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miffy495

Board games on the internet

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Hey all. Here's the situation:

I have a nephew who is 9 years old and on the cusp of becoming an awesome geeky kid. He loves board games and his Wii, but has very few opportunities to play the former. I play a bunch of board games as well, and have a great fondness for coop games like Pandemic and Arkham Horror in particular. I would love to introduce him to these and be his guide to the world beyond RISK, Scrabble, etc which my sister and her husband (both significantly less into dorky shit than me) can't expose him to, nor do they even know exists. Trouble is, he lives in a suburb of Toronto and I live in Calgary. For those who don't know Canadian geography, there's a LOT of space in between us. About 4 and a half hours on a plane. I've heard of sites in the past where one can play board games for free over the internet with others, but don't know any myself. In particular, I remember Thumb people talking ages ago about one with a german-sounding name. Can anyone suggest some good sites through which I can play games with this kid? All of my other siblings and his own brother are much more sporty and less nerdy than he or I, so as the adult gamer in his life, I want to show him that being a geek can be pretty fucking cool too. He's been reaching out to me on facebook lately, and this is something I'd really like to do.

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Any access to a PS3 or a 360?

There's some really easy recommendations on XBLA and PSN. (Catan on XBLA is pretty fantastic.)

Edit: Rereading that post, I realize this isn't what you asked for. I am useless.

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Yeah, I have Catan and Carcassonne, and have had my eye on Ticket to Ride for a long time, but my nephew is equipped only with a Wii, and this is mostly for him.

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Hey all. Here's the situation:

I have a nephew who is 9 years old and on the cusp of becoming an awesome geeky kid. He loves board games and his Wii, but has very few opportunities to play the former. I play a bunch of board games as well, and have a great fondness for coop games like Pandemic and Arkham Horror in particular. I would love to introduce him to these and be his guide to the world beyond RISK, Scrabble, etc which my sister and her husband (both significantly less into dorky shit than me) can't expose him to, nor do they even know exists. Trouble is, he lives in a suburb of Toronto and I live in Calgary. For those who don't know Canadian geography, there's a LOT of space in between us. About 4 and a half hours on a plane. I've heard of sites in the past where one can play board games for free over the internet with others, but don't know any myself. In particular, I remember Thumb people talking ages ago about one with a german-sounding name. Can anyone suggest some good sites through which I can play games with this kid? All of my other siblings and his own brother are much more sporty and less nerdy than he or I, so as the adult gamer in his life, I want to show him that being a geek can be pretty fucking cool too. He's been reaching out to me on facebook lately, and this is something I'd really like to do.

A few options: Risk and MTG duels on Steam. Vassal is also worth a look.

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Hmm... after looking around brettspielwelt for a while, I'm not finding any kind of option for a private game. Does this exist? The odds of being randomly paired up with my nephew are not that good...

EDIT: OK, I googled some other stuff and found a way to do it. Man, this crap is dense to figure out. I think I'll have to be skyping with my sister while setting this up so he can help him get into a game. Once he's there though, I can see this being pretty fun.

EDIT EDIT: Also, Vassal looks AWESOME. Thanks for the tip, Pat!

EDIT EDIT EDIT: Ok, Vassal looks pretty cool assuming someone knows how to play the games in question perfectly. It also doesn't do any of the setup for you. Still, for things like Dominion, I could see this working pretty well.

Edited by miffy495

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Catan's website has a bunch of different online games. You might need a subscription to set up a game with a non-random opponent though.

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Also this game is pretty awesome http://spectromancer.com/ (playing the iPad version of it, sort of) but, again, I can't vouch for the actual downloaded product and how well the online works, but it's a nice simple game with good depth.

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