Internet Top 100 Games List FAQS

What is the Internet Top 100 Games List?

The list is a chart of games, primarily board games. The list is ordered by a calculated 'Score' (see below), based on ratings submitted by users of the list. Originally I generated a new edition of the list every week and then switched to biweekly. Nowadays, with the dominance of BoardGameGeek and its ratings, I get few enough new ratings submitted that I am only updating the list occasionally, when there seems enough new ratings to warrant it.

What is the point of this list?

This list is intended to help give people an idea of the best games out there as rated by their players. There are a huge number of games out there and it is impossible to play/buy all of them (although some people try ;) ). This list will hopefully let people only focus on the best ones. Two particular things the list tries to achieve are:

1. Provide a reasonable 'buying guide' for those not that familiar with these games.
2. Highlight 'sleepers' - not well known games that are very much liked by those who do play them.

What games are eligible?

Basically all board, card, collectible card, roleplaying and wargames are eligible. Computer games are not eligible. Please rate those games you think are bad as well as those you think are good, particularly among those games at the top of the list. Roleplaying games will only be listed by the overall system (ex: AD&D) and not by individual module.

How are the games ranked?

Games are ranked by 'Score'. Basically, this has the effect of raising the rankings for those games with more ratings. Some method like this is vital to avoid a single '10' rating from pushing a game to the top of the list.

The 'Score' is calculated by giving ALL games on the list Five ratings of value 3.25 in addition to all the real ratings. These numbers are NOT counted in the Ave. or #Vot columns. For example, take a game with four ratings of 10 8 4 2. It has a simple average of 10+8+4+2=24/4=6. However, it's score is (10+8+4+2+(5*3.25))/9=4.47. Games with MANY ratings will be almost negligibly affected by these five low ratings.

Note that the numbers 5 and 3.25 are somewhat arbitrarily selected but I am happy with them and expect they will NOT change.

Is this how the games were always ranked?

No, editions 1-72 were ranked by 'diffused average'. I switched to this method on April 10, 2000 at the suggestion of Graham Willis and on the belief that it seemed to provide results which were generally more reflective of most participants opinions.

The formula for calculating the 'diffused average' was :

NDA = Average - ((Average - Old Diffused Average) * (C^NV))

  where NDA = New Diffused Average
        NV  = Number of Raters for that game.

Is there anything else I should know?

Yes, there are a few things which will be useful to some of you.

1. For those who have participated before and want to know what your ratings were, send me email (aarondf@bu.edu) and I can give you this information. It takes a couple of minutes to do so don't ask all the time.
2. I keep all previous editions available and they are easy to access.

        C   = A diffusing constant. (set at 0.99) (was set at 0.99875 for editions 1-4)