Don't get bored, get board games.
That's what some students are doing these days in the "loveliest village on The Plains."
"People are looking for something to do at home with their families," said Steve Ziegler, owner of HobbyTown USA in Opelika. "They just don't get out and travel as much in these (hard economic) times."
Instead of paying $9.25 to see a movie at the theater, students can shell out $15 or $20 for a game they can play whenever they want.
"(Board games) are an inexpensive way to socialize," said Madison Martin,
sophomore in pre-medicine. "I feel like, by playing board games, you can get to know someone and see a side of their personality you don't always see."
Beside being easy on the wallet, board games offer an alternative way to interact and connect with people.
"Unlike playing video games or going out to bars, you get to interact with people in ways you don't normally get to interact with them, and you get to see them be goofy," said Jordan Luke, sophomore in English and Spanish. "I feel like it's a great way to get to know people."
Luke said she participates in a weekly game night that began as a small group of friends, but has morphed into a group of around 15 people.
"There's no drinking or food or anything like that," Luke said. "It's just 9 o'clock on a Sunday night after everybody's done with everything. It's a good way to relax and end the weekend having fun."
Caleb Rodgers, freshman in pre-building science, said he plays Taboo with his girlfriend and her family on a regular basis.
"Also, my family has always had people over to play dominoes about once a week during the summer," Rodgers said.
These kinds of games can serve as a link to the past, a reminder of simpler times when the biggest worry was a scraped knee or lost Barbie shoe.
"I think college students play board games for nostalgia," Luke said. "Everyone played board games when they were little, and it's fun to go back." Classics like Monopoly, Hi Ho! Cherry-O, LIFE and Sorry! were among students' childhood favorites.
"I used to play Parcheesi with my grandfather," Luke said, "and that was a fun one because not a lot of kids my age played it."
Even the simplest games help teach life lessons, like how to lose gracefully.
"I wasn't a sore loser,"
Luke said. "I didn't get too upset, especially because in some of the games, like Monopoly, you can never get to the winner, anyway."
It looks as though board games are here to stay, Rodgers said.
"I still enjoy playing Life, Monopoly, Clue, Catch Phrase and The game of things... ," Martin said.
The game of things... by Hasbro provides a category like "Things you should do on a first date," and each player writes down his or her ideas and passes them to the designated reader.
"The reader reads them all out loud, and then you go around the circle guessing who said what," Martin said. "Some of it gets highly inappropriate, but it's all in good fun."
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