I feel there are types of games, or game mechanics, that I dislike; and there are inevitably going to be “popular” games of those types which are maybe considered amongst the best exponents of those particular mechanics. I imagine most people would similarly have game types they don’t enjoy, so we probably all have games we could list here – and they’re probably all genuinely good games, so long as you enjoy that type of game?
The ones which spring to mind for me are:
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Splendor. I’ve played this 3-4 times and never enjoyed myself at any point. This was a good thing, because it led me to realise that in general I don’t much like “engine building” in games – but it took a game which is purely engine building to make me recognise that this had been a strong factor in many other games I’d not enjoyed very much.
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“Social Deduction” games. These simply aren’t fun for me. I don’t want to have to lie and trick people; I don’t want to have to figure out who might be trying to lie and trick the rest of us; I don’t want to arbitrarily select someone to be “murdered” that day; I don’t want to have to guess who the murderer is based on little to no information. I don’t enjoy any of it. I joined a game of “Two Rooms and a Boom” one time because there was so much buzz around it, in case that changed my mind, and it was easily the most tedious experience I’ve ever had at a games convention. Most of these games don’t even sound like games to me (which is probably a large part of the problem). A little ridiculously I actually own a copy of Avalon, but just the other day it I was thinking that I should get rid of it. I think part of me has always thought “maybe this would be exactly the right choice in some situation”, but I don’t think that’s ever going to happen.
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Most games with auctions, except for High Society which is nothing but auctions and also, crucially, fast and silly. Add auctions into a longer strategic game though, and it quite likely ruins the game for me.
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RoboRally. I think I’ve enjoyed every programming game I’ve ever played except for RoboRally (which I’ve tried enough times to be pretty sure about it).
And both last and, in my estimation, least:
- Poker. You can probably file it under “social deduction” above, but I’m sure this particular title maximises the ratio of the game’s popularity against my desire to play it.