• I am only 16.  I started playing at 12.  This is now my most-loved game.  (Favorite version is Global 1940)

    Why do I love it?  I think I can list several things that apply to most of us and me.

    1:  Strategy.  Did you ever play chess and love the strategy but hate how boring it is?  Strategy is almost unlimited here in A&A.  Axis and Allies is a great strategic game with plenty of rules to make things diverse but not too complicated. (Though I still get people complaining about the learning curve).  The dice add a perfect randomness giving replayabillity and no extreme long-term planning.

    2: Plastic miniatures. As a younger child I loved playing with plastic soldiers: “bang bang…sheeeeeeeeeew PUFFFFFFFFFF” Yeah, stuff like that.  I think most of us guys have played with toy soldiers when we were young; this generally has a big impact.  As one A&A gamer said (see Hiew’s boardgaming blog), “Axis and Allies is still my best excuse for playing with toy soldiers.”  Combine this with the great variety and quality of A&A and you get a haven for us.

    3:  Teamwork/competition/social time: Games like 1940 allow up to 6 players and lots of teamwork-inspired situations always arise.  Team games are always my favorite.   The competition is enormous especially when someone gets a lucky or bad role.  There is always someone coming up with a new strategy that gets snatched by everybody else.  A&A takes a while,  which can be annoying, but during that time you spend great hours hanging out with your friends or family.   And everybody knows that competition and teamwork are two greatly-emphasized aspects of gaming on the intimate level.

    4: Dice:  Yes, rolling them is fun, getting lucky is great, and getting unlucky is upsetting (in a humorous way).   There is always that one crazily bizarre role that sends everybody LOL!  And when you do badly you can always blame the dice.  The dice ensure great replayabillity and variety in each game.

    5: History:  I know what you are going to say: A&A is not historically accurate, but that is ok because simulators generally aren’t fun.  The WW2 aspect grabs a lot of us.  It is a well-loved theme by millions of gamers.  Wouldn’t you love to role across the Desert like Rommel reenacting Tobruk?  Or perhaps you don’t want to follow history; maybe there is an alternate history which your strategy works well in.  From the Battle of France to Invasion USA, you can reenact history or do your own thing.

    Well that sums up the general facts.   As my lil’ bro said, “In Axis and Allies I get the thrills of Battlefield, Chess, Monopoly, and little soldiers all at once.”


  • Good post CdeG.

    So zombie prefers Europe Engulfed and Asia Engulfed. Has anyone else played those?


  • Yes they suck. Very boring. I played Engulfed about 3 times, Asia partially once. Not alot of room to maneuver since they have less areas to position your forces and complicated somewhat.

    The damm turn takes long time and not much going on except going thru the rules to check things…alot.


  • …and even worse, Engulf dont have plastic Tanks…


  • And painted tanks look alot better than mono painted blocks!


  • Hehehe!

    @Imperious:

    The damm turn takes long time and not much going on except going thru the rule to check things…alot

    It’s a good job we all focus on a game that is so quick and easy to play!


  • @Private:

    It’s a good job we all focus on a game that is so quick and easy to play!

    To put things in perspective, I once read a book on tabletop tactical wargaming – the kind that uses painted miniatures which are quite large by A&A standards – in which one chapter was devoted to a fellow who had devised his own tactical rules for solo WWII wargaming, and who was engaged in a multi-year project to refight (all by himself) the entire Second World War in his basement.  At the time of the book’s writing, he was getting ready to start the Battle of Stalingrad.  Now that’s dedication.

  • Sponsor

    What I like most about Axis & Allies is, it’s not trying to be anything but itself. It’s not trying to mimic the tactical strategies of WW2 warfare down to how we get the shell into the cannon, and it’s not trying to dumb things down for risk enthusiasts, or simply strip it down to chess mechanics which would void it of any theme all together. Axis & Allies is it’s own strategy experience, and to compare or label it next to anything else would be to deny it’s individuality.


  • I have to admit I didn’t evaluate the market before choosing A&A, just played Europe first Edition once it in the noughties and took the chance to get it after thinking of it in the nineties while playing Shogun - but these games were hard to find in rural Europe without internet 20+ years ago…

    And now I think: A complete Global setup table is a peace of art.

  • '17 '16

    Well “back in my day”, growing up as a teen/young-adult in the 1980s, we didn’t have much in the way of computer games.  Back then every game was a board game of some type for the most part, and while I did play extensively the more “grognard” hard-core board wargames like just about everything from Avalon Hill and SPI, and Axis and Allies was just another game I got into in my youth which was simpler to play with my friends.  There was always something “beer and pretzels” about Axis and Allies back in the 1980s that to this day still attracts me to the game.  I’ve recollected (is that a word) and customized my current 2nd-Edition version of the game, and spent quite a bit on extra units, printed game-boards and the like… all with few people to play against, but it’s part game, part collectible, and its fun either way.

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