Which new board games should you consider adding to your collection in 2025 – and which upcoming board games should you mark on your calendar? In this tabletop golden age of ours, truckfuls of shiny board gaming jewels hit the internet every week – so we’re creating this up to date shortlist of hot new releases to consider for your next game night. We’ll also call out the games coming out later this year that should be firmly on your radar screen.
If you just want the all time essentials, we’ve got you covered there too: read our player’s guide to the best board games of all time for recommendations. Or, for something more specific, here are the couples’ board games and party games we love most.
New board games to try in July 2025
These are, in our view, the most interesting and impressive new board games releases from the last three months, updated every month with the newest hotness. Board games don’t always release cleanly on a specific day, so for the record: we’re talking only about games you can actually buy and play right now, either from physical stores, web stores, or late pledges via crowdfunding.
Naturally, these are all games we’re looking to review for Wargamer – so if we’ve published a review or a preview, we’ll make sure to link it here so you can dive into our full thoughts on the game before buying!
Vantage
Easily the most surprising new board game concept we’ve seen in a while, designer Jamey Stegmaier describes their seven-year project Vantage is “an open-world, cooperative, roguelike adventure game for 1-6 players” which crash-lands players in totally different locations on a fully traversable planet, and has you wander the alien world looking for each other.
The real kicker? You explore the world in first person, through around 800 location cards, and there are over 900 other cards simulating the various interactions you can have with the world as you venture across it. It’s wildly ambitious, pretty unique as far as we’re aware, and we’re very keen to review it soon!
Azul Duel
Two-player versions of beloved board games are certainly en vogue right now, and Azul Duel is a recent example of this trend. This turns the already quite passive-aggressive tile drafting game into a head-to-head where players aim to design the most beautiful ceiling mosaic.
This is a slight step up in complexity from the original Azul, as you have more decisions to make when positioning your tiles. However, it’s still a fairly simple strategy game that you can finish up in under an hour.
Molly House
A Molly House was a meeting house and safe-haven for queer men in the 18th and 19th centuries, and this board game is a thematic recreation of that period in history. Mechanics-wise, this is a complex card-drafting game where you aim to create as much joy for your community as possible – without getting caught by constables or hidden informers among your peers.
Molly House is the co-designed by Cole Wehrle, creator of beloved crunchy games like Root and 2024’s Arcs. With such an esteemed reputation, our expectations for Molly House are high – and since one of the Wargamers picked up a copy at this year’s UK Games Expo, you can expect to hear our thoughts on this one very soon.
Galactic Cruise
Galactic Cruise gives you everything you need to run a thriving space tourism company (Katy Perry not included). It’s a lengthy eurogame where you’ll place workers to build and launch commercial spaceships and invest in ways to expand the Galactic Cruise company. All players work for the same corporation, so your actions will naturally benefit others – but you’re still all vying for that top CEO spot.
This is an hours-long, complex worker placement game, but its rules are apparently surprisingly approachable. We’re looking forward to seeing what the future of space travel looks like – on our tabletop, at least.
Codenames
Technically Codenames isn’t a new board game, but it did receive an updated edition in 2025. This version comes with swanky new art, plus a revised set of 400 code words to guess from. The insert inside the box has improved storage, and we’ve got an improved rulebook that makes it easier to onboard new lovers of word games.
Other than that, not much else has changed. You’re still split into teams, with a spy master for each who drops single-word clues to help you select your team’s code words. Seeing as the gameplay has remained the same, we’ll show you our original Codenames review rather than whipping up a fresh one for the new edition.
Upcoming board games in 2025
Here are a few of the upcoming board games slated for release in 2025 which you should absolutely keep an eye on – we’ll certainly be looking to get our sweaty reviewing hands on them ASAP!
Star Wars: Battle of Hoth
Release date: August 29, 2025
We feel almost like cheating putting Star Wars: Battle of Hoth on this list. It is, after all, a reimplementation of Memoir ’44, one of the best (and definitely the most accessible) WW2 board game on the tabletop. Take that, dress it up in some ice camouflage, and you’ve got a winning combination.
I was lucky enough to test it at the UK Games Expo and, yep, it’s exactly what we expected – a cracking strategy game with easy to learn mechanics and oodles of Star Wars theme. A bit like the Millennium Falcon, this might look like a rust bucket of a design, but it’s got it where it counts.
Lost Lumina
Estimated release: September 2025
Wargamer Tim had a quick demo of Lost Lumina at UK Games Expo and came away slightly rabid about playing more. The premise is simple: two players draft a force of charismatic animal hero cards, who will then lead their forces over a compact area control game.
The combat system involves second guessing which hero card your opponent might play while making your own selection, trying to eke the maximum advantage out of your hand. So it’s the combat system from strategy epic Game of Thrones, condensed into ten to twenty minute games.
Technically Lost Lumina is a re-release of a game published in 2024, ‘Lost Lights’, but as that was only published in German, we’re counting this as a new game.
Echoes of Time
Estimated release: October 2025
Popular designer Simone Luciani (Barrage, Darwin’s Journey, Grand Austria Hotel) is back with another strategy game. Designed for two to four players, Echoes of Time is a card game for adults where you recruit a fellowship from various factions who help you to gather a precious resource known as ‘power’. With this, you can control time itself, and the world as you know it.
It’s a high-fantasy concept, but the initial pictures imply that things might not be as complex as they seem. However, the publisher does promise that you’ll be able to build an entirely new deck of cards each time you play – so variety is a top priority.
In a BoardGameGeek forum, publisher Cranio Creations promises that this title will be available at Essen 2025 in October.
Cyberpunk 2077: The Board Game
Estimated release: December 2025
It’s fair to say there’s been some fan controversy surrounding this second high profile board game adaptation of CD Projekt Red’s troubled sci-fi RPG. Billed as a “story driven tactical action game” for 1-4 players, Cyberpunk 2077: The Board Game offers “42+ hours of gameplay” in its campaign, plus an “endless Afterlife mode”.
Most of the stink is probably simply because it’s one of a now famous breed of big, licensed IP board game adaptations, loaded up with millions of crowdfunding dollars, that puts beautiful miniatures front and center. Having been burnt by similar-looking games in the past whose design or gameplay disappointed, some folks are poorly disposed towards anything that fits that profile.
As journalists, we’re both skeptical and open minded, however – and as nerdy gamers with a liking for neon signs, techwear, and weird future slang, we’re very excited to try out a fully loaded, tabletop tactical RPG adventure in Night City. We’ll see, choom. We’ll see.
Sanctuary
Estimated release: TBC 2025
Though it doesn’t currently have a place in this list, Ark Nova remains one of our favorite strategy board games. Sanctuary is, in all ways, the younger sibling of that ultra-crunchy title. It comes from the same designer, and it’s still about managing a zoo, but it comes with streamlined and simplified versions of the original game’s mechanics.
As we mentioned when Sanctuary was announced, it can be tough to get Ark Nova to the table – particularly if your pals aren’t as keen on six-hour gaming sessions as you are. This could be a great middle ground. If only we knew when it was coming – BoardGameGeek promises a 2025 release date, but details beyond that are far and few between.
For more tabletop recommendations, here are the best card games around right now. We can also point you to the greatest tabletop RPGs of all time.
Source: Wargamer
