The Boardgames Chronicle 2025 most often played games

Welcome to the first post in this series, which looks back at my board-gaming experiences in 2025 while also exploring what I am expecting – and anticipating – in 2026. To begin, I would like to extend my sincere thanks to my fellow bloggers for the inspiration and motivation behind this series. Yes, I am looking at you: CliosBoardgames, ThePlayersAid and Dude! Take Your Turn!

As always, I will begin with a topic that particularly interests me: a look back at 2025 and the games that saw the most play at my table, along with a few additional useful statistics. Once again, I relied on the excellent Board Games Stats app, which I have been using for the sixth consecutive year. It provides a wealth of insightful data about my hobby, is very convenient to use, and synchronizes seamlessly with BoardGameGeek. If you have not tried it yet, I strongly recommend doing so.

Let us have a look into details below!

General insights

Without a doubt, 2025 was an excellent year for my boardgame group. We played 146 different titles – an increase of 40 percent compared to the previous year – for a total of 555 plays, which marks an all-time record. Some games were lengthy, others much shorter; some were played solo, others in multiplayer settings. Taken as a whole, however, it was a truly tremendous year of boardgaming.

Of course, this is partly a matter of statistical nuance – there were days filled with many games, especially during conventions, and others with a single longer title or none at all. Even so, it is still an achievement well worth celebrating.

Opponents & players count

Analyzing this statistic is particularly interesting. During the pandemic years, most of my games were played online against opponents on Vassal. This began to change gradually in 2022 and shifted significantly in 2023. By 2025, things had largely returned to normal. The majority of my plays are now with my family – Magda, Natan, and Kuba K – as we consciously try to cultivate this way of spending time together rather than having everyone focused on their phones.

My regular weekly or bi-weekly group – Kuba G, Kuba J, and Adam – accounts for a large proportion of all games played. Several trips with Żenia and Katja also resulted in a significant number of sessions. Overall, I am very pleased to see such a diverse group of players around the table.

As expected for someone who primarily plays wargames, two-player sessions dominate the statistics, accounting for a record 30 percent of all plays. Unsurprisingly, four-player games follow closely behind at 29 percent. What is particularly interesting is the number of high-quality three-player wargames played last year, which together make up 25 percent of all sessions. A very satisfying result.

Most played titles

And now to the most important and interesting statistic! The BGStats divides all your played games into couple of categories:

• centuries– played 100 times or more – well, not in 2025 nor in 2024 was I so biased to one of my favorite games so much as to have over 100 sessions logged; but there were times – like in 2016 – when I played Commands Colors Ancient 165 times…
• quarters –played 25 times or more; this time there was none here. How is that possible with 555 plays in total? Well, we have three (!!!) games with 24 plays: Time of Crisis which I played both live and via Rally the Troops, Memoir’44 – live and on Board Game Arena and Flip 7, which gained enormous popularity on our group.
• dimes – played 10 times or more – I have here actually my first 17 games from the ranking. It is pretty versatile representation – mainly wargames like C&C Ancients, C&C Medieval, Battle of Hoth or 300. But also family games like Ticket to Ride Legacy, Avel or Dominion.

• fives – played 5 times or more – I played so many games so many times that only three in that category are in Top 20 – Nova Luna, Iwo Jima: Hell On Earth and ARCS (with its great campaign!)

It gives me great satisfaction to see that I am still keeping up with my hobby and playing such a diverse range of games. Writing a blog and running a YouTube channel require a significant time commitment – time that could otherwise be spent at the gaming table. All the same, I can only hope – and wish for myself and for all of you – that 2026 will be just as rewarding for our hobby.

PS. Next week I will present how The Boardgames Chronicle blog & YouTube channel fared in 2025 and will suggest Dear Readers a look back at some of the best content created.