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SALT LAKE CITY — The Pandemic is officially over ... well, the board game's run in this bracket is at least. We're still social distancing and working from home in real life, but I digress.
The Sweet 16 round of the bracket challenge saw some early favorites like Pandemic and Exploding Kittens fall — again to the classics. At this rate, the bracket should just be titled: What is your favorite classic board game?
Codenames enters the Elite 8 round as the perceived favorite after dismantling its opponent, Sheriff of Nottingham, with 80% of the vote — the most of the Sweet 16 round by a large margin; however, Ticket to Ride, another seemingly favorite, managed 71% of the vote over Connect Four — can't say I'm all that upset, personally.
The closest matchup of the Sweet 16 round was between Risk and Yahtzee. The all-dice game had some early steam as it blew past Agricola and Betrayal at House on the Hill, but it met a worthy opponent in Risk. The world domination game edged past Yahtzee with 51% of the vote to advance to the next round.
In celebration, I taught my 11- and 8-year-old the game, and it ended with me getting elbowed in the nose when my son celebrated a victory in one of the battles — I guess that's better than someone flipping the board off the table and ruining the game. As a side note, I still won the game, even though my son won the real-life battle with my face. We'll call it a draw.
As a reminder, the 64 games were seeded based on its ranking on boardgamegeek.com and slated into the bracket in a similar style to the NCAA Tournament. To see how the games were selected, read the first article of the challenge.
The Elite 8 round of voting will go all through Friday and will conclude at midnight. The Final Four round will be released Monday and the championship round on Wednesday.
#Poll
If you can't see the poll, click here.
#Photo
Board games
To learn more about each game, click on its title, which will direct you to its Board Game Geek page. Maybe you'll find a new game to play.
- Gloomhaven
- Terraforming Mars
- Great Western Trail
- Scythe
- Wingspan
- Puerto Rico
- Orleans
- Agricola
- Blood Rage
- Root
- Power Grid
- Azul
- 7 Wonders
- Clank!
- Rising Sun
- Codenames
- Dominion
- Pandemic
- Quacks of Quedlinburg
- Stone Age
- Cosmic Encounter
- Splendor
- Ticket to Ride
- Viticulture
- Cyclades
- Carcassonne
- Secret Hitler
- Sushi Go Party
- Telestrations
- Arboretum
- King of Tokyo
- Flash Point: Fire Rescue
- Sheriff of Nottingham
- Settlers of Catan
- Shadows Over Camelot
- Evolution
- Bohnanza
- Chess
- Coup
- Betrayal at House on the Hill
- Blokus
- Qwirkle
- Smash Up
- Machi Koro
- Axis & Allies
- Labyrinth
- Dragonwood
- Bananagrams
- Scrabble
- Dungeon Mayhem
- Unstable Unicorns
- Sequence
- Exploding Kittens
- Apples to Apples
- Clue
- Risk
- Yahtzee
- Connect Four
- Sorry
- Monopoly
- The Game of Life
- Candy Land
- Chutes & Ladders
- Cones of Dunshire
