The 'Must Have' Board Games I Was Wrong About | Part 2

When buying games, you think "I'll really like this one!" Or sometimes, you avoid a game because "that looks awful". Here's 10 games that I had expectations for that didn't exactly line up to what I ended up feeling after owning and playing them. Some regrets and some better than expecteds.
Thanks for watching!

Time Stamp:
00:00 - Expectations Were Made
01:00 - The Wiz War To End All Wiz War
03:10 - The Dune Imperium Anti-Hype
06:12 - 20 Weak or Strong?
09:26 - The Batman Gotham City Chronicles Wet Dream
12:30 - The Betrayal of Mystery Mansion and Scooby Doo IP
14:22 - I'm Blue Over Azul and the Azules Family
17:12 - Dead of Winter: Which Way Is This One Gonna Go?
20:45 - The Irony of the Biggest El Grande
23:22 - Carnival of Monsters Garfield Pedigree
24:47 - My Only GMT EVER: Dominant Species…Marine
27:48 - Final Thoughts: Crows Taste Better With Ketchup

#LiegeOfGames #boardgames #wrong

[KitsuneBleu]

Some people come to this channel for board game insights; I come for one man's decent into madness

[haxan]

My most suprising like was The Witcher in the Old World. I didn't back this in the campaign because my interest was minimal. After fulfillment to backers, I watched a few playthroughs and really liked the mechanics. Ended up buying a used copy, with some extras at a really good price. Love the game.

[gabdewulf]

GMT Twlight Struggle is worth a try too, if you haven't tried it. That was another highly ranked game on BGG for a long time.

[IronSalamander]

I have an older Wiz War, it's goofy fun for sure.

I appreciate the anti-hype! It's worse with video games, but so many overhyped board games end up being ok at best. I played one of the Dune Imperium games despite loathing the IP, but it's a good game.

I played that Batman Chronicles game, big mess of a game, and I hate the idea of resting mid combat like that.

I too am a huge Scooby Doo fan! It was a large part of my childhood back in the 70s, and I recently grabbed all the old shows that I could on DVD/Blu-Ray, although don't have the Addams family episode, and some I only have digitally on Amazon.

El Grande is fun! I just played it this year finally. Would love to play again.

Hansa Teutonica was a pleasant surprise. It looked terrible, but I've played it at least 6 times now, and it's got player interaction which the lack of is why I normally dislike most Euros, and my friend that owns it brings it a lot, so it gets played a lot.

I forgot about Carnival of Monsters, plus whenever I hear that, I think of the excellent 3rd Doctor story of that name instead of that game.

Dominant Species was ok, not great but decent enough. Never played the Marine version though.

[deanmccrossen]

I’m interested in Wiz Wars but the 9th reprint art looks horrible. Prefer the look of the 8th. Is the new edition the same but new art- no changes to the regular base game?

[Renegade_KT]

Chris is the anti-hero we don't deserve but need!

[ben]

Dune Imperium is easily my most played boardgame ever. It just hits all the right lobes of my brain that makes me just feel so satisfied.

[paintballinrn]

Wiz war 8th top 10 for me. A game that just works!

[markd]

I had a similar route into the hobby. Still own DoW, haven't played it for several years but I can't let it go despite the new shiny games that come and go. Would happily play it again.

[alanrobertson]

Hey Chris, I think you should probably sleeve Dune Imperium because if you don't sooner or later you will have known information due to the exponentially greater use starter cards get. Environmentally it's probably a wash at worst given the shrink wrap, production's energy consumption and multistage shipping.

[branboom]

I thought Lords of Waterdeep was going to be super basic and boring and passed on it for years. I finally played it in 2024 and it quickly became my favourite board game.

[kennychan]

Chris, like you did for dc United. Will you do a last minute update on death may die especially from new player perspective what to pledge?

[duchypuchy]

9:00 CTG mentioned they are working on a (semi)coop version for the Nemesis deck. So we should get some coop 20 strong action in 2026

[seanbester]

I went all in on GCC season 1, then season 2, then season 3. Kept holding off playing because of the rulebook and wanted a solo mode. Guess who still hasn't cracked any of it open :P

[ViscountCharles]

As you say, Batman Gotham City Chronicles was a massive letdown.

And it absolutely should not have been!

I played a demo of the game at Essen, prior to the KS campaign, and it was great. But the things that needed improvement (icons, map readability etc) they kept the same, the things that they hadn't done yet (rulebook, missions) they did very badly, and the things that worked fine (like that first scenario) they changed completely.

I struggle to think of any other example where the development work done by a publisher (which is one of their core functions - but rarely understood by anyone who has not worked with one of the established publishers that have been around for more than a decade) has been done so badly.

[ABTOCMEPTb]

I don't care about Dune universe at all, but our group likes the mechanics of Dune board game.
Dominant Species theme always draws my attention when I see this game on sale, but visually game is implemented so plain and that stops me from getting it every time....Maybe when I see it for $30.
The rest of games here I simple never cared for.
Like your presentation. Subbed.

[benja]

I've heard Townsfolk Tussle spoken in the same breath as Kingdom Death Monster. Are they at all similar?

[kishorepurohit]

I fully agree with your views about Azzuulll but disagree with respect to El Grande…

[patrickbrown]

Bunny Kingdom and Carnival of Monsters came out at roughly the same time and I was shocked at how bad Carnival of Monsters was after how good Bunny Kingdom was. Same designer, both drafting, just CoM is terrible.

[KristoVaher]

Oh and Felicia Day goes for 50 bucks in the aftermarket :D