Pander to the urge to dominate – 20/55 Features of Best-Selling Board Games

If you looked at the media reports about board games, they would tend to suggest that because board games are a positive activity which encourage social interaction, and have a range of other benefits that players play games for entirely worthy reasons.

But just because board games have positive benefits does not mean that the darker side of the human psyche remains in the bottle during playing board games. There are plenty of gams which encourage (sometimes vicious) competition. Monopoly, for instance, is a game which is all about dominating your opposition financially and putting other players out of the game. Risk is the ultimate game of megalomania, the game is about conquest and crushing your opponents.

People tend to be full of contradictory characteristics, but also families tend to be made up of people who view game playing differently from each other. There are plenty of people around who love to play games because it gives them an opportunity to compete and win against those closest to them.

The fact that the two games listed above have sold hundreds of millions of units should be good enough proof to show that games which appeal to our basest competitive instincts can be vastly commercially successful.

We run a Consultancy business helping board games companies to grow. We have experience of most major board games markets around the world and our team has developed more than 200 board games including versions of classic games like Monopoly, Clue/do, Risk, Game of Life etc. For more information on our services (including our Export sales Consultancy) please just click here: https://www.kidsbrandinsight.com/services/

Sign up now for our free BoardGameBiz newsletter offering insights, news and analysis of the business of Board Games. We’ll also send you a free copy of our book ’55 Features of Best-Selling Board Games’ – just click here to sign up