Faq

General questions

What is Board Game Arena?

Board Game Arena (BGA) is an online board game platform. With BGA, you can play online and in real time against players from the whole world. A selection of various board games and card games is available. In order to play, the only thing you need is your browser!

What do you mean by "real time play"?

On Board Game Arena your opponents are connected to the game platform during the entire game. They can see your moves and react to them immediately - as is the case in the real world.

What is "turn based play"?

This is often referred to as "asynchronous play" on other sites, and is used here to differentiate from "real time play". Instead of all players being around the table at the same time, players leave and come back. After your opponent takes a move you are notified that it is your turn (via email or on your next visit to the site). You then go to your game, take your turn, and the process repeats for the next player.

What do I need to play?

Your browser ... and that's it!

Board Game Arena does not require anything else on your computer. Thus, you can play from any computer, anywhere, anytime!

In order to make this possible we are using the latest technologies available for the web. This is the reason you should play with the most up to date web browsers to enjoy an optimal BGA experience (read more about our browser policy).

How much does it cost to play on BGA?

Playing on BGA is free.

You can also choose to help us by making a donation and becoming a Board Game Arena club member.

What are the games available on BGA?

Board Game Arena offers a various selection of board and card games, but specializes in modern ("European style") adult games.

See available games.

What can I do if I have an issue with the website?

Most of the issues on this website should be solved with a simple web page refresh (or "F5").

If you experience persistent issues, you can browse the bug section in the forum, see if someone already reported the issue, and add a new bug report if that's not the case. Please take some time to describe the bug you are reporting in detail so that we can quickly reproduce and fix it.

What is the legal status of this website?

All the games currently available on this site have been licensed or otherwise authorized by copyright holders. Please be aware that games available on BGA can be removed at the copyright holders demand (for example: if they publish their own adaptation of the game).

Board Game Arena would like to thank all game publishers and game designers who allow us to have their games here, thus making it possible for this website to exist.

I'm a game publisher: why would I like to have my game on Board Game Arena?

The main goal of Board Game Arena is to make it easy for people to discover and love new games. We think that there are only two kinds of players on Board Game Arena: those who already bought the games they are playing online, and those who plan to buy them soon!

As the activity of this website contributes to increasing a game's popularity and thus generates hard copy sales in the "real world", we think it is beneficial to the boardgame community: people from all over the world can play online, we can have fun developing this game platform to the best of our ability, and game publishers get money from the box sales and build a special relationship with their player's community.

Meeting players and starting games

I launched a new table but nobody is joining?

For the most popular games you can find players at any time of the day. For other games we advise you to come back at peak hour (around 22:00 CEST) if you can't find opponents at the moment.

Tip: check the number of online/available players for a game before launching the table.

Tip: if nobody is available for a realtime game, you can turn your table into a turn-based table, so another player can join even hours/days after you created it.

I joined a game. When does the game start?

For realtime games:

Each table has an administrator, which is the table creator. It is the responsibility of the table administrator to start the game when he is satisfied with the number of players having joined the table.

If you are the table administrator and can't launch the game, most of the time it's because there is not yet enough players joined the table.

For turnbased games:

The game starts as soon as the maximum number of players has been reached. The table administrator can also starts the game manually if the minimum number of required players has been reached.

What is the meaning of the small color circle next to players names?

•  : this player is active. He completed an action very recently.
•  : this player is inactive. He is connected to the website but did not perform any action recently.
•  : this player is offline.

What does the '% hits' statistic mean?

% hits = number of victory points / number of games played

Where number of victory points is the following:

• When you win a 2 players game: 1 point.
• When you win a 3 players game: 1.5 points.
• When you win a 4 players game: 2 points.
• etc.

This way, "50%" means that you win 50% of 2 players game, or 33% of 3 players game, etc.

During the game

What is the meaning of the icons next to players names?

•  : this player must make a move now.
•  : this player must make a move now, and he has spent his reflexion time. Can someone wake him up? ;)
•  : this player must make a move now, but is probably not aware of the fact. If the situation does not evolve, it might be that this player has some connection issue.
•  : this player is a "zombie" (he left the game or has been fired from the game). The game goes on without this player.

When the "normal" avatar of a player is displayed, it means that this player is waiting for his turn to play.

A player has to make a move but he/she doesn't. What can I do?

• First, please remember that this player has the right to think as long as he needs to about the next move... well as long as he still has some time left on the game clock, that is.
• Then you can ask this player to confirm that he is still thinking about how to play.
• If this player seems to be away, we advise you to wait a few minutes: this player may be experiencing some network problems or have left his computer temporarily.
• If the player is not coming back, you can expel him from the game as soon as he has run out of time on the game clock for the current move (red bar) or if he goes over his allotted time to think by more than 3/4/5 minutes (depending on game speed). See Clock section for details. Important: in this case, no ELO points will be won by anybody for this game.

What is the current progression of the game I'm playing?

A percentage of progression is displayed on the top of the web page. There is also a progress bar at the bottom of the web page shows you the current progression of the game.

What is forbidden on Board Game Arena?

• Leaving a game in progress on purpose.
• Taking an unnecessary and unreasonable amount of time at the end of game in an obvious losing situation.
• Kingmaking: enabling another player to win on purpose while there is a better move to make for yourself.
• Running out of time on the game clock.
• Giving some piece of information about the current game situation that corrupts the normal game flow.
• Communicating with another player about the game privately (ex: with MSN).
• Provocation / triumphalism / defeatism ... anything which is not fair play.
• Having a shocking avatar (no advertisement, no politics, ...)

Going against these rules will affect your reputation.

What is absolutely forbidden in Board Game Arena?

• Creating multiple accounts and playing against oneself.
• Insulting other players in any manner.

Going against these rules can lead to the removal of your account and/or to the blacklisting of your IP.

What if some player does something wrong?

The Board Game Arena platform has been designed to encourage players to maintain good behavior. The reputation system allows you to distinguish between good and bad players. Then, it is up to you to decide whether to start a game with them or not.

If you think a player has behaved badly during a game, you can give him a "red thumb" at the end of the game.

If you think a player has committed a serious wrongdoing during a game (ex: insult), please report this player to us, using the "report this player" link from his profile or game result page, so that we can take appropriate measures.