Games: American Boxed Games and Their Makers, 1822-1992 : With Values

Rating:
Summary: A Must-Have for Game Lovers and Game Collectors
Review: Bruce Whitehill has written a terrific reference work that belongs in the library of any serious game collector.

Rating:
Summary: The most comprehensive and best-written book on board games
Review: I'm sure many of you will have noticed that board games are becoming popular again, and also collectable! It is invariably in times of good economy when people seem to enjoy playing and collecting games. The times in history that the best games were invented were the Victorian era, the Roaring 20s, pre-war economic recovery (late 30s), post-war (50s), and off and on until the late 90s current recovery. Because of this, finding game collector's resources such as this one is very useful.

I have several of the board game books which refer to the history, have images of, and list the values of collectable board games throughout their history. "Games: American Boxed Games and Their Makers, 1822-1992: With Values" is, by far, the best written and most useful in starting a collection. I feel that Bruce Whitehill's pricing is very accurate and that the exhaustively researched history of each game and every game company has lead to some important insights about my collecting.

I have found that I use this book most often in conjunction with another good book, "Board Games with Price Guide," by Desi Scarpone (also available on Amazon). The main benefit of the Scarpone book is that there are full-color photographs of every game he lists. He tends to list more pop-culture games, while Whitehill highlights nearly all of the Victorian and traditional games like the Parker Brothers classics, etc. The Scarpone book also doesn't price as accurately; with prices generally being stated as a range, and being more wholesale oriented (half retail).

This book has only eight pages of color plates and only 1/3 or fewer of the games listed has a black & white picture, but there are far more games listed, priced, and described (with contents and histories) than any other book. I refer to it three times as often as the others. It also has great, detailed sections on game history, collecting games, and how to price them, and a GREAT games resources section!

Above all, I think this the best single ! book about board games that I have discovered. I would like to see the publisher/author do a version that has color images throughout, but I love the book for what it is even without the color.

If anyone reading this review would like to contact me with questions or comments, I welcome them.