The Settlers of Catan

The Settlers of Catan is a board game that was published during 1995 in Germany and since has been translated into 30 other languages. It's a game where you are establishing settlements on the island of Catan. The games original design was actually supposed to be a large game of exploration and development in a new land but had to get downsized. The expansion combined with the game is close to what the game was originally supposed to be.

The game board represents the island and is made up of hexagonal tiles that represent different land types that are laid out randomly at the beginning of the game. Players collect the resources on the different land types and build up settlements. On each players turn they role two dice to determine what land produces resources. If they role a seven, they can move the thief, which keeps that hexagon from producing resources until it's moved and that player takes someone elses resources. You can also trade resources with other players and the offshore non-player bank (at a rate of four to one unless you own a dock). There are also different types of development cards you can get to help you by trading resources for them. The goal of the game is to get ten victory tokens, and you get victory tokens by building settlements, upgrading settlements to cities, and other achievements such as building the longest road.

This seems like a good family game to play. It is a simple game to understand so kids could play easily, but interesting enough to keep me interested. Since there's some thinking involved in how you're going to obtain the resources you need, I think that it requires enough thought to keep me immersed in the game. However, I don't think that I would be able to play it extensively like some other card and board games.