This is a list for the true cardboard creeps out there. The ones who keep those little Silica Gel packets in their games. Just in case. The ones who could go out and join a game night. But they stay in. And play their own damn games. By themselves! In silence!

Solo gaming is perhaps the most actively evolving part of our hobby. There are constantly new ways of playing solo that emerge for games that should never work in that way. It’s a rarity for a game to release without a solo mode or automata these days, and the hobby is better for it.

From the simplest Beat-Your-Own-Score solos to the most complex bots, solo games span the depth and breadth of Tabletop Gaming. If you like a game for any reason, chances are there’s a way for you to play it by yourself in your basement with one unshielded bulb illuminating you and your meeples.

Before we dive in, I must give some thanks. There are so many solo games out there that I have not played. Most of them, even! The online solo gamer communities are wonderful, and shared thoughts that have found their way here. Special thanks to the members of the Gaming Rules! Slack, and the 1-Player Guild on BGG.

OK, enough sap. On to the rankings already!

10. Best Solo Game for Gamers Who Like An Audience

Hoplomachus: Victorum
Is the setup the best part of Hoplomachus: Victorum? No. But it is ridiculously close. As always, Chip Theory goes overboard on production. The marbled stadium seating where your future enemies sit and watch your bloody conquest across the ancient world is absolutely breathtaking.

The game is great, too. Fabulous tactical battlefields filled with stacks of chips and an overwhelming (for the first 7 hours) set of keywords and evolving enemies abound. This is absolutely an all-weekend game. To play all four acts takes 8+ hours. Use the now-official quick variant Mercury’s Boots to dramatically cut back play time while still gaining the full experience.

1 Player • Ages 14+ • 60-90* minutes • $149

*CTG is full of it, this game takes 8 hours

9. Best Solo Game for Doodlers

The Anarchy
The Anarchy is a dense, heavy flip-n-write. Emphasis on the write. There are two Excel-inspired sheets that you’ll scrawl your way through for the highest score. Scribbling, circling, crossing out. Just don’t lose your place and fill in the wrong line.

This game is kind of a staring contest with a table. There is never enough of what you want. And yet if you look long enough, you can combo your way to victory. The included solo campaign will give specific setup scenarios to conquer, and depending on how well you do, bonuses for your next game. The lift is very heavy for a flip-n-write, and it is delicious.

1-4 Players • Ages 13+ • 60-90 minutes • $64

8. Best Solo Game for Sophisticated Pirates

Nemo’s War
Nemo’s War is an incredible simulator. It is vast, it is dense, it is dark, it is overwhelming. And yet. The brilliance of the game comes in its ability to capture the story and feel of outrunning the Navies of the World while Nemo relentlessly pursues one of his variable goals.

Nemo’s War is a fantastic way to get a war game-ish experience by yourself. The theme and story are immersive. There are dozens of dice to chuck (two or three at a time. But I couldn’t just let that alliteration slip by), and tough decisions to be made. It can end in utter ruin or splendiferous triumph for you and Nemo. Just make sure you’ve got a Captain’s Hat ready to wear while you play.

1-4 Players • Ages 13+ • 60 -120 minutes • $75

7. Best Solo Game for Hippies

Gingkopolis
Gingkopolis is an ingenious design. (inb4 “well that’s just, like, your opinion man”) Players are building a city together, competitively, while trying to mimic the magnificent Ginkgo Biloba in symbiosis with nature. That theme falls away the second you open the box, but it doesn’t matter. The puzzle is that good.

Build out, or build up? You decide. The game leaves out the player powers and re-draw tokens with solo. So it becomes an efficiency puzzle of “do the best with what you got”. The bot, Hal, is super easy to run and is a brilliantly frustrating opponent.

1-5 Players • Ages 10+ • 45 minutes • $48

6. Best Solo Game for Coin Pushers

Under Falling Skies
Under Falling Skies started life as an in-hand card game. It had enough of a following that Czech Games Edition spun it into a full-blown board game that is essentially Galaga. And it’s perfect. I find myself playing on my lunch break occasionally. The board is unique, the alien ships are fun, and the puzzle of dice placement is challenging.

And if it works for you, there’s a campaign included that takes about 10 games to play through with a fun comic book story to accompany it. Under Falling Skies is the perfect blend of thinky challenge and not overstaying its welcome. That 40-minute estimate is right on.

1 Player • Ages 12+ • 20-40 minutes • $62

5. Best Solo Game for Time Travelers

Anachrony
Ask for a resource, and it just plops out of a time portal for you? Yes! Oh, wait, future me has to pay for that? Nooo!

Such is Anachrony.

The Infinity Box for Anachrony is a testament to sprawl in board gaming. It is also my favorite game relic I own. The inserts are many, and they are magnificently designed. The number of game trayz that litter the table when this game comes out is silly.

And yet. Anachrony is fantastic. It is a crunchy worker placement optimization puzzle that rewards clever planning and punishes shortcomings with equal fervor. Theme, art, gameplay, and graphic design all come together to make for a magnificent gaming experience.

My favorite way to play is against the Chronossus bot using the Fractures of Time module. The bot is on the more complex end of automas and does a great job of simulating a human player. Fractures adds wonderful crunch, and the minis are arguably essential for gameplay.

1-4 Players • Ages 15+ • 90-180 minutes • $60

4. Best Solo Game for Token Touchers

A Feast for Odin
Uwe’s ode to the Vikings of yore. Complete with two different trays of polyomino tiles, plus all the wood, stone, ore, boats, and meeples a fella could want! Setup can take a while, and for us meticulous michaels, it is lovely.

A Feast For Odin is a tremendous sandbox. Lead your Vikings on raids, or trades, or whaling journeys. Or stay home and raise horses! (Norwegian expansion required for the Equines). There is no bot to speak of; instead, you play with two colors of Vikings, blocking spaces for yourself in alternating rounds. It makes the game extra challenging because you cannot spam a single strategy.

1-4 Players • Ages 12+ • 30-120 minutes • $125

3. Best Solo Game for Card Counters

Imperium [Classics, Legends, Horizons] & Star Trek Captain’s Chair
Hey bro, nice deck.

The Imperium system series of games is wonderful. It originated with Imperium Classics, added more decks in Imperium Legends, evolved in Imperium Horizons, and ascended with Star Trek Captain’s Chair (with more content due soon!).

These are among the deepest games I own. The core of the Imperium system is your deck. wink. The best review for Imperium and all its civs has already been written, find it here (with apologies to your mother).

Pick a civilization or a Star Trek captain and guide them through an epoch or an episode. Each deck plays wildly differently from the others. Each deck has its own “thing”, what it guides you to do.

Build your deck, cycle your deck, add your more powerful or strategic cards to your deck. Buy from the market, and use your action economy effectively. The system is brilliant. The decks are remarkably replayable, and the market keeps each game unique. The bots are easy to run and challenging to beat.

This is a desert island game. Play it forever.

1-4 Players • Ages 14+ • 90-120 minutes • $32

2. Best Solo Game for Wizards

Mage Knight
Mage Knight sits atop many of the best solo game lists, including the previous version that was published here at BGQ. And for good reason. Mage Knight is incredible. It is deep. It is fiddly. It is thematic. It’s wizards with giant swords. Yes please!

Like the Imperium system above, it is a deck management game. Cards give abilities (move, attack, block, influence), but you can also spend cards as +1 of anything. And therein lies the brilliance.

Your hand may not lend itself to accomplishing the specific thing you wanted on this turn. That’s ok. The tactical brilliance of Mage Knight is in learning when to spend cards to boost other actions. When to adjust from planning a siege to exploring tiles. When to fight that dragon (more on that dragon coming soon) or move away and recruit.

There is no solo opponent beyond a “dummy player” to act as a timer. It’s just you vs the board. That decision space is vast and rewarding. No game I know has captured the feel of leveling up and the power boosts that come with it as well as Mage Knight.

Just remember to Pillage that Village.

1-4 Players • Ages 14+ • 150 minutes

1. Best Solo Game

Voidfall
Voidfall is a masterpiece. A determinist’s dream. There is no randomness, no surprise powers. Just you, the Voidborn, and the 10,000-piece puzzle that is Voidfall.

It looks like a 4x game. It is not. There is no exploration or exploitation. The on-ramp is considerable. Players must learn an entirely new hieroglyphic language from the genius that is Ian O’Toole in order to understand the gameplay, in addition to the rules.

Voidfall is a table hog. Its setup time is considerable, especially with the Galactic Box edition, where you must physically assemble each Fleet mini that gets played on the board. There is the galactic map, the galactic event board, the technology offer, the agenda offer, the crisis board, your House mat, tokens, resource trackers, a score tracker. It’s enormous, and all integral to gameplay.

After that enormous on-ramp of rules and setup, the payoff is well worth it.

The ridiculously oversimplified version is that Voidfall is a card game. Play 3-6 Focus cards per Cycle for 3 Cycles and then count up points. That card play impacts several of those systems on the board. That can have cascading effects meaning one card play can result in 4-5 lots of cogs moving around the board.

Those card play decisions can be agonizing! You always wish you had one more turn to play in that Cycle.

The solo game adds an extra layer in mitigating crises each turn. Each crisis makes the Voidborn more powerful unless you can meet the criteria to get rid of it.

Yet there is no bot to speak of. The Voidborn will attack each Cycle, but there is nothing to simulate another player. And that isn’t needed, because the decision space for your own empire vs the board is enough.

Each House has 2 starting setups, with unique technologies and play styles. There are different Galactic Events for each Cycle. You can play this dozens of times without ever playing the same game, despite how deterministic the game is.

After all of that. All the rules. All the setup. All the hieroglyphs. The payoff is a game that is dazzling in its scope, magnificent in its decision space, sublime in its experience. The Voidborn are here. And more are coming.

1-4 Players • Ages 15+ • 90-240 minutes • $120