Lord of the Rings
"I'm going to Mordor alone!" "And I'm going with you!"
Games scratch any number of itches. Some like the gaming and don’t want any idle chit-chat. Others prefer socializing; the game is secondary. Some eagerly attempt to crush their enemies and win. Others hate intense conflict, even when simulated by pushing pieces across the table. You can play any game in any way, but players with differing underlying values may lead to awkward group dynamics.
Co-operative games can’t cure this problem, but often mitigate it. There is a puzzle, but you (hopefully) talk to everyone to figure out the best solution. Players can embrace their inner Conan … the enemy is not another player at the table, so no hard feelings. (Hopefully).
Reiner Knizia’s Lord of the Rings1 was not the first cooperative board game of the 20th Century2 but most co-ops were Dungeons and Dragons as a board game — you fought against monsters, but as a team. Think of HeroQuest or Gauntlet. Players certainly could discuss and coordinate, but often the game would play perfectly well if each player performed to the best of their capabilities. There were cooperative games, most notably Role Playing Games, although just how cooperative those are depends on setting, the players, and the Game Master. True cooperative board games were rare and mostly unplayed.3
Knizia’s cooperative required cooperation. Players still took their turns one at a time, but each player was limited to actions based on their hand of cards. Each hobbit also had a unique ability, and was more suited for some of the requirements or others. Players could cajole, discuss or argue; but during your turn you make the decisions. But sometimes players would have to chip in resources (to summon Gandalf) … and sometimes those decisions could be selfish, because nobody wants to “be Boromir” and the first one to die4.
Knizia may have not introduced the concept of “a player gets a turn, then Sauron gets a turn,” but this was one of the first board game feature where the antagonist is the game system itself. Before this, a few board games had a “one versus many” where the antagonist is a player against the rest who form a team5. Solitaire games (and computer game) had “automated opponents” but no cooperation. Knizia mixed the two with fantastic results, no doubt helped by one of the most popular licenses of the last hundred years.
In the years after Lord of the Rings release many other coops hit the market, most notably Matt Leacock’s Pandemic (one of the best selling games of this century)6 and the entire genre of co-operative games widened the appeal of board games, as people realized that not every game involved crushing your enemies. So, I feel that Lord of the Rings is one of the 100 Most Influential games in the 20th Century.
(Even if it just barely snuck in before the deadline).
Not to be confused other games with that name (or very similar ones), including Reiner Knizia’s Lord of the Rings (his game for children) which came out a few years later with the exact same name.
It was possibly the last, published in 2000. (As always, I am not interested in arguments about whether that is or is not in the 20th Century). As of this writing, BGG lists 551 pages of cooperative games and (newest to oldest) Lord of the Rings is on page 510 (and after page 530 they are games whose release date is unknown/unset). Believe me you haven’t heard of most older games that precede it … excepting one, which I will be writing about later.
Mosbø and Mosbø’s Wizards was a game I played and owned, but only as solitaire and even then it was …. OK. But my local college gaming group played a variant to drastically speed up the game. A few games published by MetaGaming in the 70s and 80s might be considered cooperative, I’m not sure.
Boromir isn’t actually in the game, but the point stands. If you get too corrupt, you are out and (assuming you aren’t the ringbearer) get to watch the rest of the game.
BGG includes one-vs-many, so a few of those games on the 551 pages you would recognize, but I did not count (and I plan on writing about at least two of those). My earlier footnote was focusing on strictly cooperative games.
It is an utterly brilliant design, encapsulating the plot of a book in game form. Though also let down by the need to follow the plot every game.
Great game. To me, the core mechanic is the alternating "player turn -> enemy turn", which maybe is what you call "one vs. many". It is elegant and makes it easier to scale a game to any number of players. The downside is that this mechanic became so popular (especially after Pandemic) that I eventually found it stale. In a meta sense, it's like when Frodo and Sam set out they agree to let Pippin join knowing that it makes Sauron stronger. I guess thematically that works for LotR, but less so for Pandemic. It is more exciting when the addition of an extra player allows us to fight a tougher enemy rather than making the enemy act more often (relative to my turns).