The Board Game Purge — When You Have No Friends to Play With

I am currently in the process of giving away my board games. I love board games! Unfortunately I have no one to play them with. They are gathering dust in my room. It’s better to send them off to other people, who will hopefully have the time and friends to play with them. The other week, I gave away my copies of Eclipse: New Dawn for the Galaxy, Order of the Stick Adventure Game, and Azul.

I always struggled to find friends, let alone people to game with. I did find a group to consistently play board games with — thus fueling my board game purchases — but that changed post-COVID. We stopped playing games due to the threat of COVID, but four years later, the group dynamic has changed. One was a victim of multiple COVID infections, wrecking their health that they needed to move back with their parents to rest and recover. Another got married with their spouse and their new business being the top priority.

One of the group’s favorite games, Terra Mystica, remains at home (even if I am not the owner). We also managed to play a few sessions of Betrayal Legacy but that story will most likely never finish.

Over the years, I managed to settle on digital adaptations of board games. I am quite happy with the implementation of Dune Imperium and is one of my go-to games. And Ascension frequently gets played on my iPad, even pre-COVID.

The other week, by sheer coincidence, I ran into someone who was in a similar plight as myself. They have a copy of Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion that remains unopened due to the lack of a gaming group. Their shelves had games like Root and Summoner Wars and Dune Imperium, and unfortunately their family didn’t take interest in them, although they do get to play with their co-workers.

Hindsight is 20/20 but at that moment, I wish I could have reached out to them, told them I was in the same boat and I wish I could play their games with them, so that their hobby is a little bit less lonely. At how I hope their passion for games isn’t stifled and that there are others like myself rooting for them.

Unfortunately, social dynamics is a tricky thing. That’s not exactly a confession you say to someone you just met. And they were accompanied by a mutual acquaintance who was also navigating the waters of a new friendship.

Some people might cling to hope that maybe they’ll see that person again but it’s impractical to expect lightning to strike twice. I wish we could have comiserrated regarding our circumstance and there’s all the board games we could have discussed and played with. But that opportunity has probably passed, and so the board game purge continues.