Boxed Culture: Too Many Boxes!! 1

This week on boxed culture I wanted to talk about organization of your collection. I have ran out of room for my games and they are piling all over the floor. Not something am proud of, but it happens. Before I reached this step I used to love to keep my games organized in a easily accessible fashion. I have learned some really good skills from actively organizing my board games that I would love to share with you all!

Guts of the Game

Steampunk Rally before the bagging!

I personally love making sure the insides of a game are organized and easy to get at when/if i need to play. I have a big collection of bags that I use to sort and organize my components when I get a new game. First step is punch out the components, then I used the games rules insert to organize the pieces into separate bags. Usually I will put all the matching color player components in the same bags with any set starting resources that way they are like little handouts for the players to look through while I set up the game. I usually will not bag things like tiles, boards, spin dials, or anything that is larger than 2 inches by 2 inches. This really makes games easy to set up and tear down. Using the game manual to sort is a must if you want to have everything in the right spots for set up.

Steampunk Rally after the bagging.

Box Size and Self Space

The next step is finding the right spot for game on your shelf. Most of my games fit well on my shelves. I use the IKEA Expedit, however this shelf is no longer sold by IKEA. In a confusing and strange turn of events they got rid of the Expedit and started making the Kallax which is …well almost the exact same thing. So yeah, most games fit well in the sections of this shelf. Square boxes work very well and you can even put longer boxes in them. Games like Kemet, XIA: Legends of a Drift System, Pandemic: Legacy, and even Mage Wars fit on these shelves with minimal ascetic issues. The Kallax sufficiently handles most of my box size shelf issues. There are a few stranger sized boxes that will not fit on these shelves and I usually have to end up putting them on top or on the floor. Some examples of these games are Fortune and Glory, Space Hulk, Star Trek: Fleet Captains, Cthulhu Wars, and Catacombs.

Games like Xia and Mage Wars fit snugly along with their square boxed brothers and sisters!

The Personal Preference

The last thing you can do, if you are feeling particularly crazy, is sort your collection. I would love to do this but it becomes exponentially harder to do as your collection increases. Some people do it alphabetically by the name of the game or designer. I think that is a bit much. Other people sort by theme which I find more interesting but it is still a grey area. Some games are horror and sci-fi. Where do they go? I’m am sure that is easy for some to decide but if you are organizing, it can be hard to keep your criteria internally consistent. One way I have though about sorting my games is by player count. This seem like a good way to do it and I have kind of already started. One thing I have done is kept all my small party games in my car in a bag. That way when I am out and about I can take those out to play. This has helped make some room in my house as well.

You could even organize by color I guess…if you have that much time.

I may try a follow up with this topic in a few weeks if I ever find a solution for my collection exploding all over my house. I hope you enjoyed, see ya next time!

-Kyle