It seems like I’ve always had a vast collection of board games. Yet when I think back, it was only about 8 years ago that my board game collection consisted of various versions of Trivial Pursuit and a beat up copy of Axis & Allies. The game that jump started my collection of almost 100 board games was Star Wars: The Queen’s Gambit.

I’ve always been a huge Star Wars fan. I was just old enough to remember seeing “Return of the Jedi” in the theaters and then start collecting as many of the toys and other merchandise that I could get my little hands on. The Queen’s Gambit came out just after the Episode I craze, and I’m pretty sure was marketed directly at me, personally.

The game centers around the events at the end of the “The Phantom Menace.” The players must control the Jedis fighting Darth Maul, Anakin fighting the droid ships in space, the queen sneaking back into the palace, and the Gungans against the droids in the field. The board features places for each of these battles to take place including an impressive three story board representing the palace. The game looked cool from the start, but the three story board was the one thing that convinced me to buy it.

The Queen’s Gambit pits two team’s against each other in the Star Wars universe. One team controls the Naboo, Jedi, Gungans, and Anakin, and the other controls the droids and Darth Maul. Cards are drawn and played each turn to determine what can be moved. It can sometimes be frustrating to wait for the right card to come into your hand. It’s even more frustrating when that card shows up one turn too late.

The droid player’s strategy usually involves using as many Darth Maul cards as they can to weaken the Jedi while at the same time advancing to kill the shield generators on the field. Once the shields are down, the tanks can move in and wipe out the Gungans. The palace usually takes care of itself for awhile. It is important to knock off some of the palace guards, but you shouldn’t have to bring in new troops to do so.

The good guys have a hard time in this game. They have to defeat Darth Maul to even stand a chance and are almost certainly doomed to fail if Anakin can’t make it through the droids. Reaching the throne room is a pretty simple task compared with destroying the rest of the droids. Make sure that Darth Maul doesn’t win.

Queen’s Gambit is a pretty silly game, but that didn’t stop my friends and I from having lots of fun with it.

Twixt is a strategy game originally published by 3M in 1961. This is one of the types of games that takes less than five minutes to learn but the strategic aspects can take years to master.

The board is a grid of points that give the game a very mathematical feel. Each player takes turns placing a peg in one of the points on the board. After a peg is placed, a link may be made between any two pegs that are exactly two points over and one peg up (or any other combination that is like a knight’s move in chess).

The first player that makes a series of links from one side of the board to the other is the winner. One player top to bottom and the other left to right. Players run into each other as they are trying to cross the board.

After a few times playing the game, both players get a pretty good idea of basic strategies. More complex mathematical strategies are used by more advanced players who have tournaments every year. These games never actually end with one player making it across the board because the other player will give up when it becomes obvious that he can’t win.

The only thing harder than mastering this game might be finding a copy of it somewhere. Good luck.

Five hundred is a trick taking card game that was created in the early 20th century in the United States and now enjoys worldwide popularity, especially in Australia.

The game is very similar to Euchre, but each player is dealt ten cards instead of five. Players then take turns bidding for how many of the ten tricks that they and their partner can take. Bids must be for at least seven of the tricks, and the bids also include which suit will be trump or if there will be no trump.

Successful bids earn the team between 140 and 520 points while failing bids lose the same amount. The winning team is the first to pass 500 points or to force their opponents below -500 points.

500 is a card game with many levels of strategy at many points throughout the game. My friends and I have been addicted to it for years. All you need is four people and a deck of cards. You don’t necessarily need dice and a board for a strategic game.