History · 2004 to today
National Games Week history: origins, organizers and the 2005 Top 100
The history of National Games Week starts with a games catalog publisher in Broomfield, Colorado, a press release in October 2004 and a simple ask: one week a year with the screens off. It ran for three Novembers before its organizer closed.
Timeline
From the first week to this one
The first week runs from November 21 to 27. By its end, 2,536 members in all 50 states have signed up, among them 525 game stores, 327 game clubs and 80 schools.
The second week, November 20 to 26, produces the Top 100, ranked from members' favorite games and the games played at their events, with HeroClix in first place.
The third week runs from November 19 to 25. A Top 100 for 2006 is planned, but no list is known to have been published that year or since.
In the spring the organizer, publisher of the Games Quarterly catalog and magazine, announces that it is closing. The magazine ends with it, the catalog is sold to two former staff, and the organized week ends too.
Separately, the American Library Association holds its first library game day, using the name National Games Day. It is a different event with a different purpose.
Another small company puts up a few pages promising to revive National Games Week, with a list of past sponsors. The plan goes no further than those pages.
The library event goes international. It becomes a full week in 2017 and, in 2022, International Games Month, filling all of November in libraries.
National Games Week falls on November 22 to 28, around Thanksgiving on the 26th, and it belongs to whoever clears a table and invites people over to play.
The origins of National Games Week in 2004
National Games Week history begins in October 2004, when a small marketing company in Broomfield, Colorado announced an event aimed at the games trade and the public at once. The company had long published the Games Quarterly Catalog, a reference for the industry, and earlier that year had launched Games Quarterly Magazine for players. The new week was meant to put both audiences in the same room.
The pitch was easy to repeat. People across the country were urged to switch off the TV, get away from the computer for a while and play any kind of game, from cards to miniatures. Publishers signed on as sponsors, and the first week was set for November 21 to 27, 2004, the fourth week of November and also Thanksgiving week.
Its origins also show some optimism. The press release forecast events in about 15,000 homes, schools, churches, colleges, community centers and stores in the first year. That number was a hope printed in October, not a count taken in December, and it should be read that way.
The organizers, the sponsors and the first week in numbers
The organizers built the week around membership. Joining was free, and members could order posters, invitation cards and promotional packs supplied by sponsors; the first announcement even promised U.S. postage stamps printed for the week. Each event, whatever the hour, was called a "Games Day", a name the company listed as a trademark alongside National Games Week itself.
Five companies headed the 2004 sponsor list: Wizards of the Coast, Upper Deck, Pokémon USA, Rio Grande Games and Mayfair Games. A year later the site described the week as backed by more than 100 game publishers, and a later list of past sponsors ran from Avalanche Press and Days of Wonder to Looney Labs, Privateer Press and WizKids.
The tally published after the first week is the most solid figure from the period. Members came from all 50 states: 1,586 individuals, 525 game stores, 327 game clubs, 80 schools and 18 churches, 2,536 in all. Asked about the games they played, members named board games most often (21.6 percent), then role-playing and collectible card games (18.6 percent each), miniatures (16.1), family games (14.3) and party games (10.8). Churches were the smallest group, which surprised nobody who has tried to book a church hall in Thanksgiving week.
The 2005 Top 100 and the year without a list
The second week ran from November 20 to 26, 2005, and produced the one document from the period that people still look up. Members were polled for their three favorite games, and the organizers combined those answers with the games actually played at events, including events reported on BoardGameGeek. The result was a ranked Top 100.
It reads like a portrait of a hobby in transition. HeroClix, a collectible miniatures game, took first place, ahead of Dungeons & Dragons and Magic: The Gathering. Settlers of Catan came fourth and Carcassonne sixth, while Risk, Monopoly and Scrabble shared the list with Puerto Rico and Power Grid. The 2005 Top 100 is laid out in full, with notes on which games are still in print.
The third week followed on November 19 to 25, 2006. A page was set aside for a 2006 list, but no list is known to have been published, and the page later carried only a note that its link was out of date. What is known about the 2006 week is gathered on its own page.
Games Quarterly and the end of the original week
Games Quarterly Magazine was the engine behind the week. It launched in early 2004 with a circulation the publisher put at 105,000, and its pages presented new games to hobby players and newcomers alike, next to features for teachers on using games in class. The week gave the magazine a public event; the magazine gave the week its readers. In 2005 the site even handed out a free PDF from the magazine, The Pirate Isle, a variant that adds pirates to The Settlers of Catan.
In the spring of 2007 the company announced that it was closing, Games Quarterly Magazine stopped with it, and the catalog was sold to two former staff. No organizer stood behind a fourth week that November, and the week slipped from the calendar.
One revival was tried. In 2010 a different small company put up a few pages promising to bring National Games Week back, with a list of past sponsors and some tips for planning a game day. It never got further than that, and it remains an odd footnote in the history of National Games Week.
Libraries, International Games Month and a different game day
In 2007, the same year the original organizer closed, the American Library Association started a library event under the name National Games Day. The names overlap, but the two were separate efforts: one was a membership campaign run by a games publisher, the other a day for libraries to open their tables to the public. The library day went international in 2012, became a week in 2017 and has been International Games Month since 2022, run by volunteers in the ALA's Games and Gaming Round Table.
For anyone keeping the November tradition, the overlap is handy. A library game day early in the month and a home game night during Thanksgiving week fit together well, and the library game day guide covers the first of the two.
National Games Week history after 2007: a week kept by players
The longest stretch of National Games Week history has no organizer at all. Since 2007 nobody has run the week, and nobody has needed to. The idea was always simple enough to carry itself: pick a night during Thanksgiving week, set out a game and invite people. In 2026 the week falls on November 22 to 28.
What has changed is the shelf. Many of the 2005 favorites are still sold, and some have passed from one publisher to another. The advice the 2004 organizers gave hosts has aged better than parts of the list: games that take twenty minutes to learn, a co-host to run things while you play, and a meal break of 30 to 45 minutes once a night passes three hours. The game night hosting guide builds on that advice, and the dates for every year start from the same Thanksgiving rule the organizers used in 2004. That is the whole of National Games Week history so far: a week that outlived the people who started it.
Further reading
Sources and further reading
FAQ
Questions people ask
When did National Games Week history begin?
In October 2004. A marketing company in Broomfield, Colorado, which published the Games Quarterly Catalog and Games Quarterly Magazine, announced the first week for November 21 to 27, 2004. The plan was one week every November, Sunday to Saturday, during Thanksgiving week, when families already spend time together.
Who were the organizers of National Games Week?
The week was coordinated by the publisher of Games Quarterly, a small Colorado marketing firm that had served the games trade for years. Game publishers joined as sponsors, led in 2004 by Wizards of the Coast, Upper Deck, Pokémon USA, Rio Grande Games and Mayfair Games. The company closed in 2007.
What happened after 2006 in National Games Week history?
The organizer closed. The third week, in November 2006, was the last one with a company behind it. In the spring of 2007 the publisher announced it was closing and Games Quarterly Magazine ended. A small revival site appeared in 2010 but went no further. Since then the week has been a tradition kept by players.
What was the most popular game in 2005?
On the Top 100 compiled for the 2005 week, HeroClix, a collectible miniatures game from WizKids, ranked first. Dungeons & Dragons was second and Magic: The Gathering third, with Settlers of Catan fourth. The ranking combined members' favorite games with the games played at their events that November.
Is there a Top 100 for 2006?
No list for 2006 is known to exist. A page was set aside for one, but it only ever showed a note that its link was out of date, and no copy has surfaced since. The 2005 list remains the only Top 100 from the original weeks, and it is still the best record of what people played.
Is the ALA's library game day the same event?
No. The American Library Association began its own library event in 2007, the year the original organizer closed, and used a similar name. It was a separate effort. It later went international, became a week in 2017 and since 2022 has been International Games Month, covering all of November.
How many people took part in the first National Games Week?
The organizers' tally for 2004 counted 2,536 members in all 50 states: 1,586 individuals, 525 retail stores, 327 game clubs, 80 schools and 18 churches. Individual hosts were by far the largest group, and stores came second, with many of them running an event on every day of the week.
What was Games Quarterly?
Games Quarterly was a catalog and a magazine put out by the company that organized National Games Week. The Colorado marketing firm published the Games Quarterly Catalog for the games trade and, from early 2004, Games Quarterly Magazine, which it said had a circulation of 105,000 at the time. When the company closed in 2007 the magazine ended, and the catalog was sold to two former staff.
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