Aren’t words great? After all, without them you wouldn’t be able to read this very magazine. It turns out that words are also pretty fab when it comes to games, with loads of tabletop designers opting to make the mastery of language and enjoyment of spelling, puns, wordplay, storytelling and other linguistic hijinks part of the fun.
Of course, you can’t mention word games without someone bringing up Scrabble, but we’ve deliberately avoided including the family favourite in this list for obvious reasons; first off, everyone already knows about it and, secondly, there are so many lesser-known games out there that deserve your love just as much. We’ve gone for games that ask you to create your words from letters, some that involve using your knowledge of words to score points and others that treat letters and words as something else. Though they may be quite diTherent when it comes to words, they all have something in common: they’re all loads of fun. Oh, and they’re not Scrabble.
Chosen by Matt Jarvis