One of the most frustrating parts about board games for me is purchasing the games. I don’t mind spending money on a good game of course, but I have a very long list of board games that I want to play at some point and games can be expensive. It’s hard to justify buying more than a few games a month, especially around Christmas time when you’re buying gifts for your friends and loved ones. One of these days I hope to find a way to rent board games for a limited time (if someone ends up creating this, I want in!), but until then it’s either playing your friend’s games or buying them yourself. With all that being said, I was recently contacted by an up-and-coming family business that could potential make buying games a lot more interesting.

The company is called Tabletop Monthly, and it works just like it sounds. You subscribe to their service for $30 a month and once a month you receive board games, card games, and accessories for your enjoyment. Whatever games you receive are your forever, and you never know what games you will be receiving on any given month. There are two different types of boxes, one for “hardcore” games and one including “family” games. The hardcore games are more technical and competitive, whereas the family games lean towards simpler themes that you can pick up easily and play with anyone. This isn’t the first board game subscription service in the market, but it’s a good price and the different types of subscriptions allow any type of tabletop gamer to enjoy the games they deliver.

The company is owned by a family of gaming enthusiasts (who own a pizzeria as their main job) and they were kind enough to give me two sample boxes to try out and review. Initial impressions are good- I received one game and two miniatures in the hardcore box and three travel sized games in the family pack. One of the most important things to mention about the games I received is that I didn’t own any of them; in fact, I had heard of some but there were others I didn’t know existed until I opened the box!

I haven’t gotten a chance to play any of the games yet, but I plan on doing so soon and writing up an in-depth review of everything I received. Until then, if you’re interested in learning more about Tabletop Monthly you can find them at tabletop.cratejoy.com or on Twitter @tabletopmonthly. They’re currently doing a promotion where if you provide them with your E-mail address, you’re entered into a drawing to receive a lifetime subscription for free!

That’s it on Tabletop Monthly for now. Be on the lookout for more posts soon with additional details about the new games I got!