Member Reviews
Fun non-fiction look at the history of games, especially the social history and the story of game design. This would be interesting to game developers and designers interested in the wider context.
Book received from NetGalley.
The book was entertaining, and I was almost guaranteed to enjoy it since my family and friends get together a few times a year to spend the weekend playing games, and board games are a part of it. We're more likely to be playing Catan than Monopoly, or Arkham Horror than Clue, but the more well-known board games are on our shelves as well. The book starts with early games, like Senet and Chess and discusses newer games as well. I liked it, and at some point, I may pick it up for a re-read. I do recommend it for any gamers out there.
This book is SUPER interesting. This isn't even a real DNF review - Its not that I don't want to finish it, its that I'll never fully read it. I flick through chapters and find it interesting, but its really long to sit and read cover to cover as a nonfiction book and the way its bogs itself down with details makes it hard to read for long periods.
It's All A Game is a book about the history of the board game and features a lot of fun games and looks into details about why the games were created and why they have been such a staple in households for so many years. My favorite board game is Monopoly so reading more about that one and how it helped prisoners escape the Nazis was pretty interesting. There were a lot of games I have played featured as well as some that I had never heard of mentioned in the book as well. It goes without saying that this book was a FUN read and if you have any interest in games you might want to check it out!
I received a free e-copy of this book in order to write this review, I was not otherwise compensated.
This was much more interesting than I had expected it to be. I've always liked board games and often wondered where they stemmed from. I had a vague idea about the background of Chess but never knew about the starry past of Backgammon and I learned so much about the unlikely beginnings of Monopoly, Scrabble and Operation.
The board games featured all have remarkable stories, from post world war II morality, religious indoctrination, war games and battle planning and even pandemics. A lot of the games were familiar to me though some were entirely new (and now I want to play those).
The book covers a lot of ground- seminal moments in human history are well covered but the author really invests in communicating the cultural context that created all of these games and suggesting how they all became so prevalent
Sophie’s reading time has been rather limited over the last few weeks thanks to the school summer break, however, she did find time to work her way through It’s All a Game: The History of Board Games from Monopoly to Settlers of Catan by Tristan Donovan. In fact, that title is rather misleading as the book begins thousands of years before Monopoly‘s invention with the beginnings of recognizable board gaming way back in the ancient world.
First and foremost, this is a book about the history of games. In turn, chapters examine different styles of games and explore their history. One chapter looks at the games found in Ancient Egyptian tombs and in the ruins of ancient Iraq, another follows the history of war games and explains how they truly changed the fate of our planet, another explores how the plastic era blurred the boundaries of toys and games with creations like Mousetrap. We meet the inventors of the games nearly all of us have in our homes and learn the stories of how those games often never became the household names they are today except through fate and a hefty dollop of luck.
However, this is more than just a history of the games themselves. It’s All a Game looks at the eras in which many classic games found their fame, discussing the social history surrounding them and seeing how these cultural messages were reflected in popular games of the era. Changes to The Game of Life over the decades have reflected changes in American society, Monopoly‘s current message differs hugely from its beginnings as an anti-capitalist lecture in a box, and Twister would never have become successful if it hadn’t been launched in the era of the swinging sixties.
Sophie found it fascinating to see how games had changed to meet societal attitudes over time. The chapter about games reflecting sexual attitudes was particularly interesting as it tracked the initial pearl clutching faced by Twister (touching other people so intimately in the living room, won’t somebody please think of the children!) through to Seduction in the 1970s (“a swinging game for swinging couples” – yes, you can still pick it up on Amazon), then on to SEXploration! in the wake of the AIDS/HIV crisis – a game in which players could catch STI’s from sex without a condom. One of the final chapters looks at the modern games that are exploring the world we live in today – games about geopolitics, the War on Terror, international pandemics, and other global fears – and shows us how these games teach us more about the world. There is an important reason why the box art for Pandemic shows us what it does.
This is a book that will appeal hugely to tabletop gamers but also one that Sophie would recommend to anyone with an interest in modern world history. Tabletop games reflect our world back at us in far more depth than she ever realized.
This is a fun book to read about this history of board games. It is always nice to just read a fun book about unique bits of history. I highly recommend it.
This must be on my shortlist for non-fiction title of the year, for it really does hit the spot. The contents page doesn't look particularly like it, but it is a straight historical narrative on the whole, covering the millennia from the early board games' evolution, up to modern computer programmes winning at chess and go, and current games cons with the new titles that might or might not be remembered in decades to come. It certainly taught me a fair bit about a lot, and even if you have a passing knowledge of games, contents such as the great Scrabble dictionary divide and debate will entertain. Even Monopoly gets a skewed look, with the help of subterfuge editions for POWs. Seeing as the only omission I could think of would be the plagiarism claim about Trivial Pursuit, I have to consider this a fully comprehensive book. And much like its subject it's not exactly geeky, but can be great friendly fun. This really is the book on this subject you'd hope for.
This book was a very enjoyable non-fiction read for me. I love reading about nerdy things and board games is something that I have been getting more and more into this year. The writing was a bit dry at times and sometime filled with fact after fact but I did enjoy reading about some of my favorite games. I particularly loved the section on chess and how it was adopted across cultures and changed to what we know now.
This book is probably not one you would sit down and read all at once. It was one that I loved dipping in and out of throughout the month and it could be read just skipping around to chapters you were most interested in. The one downfall that I saw was that the chapters were long. I think that having shorter chapters and really cutting the stories down a bit would have helped with the paving of the novel. Unless I was a big fan of the game, I didn’t care as much for the depth of detail the author went into.
I think that this is a great book to give a game lover in your life or someone who just loves learning about little glimpses of history in fun and palatable chapters.
Fun book about the history of board games. If you are a gamer, you probably should brush up on the history of your favorite past time. This book covers the origins of Monopoly, Risk, and all those plastic board games you played as a kid (Mouse Trap, Operation). The parts I found interesting were the ancient history of board games going back to the Egyptians. There was a lot about Chess since that is an old and extremely influential game.
Overall, good read and well written. Excellent book for anyone who enjoys games and/or history
There's few things I enjoy more than sitting down with some friends and playing table top games. From the classics of Monopoly, Scrabble, Chess, and Sorry, to the modern successes of Catan and Ticket to Ride, the sheer joy these games provide is amazing. When I saw this book was being written, I knew I had to get my hands on it.
Donovan does a splendid job at taking each chapter and chronicling the history of a particular game that has stood the test of time. Starting the book off with chess was a brilliant move because the game itself is so popular but also, something unbeknownst to me prior to reading this book, its history is so rich and full of controversy and change. Immediately the reader is hooked and Donovan never lets go. Backgammon, Monopoly, the Game of Life - all of the board game successes that have passed from generation to generation are here, and there's so much fun history to learn from this book.
Donovan writes in such a casual, easy way that it feels like you are actually sitting down to play a game together and he looks up at you and says, "Oh, by the way, did you know..." and the book writes itself. People of all age, gender, and gaming experience will love this book. My brother is an avid gamer, and I have already planned to purchase a copy for him for his upcoming birthday. By knowing the history of how these games came to be, one can truly appreciate the richness, depth, and complexity they bring to the table.
This book is a home run in about every facet. Well-written, full of interesting topics, and never gets tired or boring, It's All a Game is a smash hit. Highly recommended.
I thought this book would be a natural fit for me. I love board games and I love history. So, history of board games? YES PLEASE. It turns out I was right. This was a great overview of the hobby and talked about games ive never heard of before but hope to get a chance to play soon.
This was well written and thought provoking, yet entertaining and enjoyable. I would recommend it to anyone. 4.5 out of 5 stars.
We like to play board games at my house so I was eager to read It’s All a Game to learn more about the creation of some of our favorite games. For the most part, the book was interesting and entertaining, and I learned a lot of fascinating facts that I have been imparting to my family and friends. My one caveat is that occasionally Donovan spends way too much time on one particular subject such as the Russian domination of chess for decades; I found that out of place in a book on the history of various games. I just skimmed those sections and moved on.
The histories of games such as Clue, The Game of Life, Monopoly, Trivial Pursuit, and Scrabble are much more complicated and creative than one might think. Truly for me, it was actually a subject I had never thought about at all. Each game follows a path that seems to be a combination of ingenuity, luck, and timing, and each individual story is quite intriguing and speaks to what society valued at the time of the creation of that particular game. I was also amazed to learn that Monopoly was used to funnel escape kits to the Allied prisoners during World War 2. The cardboard base of the game had small compartments cut into the board to stash a small compass, two files and a silk map and then the playing area was glued back on. Money in the currency the prisoners would need was hidden among the Monopoly money. How cool is that?!
I really enjoyed the section on German games, particularly The Settlers of Catan and Ticket to Ride, because we play those a fair amount. I wish the author had included a few other popular games such as Blokus and Sequence to round out the book, but overall he covered a good list of games.
I recommend this book for those who enjoy playing board games; I learned so many cool details that add another dimension to my enjoyment of playing those games. Thanks to Thomas Dunne Books and NetGalley for the chance to read this ARC in exchange for an honest review.
A fascinating look into the history of board games including classics like chess, Scrabble, Life, Clue, Mousetrap, Operation, Monopoly, and Risk, and newer games like Catan and Ticket to Ride. Some games, surprisingly, were used by the Japanese before the attack on Pearl Harbor, and by the allies to smuggle information during WWII.
A brilliant little book full of fun facts and interesting stuff for board game fans . Great fun to read .
Thank you to Net Galley and Thomas Dunne Books for an ARC of this book. I did enjoy it, but I wish it had covered more games, rather than long chapters on some of the games that didn't interest me as much. I really enjoyed the chapters that involved some of the games I grew up with. The interesting back stories were well researched and fascinating...sad in some cases. I'd recommend this book...you can just skim through some that you aren't as interested in.