Two Person Board Games?

[Hypersmurf]

Fightball!

-Hyp.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Not board games, but book games: the Lost Worlds/Runequest/Knights of the Dinner Table/Battletech combat games, as well as the conceptually similar Ace of Aces game from Nova Game Designs. Each player uses an illustrated book that has a POV that shows his opponent and a card detailing his possible maneuvers. Like countless other games before it, the object is to kill your opponent.

Nova Game Designs' Lost Worlds was a fantasy combat game, and the same system was used by later companies to put out the fully compatible RuneQuest and KODT combat games. There are a couple dozen books in the assembled games.

NGD's Battletech game, while using the same system, never caught on. AFAIK, there were only 4 books ever produced.

Ace of Aces was probably the best of the bunch, simulating air combat in WW1. Truly a classic. "Leatheroid" covers, early 1900's style illustration...simply cool.

Any of these games could be played in minutes, but two skilled or wary opponents could last a half-hour.

Unfortunately, all are out of print- but you should be able to find copies relatively easily.

Ace of Aces

Lost Worlds

THIS JUST IN! Flying Buffalo, Inc has become the successor to Nova and Chessex to both reprint the old and print new Lost Worlds combat books!

Flying Buffalo, Inc

 

[Mistwell]

Not to derail this, but I was just thinking the other day that about a year ago or so I think you were looking for a new job here in L.A. Where did you end up?

I ended up working for my families company (now third generation), which is at www.academicapparel.com and www.buyclassrings.com . I also still have my own law firm on the side 2 days a week, where I represent some gaming and comic book related companies, and a few others. Thanks for remembering! Where do you work?

 

[Samothdm]

I ended up working for my families company (now third generation), which is at www.academicapparel.com and www.buyclassrings.com . I also still have my own law firm on the side 2 days a week, where I represent some gaming and comic book related companies, and a few others. Thanks for remembering! Where do you work?

I got laid off from my old ad job but am now currently freelancing at another ad agency on Wilshire right next to the Los Angeles County Art Museum.

[corporate schill]Buy Nestlé products! You know you want some tasty, delicious... something. What am I working on again? [/corporate schill]

I remembered because my friend is an Assistant United States Attorney in downtown L.A. and I think I had posted in your thread when you asked for job leads to check out over there and see if they were hiring at the time.

 

[Hopping Vampire]

theres also a 2 player card game called Dungeoneer by Atlas games, really fun stuff.

 

[KnowTheToe]

Scrabble is a great two layer game
Yatzee (or however it is spelled)
Cribbage (card game with a peg board to track scoring)
boggle
Gin Rummy

 

[Fieari]

Give Go a try. Now that's a game with some depth to it... man it rocks.

Monopoly can have some new life breathed into it with varient rules. Try this one a shot: you both control two tokens, and roll two dice. You can either apply one die to each token, or both dice to one or the other. Makes things quite interesting, and the statistical value of various properties becomes more obvious. Works reasonably well with two people.

Ever hear of the Sugar Packet Game? Try it with a deck of cards.

Cheapass games have a LARGE amount of... well, very cheap, but very fun games. I highly reccomend them. Stuff like the Great Brain Robbery (Zombies+Western), Unexploded Cow (Stampede cows over a minefield to clear mines), U.S. Patent Number 1 (obtain the patent for a time machine before the other inventors of the time machine throughout the ages)... that sort of thing. It's GREAT.

 

[haiiro]

I'll second Scrabble and Mastermind, both classics for me.

Outside of the family game realm, Out of the Box has a line that includes several cool two player games: Columns and Quadtria are both excellent strategy games, very fast to play but with good depth. They're fun to play several times in a row.

Another abstract strategy favorite of mine is Abalone, which has won all sorts of awards. Definitely a thinking game.

My ex and I used to really enjoy sitting down in front of the computer and playing Text Twist, a Yahoo! word game, together. It's free and very addictive.

And, much as I'm glad my 12-step program cured me of this particular addiction, I really miss Magic: The Gathering as a quick, fun two player game. That road leads only to ruin, but it's a pleasant sort of ruin.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Seconding the recommendations of M:TG and Cheapass games, and also suggesting this- If you like the Cheapass games, check the OoP games stores for things like:

1) The old MetaGames (now Steve Jackson games) like Ogre, G.E.V. and the watershed Melee/Wizard/In the Labyrinth RPG- 3 stats, design a PC in 5 minutes.

2) Old TSR boardgames like SAGA or Revolt on Antares

3) Old Task Force Games minigames like Ultrawarrior and Robots!

4) RoboRally

5) Crimson Skies (the original, not the WizKids version). Not that I'm knocking the WizKids version- I haven't played it.

6) Avalon Hill games like Acquire, Feudal, Starship Troopers (the original- I heard they changed it), and the various Empire Builder-system train games like Iron Dragon (AFAIK, the only fantasy RR building boardgame out there).

7) Flying Buffalo's Nuclear War series of games. Quite simply the funniest game ever made about armageddon!

8) Star Fleet Battles and Starfire are both classic starship combat games.

9) Frag!, Munchkin, and Lunch Money are all classics. Also check out Modern Art, Lord of the Rings (boardgame), Quarto and Cathedral.

10) I'm also a big fan of Chainmail, which became D&D miniatures game, and its European competitor, Confrontation. And a buddy of mine just presented me with HeroScape, a new, Chainmail-esque boardgame that looks pretty cool!

 

[haiiro]

Seconding the recommendations of M:TG and Cheapass games, and also suggesting this- If you like the Cheapass games, check the OoP games stores for things like:

There's some truly excellent stuff on your list, but some of the games you mention aren't any fun with two players -- RoboRally and Munchkin jump to mind, for example.