Best Board Games 2014 – Nominees are in!

The Dice Tower Awards Best Board Game — Which games will take home the title this year?

What are the best board games and card games from 2014?

Well, it’s that time of year again – time to look back on 2014 and determine which were the best games published.

The annual Dice Tower Awards recognize the best board games published every year. While the award winners won’t be announced until the summer, we’re happy to share the list of nominees for 2014.

Over 3,000 new board games are published each year. So finding the best board games and card games is a tough job for sure. But that’s a challenge board game reviewers from all over the world take part in as part of The Dice Tower Awards.

Without further ado, here’s the list of nominations for Best Board Games of 2014.

Star Wars: Imperial Assault has a good chance of winning Game of the Year.

Game of the Year

Dead of Winter board game — Dead of Winter looks creepy.

Best Co-op Game

Arcadia Quest board game — Arcadia Quest is packed with a ton of cool miniatures.

Best Board Game Components

Best Family Game

Abyss board game — Abyss sure has some cool artwork.

Best Game Artwork

Best Game Expansion

Cash n Guns board game — Ca$h ‘n Guns is really a fun game.

Best Game Reprint

Best Game Theming

Splendor card game — Splendor has received a lot of positive reviews.

Best New Designer

Best Party Game

Best Small Publisher

Five Tribes board game — Five Tribes has impressed a lot of people.

Best Strategy Game

Best Two-Player Game

Spyfall board game — We’re really looking forward to playing Spyfall.

Most Innovative Game

So far we’ve only posted a review of one of the games on these lists – Splendor. And we’ve only played a handful of the rest of the games on the list so far. (Yes, we have some favorites already…)

But we are familiar with most of them and many are on my “want to play list”.

Now that the nominees are set, we’ll give it our best shot to play as many as possible before it’s time to vote.

Truly judging the merits of a board games takes time. Some games may be good initially, but will fade when the shiny “hotness” wears off. So it’s good to take a look at winners from years past and see if those games are still considered great board games.

Winners of Best Board Games from years past:

2013 – Best Game of the Year Winner: Caverna: The Cave Farmer
2012 – Best Game of the Year Winner: Star Wars: X-wing Miniatures Game
2011 – Best Game of the Year Winner: Eclipse
2010 – Best Game of the Year Winner: 7 Wonders
2009 – Best Game of the Year Winner: Smallworld
2008 – Best Game of the Year Winner: Dominion
2007 – Best Game of the Year Winner: Race for the Galaxy

Which games do you think will win for Best Games of 2014?