SDS 104: Board Games

Hey everybody, welcome back to SuperDataScience podcast. Today we’ve got a very different episode we’re not going to get into technicalities of data science or explore career options. Today we’re going to simply talk about board games. And why is that?

Well, because I personally love board games and I wanted to share some of this passion with you. Also, we’ve got the festive season coming up. We’ve got Black Friday, we’ve got Christmas and New Years and lots and lots of other holidays coming up very, very, soon, so if you’re looking to pick up a great present, a board game is always a fantastic present.

Also, another reason is, here’s a data science reason for you, if you go to Google Trends and type in ‘board games’, you’ll see a very cool seasonal trend. You’ll see that board games actually, the search term ‘board games’ doubles in searches every October, November, December, compared to the rest of the year, so there’s a huge spike and it’s really cool. If you look at it you’ll see that clear seasonality. If you’ve not worked with Retail data before, and not seen a seasonal effect, then I highly recommend checking it out. Google Trends, and then just type in ‘board game’ or ‘board games’.

And finally, because board games really help you develop critical thinking and creativity, and they also help you socialize. I think a lot of the time we can get stuck working on data science and then when we do try to socialize or we think we’re socializing, all we’re doing is we’re on Facebook or on LinkedIn and it can be sometimes … It’s like pseudo socialization, you think you’re getting social interaction but it’s actually not; it’s impersonable.

Or even some people play computer games, even if you’re playing a computer game with friends or with other people, it’s still not in person. Whereas board game, you get to interact with people, you get to have fun, and I think it’s always important to develop all aspects of your personality.

So, I’ve prepared a list of my favourite board games, the ones that my friends and I have played and I’m going to read it out to you very quickly now, because it’s quite long, and then after that I’ll get to the ones that I would highly recommend checking out.

Here’s the list of board games that my friends and I have played literally just in this year, in this, like, in 2017. We’ve played all these board games, except for maybe two of them. I think that I added two from some other years. So here we go:

• Pandemic Legacy or Pandemic

• Harry Potter: Hogwarts Battle

• Secret Hitler

• Avalon

• Exploding Kittens

• Archipelago

• Dracula

• Cards Against Humanity

• Galaxy Truckers

• Cosmic Encounter

• Taboo

• Monopoly

• Descent

Those are just the ones that came to the top of my head in the last, you know, five minutes or so. I’m sure there’s more. And yeah, you might recognize some of those from the list, you might relate to that, and I’m very excited, I’m giving you, like, a mental high five right now if you’ve played any one of those board games. But if you haven’t then not to worry, this is exactly the best time probably to pick them up, especially if you were thinking of a present for somebody. And some of these board games, what I like about them, is that you can even play them in two people.

The one that I would recommend checking out just in this episode, or from this episode, is Pandemic. Very, very cool board game, it’s quite scientific, it’s about, like, a virus spreading across the planet and you have to dispatch scientists across the world to stop the virus and quarantine regions or cure them and so on. So, the base Pandemic is really cool, a very good starting game. And if you’ve played Pandemic, then the next step, I highly recommend getting Pandemic Legacy. That’s a one-of-a-kind board game where you actually build your own board game as you go along. And as things progress, you have to rip up cards or put stickers on the board, and things like that, so it’s a very unique type of board game.

What I like about Pandemic, as I mentioned, is that you can play it even in two players. You don’t have to … Some board games you need, like, five players, four players to make it interesting or fun. Pandemic Legacy and Pandemic, I’ve played it with just one other person, with two people playing it, it’s really exciting. So, if you want to give your better half a present and you’re not envisaging going out and playing board games with friends, Pandemic Legacy is a great example of that great option.

Yeah, and so some of the other ones here, some of them, my top picks for board games would be Pandemic Legacy. Harry Potter: Hogwarts Battle is surprisingly good if you’re a fan of Harry Potter or if you have friends who are fans of Harry Potter, they would love it and it’s not childish at all, so, I played it just recently, like two days ago.

Secret Hitler, very fun board game was funded through Kickstarter, it’s about … It’s very similar to Avalon, you just have to find out who is playing the Hitler character and you need to stop them from doing all their bad things.

Cards Against Humanity, great game. I only played recently for the first time, very, very fun but also, it’s not for kids. There’s lots of bad language in it and things like that so be prepared for that, it really requires, I think quite a few drinks before playing it or a very open mind. Those are kind of the four. Probably Dracula is another great one. You have to find Dracula on the map and like three or four of you play against one person who’s playing as Dracula.

So those are my top favourite board games and this was our casual episode about having some fun, having a really engaging and interesting time with others and a way to socialize, so if you’ve never played a board game, I really highly recommend doing so. If you have, then it’s a great Christmas gift or a holiday gift for those people around you and, yeah, if you haven’t done that in a long time, then maybe it’s time to. This could be a quick inspiration to revisit that passion and see how you go.

I hope you enjoyed this episode and I’ll look forward to you next time. Until then, happy analysing.