Where Have My Console Board Games Gone?

By James Munn | January 16, 2007

You’ve probably read that in 2006, the Xbox 360 Live Arcade game UNO was the ninth most-played game on the Xbox Live Arcade. UNO, developed by Carbonated Games (also of Hexic fame) in Flash Lite, up on the board with epic titles like EA’s Madden ‘07 and some little-known title like Gears of War. It was the only Live Arcade title to crack the top 20. The fact is that it’s an awesomely fun little game for an awesomely tiny price, a great combination.

I fired it up a few weeks ago and began to wonder, where are the online board games? The Live Arcade is an absolutely perfect venue for a game of online multiplayer Monopoly (with the different versions of Monopoly available for purchase from the Marketplace) or a classic game like the Game of Life? I heard a rumor recently that Sorry was on its way to the Xbox 360. I can almost hear the player voices in my ear,

Topics: XBOX 360 | Comments

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marc

settlers of catan seems well on its way to the arcade, and though it has a huge cult following im interested to see how it does. youre right though that it seems like games like risk, stratego, etc would so well. maybe the problem is in lisenceing?

gunstar

Settlers of Catan is perfect start. Then maybe Carcassonne, Ticket to Ride, Puerto Rico, Samurai (sweet demo at klear.com), Memoir '44, and a whole bunch of game you can't buy at Toys R Us

Kyle

Catan.

That's all.

Karsten

Settlers of Catan, Carcassonne and Alhambra were officially announced as coming to the XBLA in Leipzig last year. I have no idea when these games will be released, but they are coming.

Yehuda Berlinger

As mentioned, the above great Euro games are on their way.

As for the old American games that sit on the shelf, everyone is discovering that the joy about these games was the company, not the games. Playing them solo against a computer, you realize how vacuous they really are.

And why play bad game across a net when there are such better choices?

Yehuda

jimmycanuck

I've been saying this for ages!! Thank you for bringing this up. I'm dying to play Monopoly, Scrabble, Trivial Pursuit - all of the classics on XBL.

And just think about the extra content they could rake in the cash on - Monopoly "Limited Edition" board downloads, different Trivial Pursuit editions -- it seems to me like board games would be a huge cash cow for publishers.

James

I haven't played a board game with my brothers since I was a kid. We're all scattered across the country now.

Having these board games available to play online with video chat similar to UNO would be perfect.

Kyle

Oh, I'm sorry Karsten. What I meant by that is just that Catan is going to be incredible. I didn't mean to act like it was the only board game coming to the XBL Arcade.

Mark

I like this online multiplayer monopoly
http://www.galacticmag.com/
, but I doubt it will be released for consoles.

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Where Have My Console Board Games Gone?