Most Anticipated Historical Board Games, 2025

Happy new year, everybody! I hope it will bring you much joy. I also hope it will bring you board games (which is basically the same thing). The question is, however: Which games? – Here are a few 2024 releases which look most intriguing to me.

As always, don’t take this as a shopping list (neither for you nor for me). Your taste in games and your discretion how many new games you want to chase decide what will end up in your shelf (and, hopefully, on your table)!

After that reminder, on to the games. As all of them are set in human history, they are ordered from most ancient to most recent.

Hubris (Morgane Gouyon-Rety, GMT Games)

1-3 players, 30-500 minutes

When Alexander the Great died, his generals fought over the succession. Three of them managed to carve out their own kingdoms and establish hereditary dynasties there – the Antigonids in Greece, the Ptolemies in Egypt, and the Seleucids in western Asia. Yet one after the other, they lost their sovereignty and their lands to the emerging superpower in the west – the Roman Republic. In Hubris, you fill the gilded shoes of one of the Hellenistic kings and try to achieve supremacy in the Greek world while staving off the Roman intruders. As no king can hope to do all of this by himself, players rely on the leaders in their courts to help them govern their realms, make pacts with their neighbors, or wage war on them. Yet it is not only the ability of your diplomats and generals that should concern you, but also their loyalty…

Hubris is currently in final art/proofing at GMT Games, so we can expect a release within the next few months. You can pre-order at the reduced P500 price ($59 instead of $93) here.

Oblique: Supply Lines of Frederick the Great (Amabel Holland, Hollandspiele)

2 players, 60-90 minutes

My entry into wargaming has been with a game on Frederick the Great, and I remain fond of both the period and the man himself. Oblique deals with eight of his campaigns, putting the emphasis just as much on supply as on maneuver and tactics: Supply is essential for fighting battles and replenishing your forces, as befits a Supply Lines of… game. Yet unlike the Fabian commanders of the American revolution from previous instalments of the series, Frederick the Great often sought the decisive battle, and his remarkable tactical skill brought him many victories over superior enemy forces. Thus, Oblique features a battle mini-game to fight out engagements. Your daring maneuvers may get you there firstest, and your mastery of supply will ensure you come with the mostest, but it is your tactical acumen which will see you through stubborn opposition.

Oblique is going to be released in January 2025 – so, anytime now!

Verdun (Ren Multamäki, Dragon Dawn Productions)

2 or 4 players, 30 minutes

Inventive trick-taking games are all the rage now. Verdun transports the often lighthearted genre into the trenches of World War I, with either two players or two teams of two attempting to capture objectives (being repelled as often as not) while taking as few casualties as possible. “As few as possible” is a relative term here, for winning scores are likely negative – all the objectives you took were worth less than the casualties you suffered, it’s just that your opponent’s score is even worse. While you shouldn’t expect a small card game like this to educate you on the finer points of trench warfare, on the rolling barrages and the inevitable counter-attacks, it seems to me that the game communicates the grim logic of attritional war very effectively.

Verdun can be played by head-to-head or in teams of two. It is expected to be released in May 2025.

The Bell of Treason (Petr Mojžíš, GMT Games)

1-2 players, 30-60 minutes

The Final Crisis series is dealing with political conflicts (which often escalate into military action) in a short playtime (say, a lunch break). Its newest instalment The Bell of Treason is set in 1938: Nazi Germany was demanding the cession of the Sudety area (most of whose inhabitants were ethnic Germans) from Czechoslovakia. The players take the roles of the two political camps in Czechoslovakia – those who wished to resist the cession and those who wanted to find an agreement with Nazi Germany to avoid war with a much more powerful country. Historically, the latter prevailed (the Sudety were ceded), but their hope for agreement and peace dissolved – Nazi Germany annexed the entire Czech part of the country, made Slovakia a vassal state, and unleashed the Second World War within a year of the cession of the Sudety.

The Bell of Treason is the first game (to my knowledge) dealing with these events, and as I got to play an early version of it at SDHistCon in 2021, I can assure you of its tight gameplay – and the many thoughts and discussions about history it sparks.

The Bell of Treason is currently at the printer, so it will be released within the next few weeks. You can preorder it at the reduced P500 price of $32 (instead of $49) here.

Chicago ’68 (Yoni Goldstein, The Dietz Foundation)

1-4 players, 90-180 minutes

Street protest was a hot topic in the 1960s… and used to be so in board games of the time as well. James Dunnigan designed two games which had alternative protesters clashing with the authorities, one of them set during the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Yet afterward, the topic faded away from games… until recently.

Chicago ’68 pits the Demonstrators against the Establishment, with each side subdivided in its leadership (the Mayor and the Yippies) and the rank-and-file (the Chicago Police Department and the National Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam). While the Establishment is more powerful, it must succeed on two fronts – nominating Humbert Humphrey as the Democratic presidential candidate at the convention, and winning the battle for the hearts and minds of Americans by having its action in the streets favorably covered by the media. Fail on either front, and the Demonstrators win!

Chicago ’68 can be played solo, head-to-head, or in teams of two. The game can be pre-ordered here for the apt price of $68 and is expected to ship in early 2025.

And what are your most anticipated historical board game releases of 2025? Let me know in the comments!