them seem to have endless patience.

My earlier post was called I Don’t Play These Games. But I Love That Places Like This Exist (https://justme.website/gaming/i-dont-play-these-games-but-i-am-glad-that-places-like-this-exist/).

Recently, something similar happened. Through Bubbles (https://bubbles.town/), I found a personal blog post about SPIEL, a huge board game convention in Essen, Germany. The author described visiting the event, discovering new games and talking to designers and other enthusiasts. I like playing board games every now and then, but I wouldn’t call myself an enthusiast. What caught my attention though was the world surrounding something I had always considered a relatively ordinary pastime.

220,000 people playing board games?

In 2025, SPIEL Essen (https://www.spiel-essen.de/) attracted 220,000 visitors from all over the world. There were 948 exhibitors from 50 countries, presenting no fewer than 1,716 new games. The event occupied 77.500 square meters of exhibition space. More than 1700 new board games! In a single year!

SPIEL takes place annually, and the 2026 edition has expanded to occupy all eight exhibition halls. Designers present their latest creations, publishers announce new titles, journalists interview well-known game designers, and visitors spend days trying out games they have never seen before.

There is also a substantial online world supporting all of this. BoardGameGeek (https://boardgamegeek.com/) is an enormous database and community where people review games, maintain collections, discuss strategies and argue about rules. There are specialist news websites such as BoardGameWire (https://boardgamewire.com/), podcasts such as Ludology (https://ludology.libsyn.com/) and countless YouTube channels. And, of course, personal blogs written by people who simply love board games. Which is how I ended up here in the first place.

Board games aren’t what they used to be

I still associate board games with sitting around a table, rolling dice, moving pieces and trying to win. But modern board games can be considerably more elaborate. Some are cooperative. Instead of trying to beat each other, players work together against the game itself. Others involve stories that unfold over dozens of hours.

There are even games that change permanently as you play them. These are called legacy games. Players might place stickers on the board, open sealed envelopes or permanently change the rules. Decisions made during one session affect what happens during the next. A physical game that gradually develops its own history, based on what the players have experienced together. I like that idea.

Then there is solo board gaming. At first, that sounded strange to me. Aren’t board games supposed to be social? But we read books alone, solve puzzles alone and play computer games alone. So why not board games? Some are designed specifically for one person. Take Friday (https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/43570/friday), a card game in which you help Robinson Crusoe survive on a deserted island. Or Under Falling Skies (https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/306735/under-falling-skies), where you defend Earth against an alien invasion, using dice to manage resources and fight off approaching spaceships.

Both are physical games, with no computer opponent or app required. The rules and game components provide all the challenges. Someone has essentially designed a little world that you can explore entirely on your own, sitting at a table with cards, dice and cardboard pieces.

Other games are almost works of art, with beautifully illustrated cards, carefully designed playing pieces and entire imaginary worlds. Take Wingspan (https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/266192/wingspan), a game about birds, or Root (https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/237182/root), a strategy game involving woodland creatures. Both look quite different from the board games I remember.

An analogue hobby with a digital infrastructure

For a hobby that seems so analogue, board gaming has developed an impressive digital ecosystem. People use online communities to discover games, watch YouTube reviews, discuss strategies and follow designers. They finance new games through crowdfunding platforms such as Kickstarter (https://www.kickstarter.com/) and Gamefound (https://gamefound.com/).

Board Game Arena (https://boardgamearena.com/) lets people play digital versions of board games with others around the world. And Tabletop Simulator (https://www.tabletopsimulator.com/) recreates a physical gaming table on your computer, complete with cards, dice and playing pieces.

So people use all sorts of digital technology to discover, discuss, finance and sometimes even play games that often involve nothing more technologically advanced than cardboard, wood and plastic. Somehow I like that contradiction.

It also reminds me of the British tabletop gamers. They can use websites, videos and online communities to learn about miniature painting, discover new techniques and find inspiration. But eventually, they sit down at a table and start painting tiny figures by hand.

Technology doesn’t replace the physical activity. It helps people become better at it and connects them with others who enjoy doing the same thing.

And yes, even AI has entered this world

While reading about board games, I came across an academic report published in January 2026 called AI in Board Game Design and Development (https://www.strategieshorizon.eu/reports/ai-in-board-game-design). It was written by Professor Paul Wake of Manchester Metropolitan University as part of the European STRATEGIES research project.

The report explores how artificial intelligence is finding its way into the design and development of tabletop games. Designers are experimenting with AI to help write rules, develop stories, generate artwork and create game components. It also examines how designers and players feel about AI-generated content, and how crowdfunding platforms are dealing with transparency. If you are supporting an independent game designer because you appreciate their creativity, wouldn’t you want to know whether the artwork was created by a human illustrator or generated by AI? These are essentially the same discussions about creativity, authorship and the value of human work that we see in software development, publishing and digital art.

But there is another side to it. Imagine someone who has a wonderful idea for a board game but can’t draw, doesn’t know how to write a proper rulebook and has never designed a game before. AI might help that person turn an idea into something playable. That doesn’t automatically make it a good game. You still need to test it, balance the rules and discover whether people enjoy playing it. But it could make experimentation easier. I like technology that helps people make things they otherwise might never have attempted.

The people are more interesting than the games

The more I read, the more I realised that my fascination with this world has less to do with board games than with the people surrounding them. People who spend months designing a game. People who create miniature landscapes that look like something from a fantasy film. People who travel to Essen every year to meet designers and discover new releases. People who maintain personal websites where they write thousands of words about a particular game, even though only a relatively small group of readers may be interested.

I recognise the enthusiasm. It’s the same enthusiasm you find among people who restore vintage computers, build mechanical keyboards, collect cassette players, experiment with Linux or create their own little corners of the IndieWeb. These communities develop their own vocabulary, traditions, personalities and debates. Things that seem insignificant to outsiders can become subjects of endless discussion.

You can’t search for something you don’t know exists

This is also why I enjoy wandering around the independent web. If I had opened a search engine and tried to find something interesting to read, I probably wouldn’t have searched for board game conventions. They simply weren’t on my radar. But someone wrote a personal account of SPIEL Essen. Bubbles brought that post to my attention. And suddenly I was reading about a community I knew very little about. Search engines help you find answers to questions you already have. But how do you discover the questions you never thought of asking? That’s where personal blogs, discovery tools and the IndieWeb become so valuable to me. They introduce you to people who care deeply about things you might never have considered.

I am not planning to become a serious board game collector, design my own games or travel to Essen every year. But I am glad these communities exist. There must be thousands of others, quietly doing their own thing somewhere on the internet. People building, collecting, experimenting, playing, documenting and sharing. Most of them completely outside my usual interests. And that’s precisely why I want to keep finding them.

Sometimes the most interesting thing you discover online isn’t a new technology, a website or an idea. It’s discovering just how much fun other people are having.