TomNook posted...
Tic Tac Toe is solved, and too basic to not always play it solved.
Chess is pretty much solved as well (at least for multiple variations), and no one complains about that one.
MeatiestMeatus posted...
The point to playing a game is having fun. Player agency can be integral to having fun, but doesn't dictate whether a player will have fun, or how much fun they can have
This is the key. And it's telling that most of their worst games are games that generations of kids have played and enjoyed for decades. ie, relatively simple games that can serve as bonding experiences or just fun time-wasters.
Some people don't enjoy games where every player at the table needs to memorize a multi-volume rulebook to know which dice they roll when and how to position and move the 4,378 figures, meeples, resource markers, tokens, and fortifications and which of the four card piles you need to draw from during which of your 7 turn phases.
It's fine if some people do. Euro-style games can be fun to play, and they can even be fun to watch if your on YouTube and want to see another group plow through it. But some people just want to play a simple relaxed game with some friends while kicking back a couple drinks, and most Euro-style games would be
absolute hell
for them.
I mean, honestly, I think my friends and I have had more fun playing drunken Disney Charades than anything ever published by Ravensburger, or that's won the Spiel des Jahres. And as much as I've enjoyed watching TableTop or NRB's Board Game Club, I wouldn't dream of bringing 99% of those games to the table for my friends, because they'd hate most of them.
MeatiestMeatus posted...
If you're incapable of having fun without having a larger influence over the gameplay, that's fine.
I'd argue that it might potentially be
not
fine, because it implies deeper issues all its own.
It's one thing to enjoy overcomplicated games. It's another to be completely incapable of enjoying anything
but
overcomplicated games.
When it comes to tabletop RPGs, I've spanned the gamut from Amber Diceless RPG (which almost borders on being completely freeform) all the way to TimeLords (a game which assigns multiple damage hitboxes to every creature, which contains rules that break down your real life physical condition and mental prowess to assign to stats so you can play as "yourself", and which pretty much requires you to understand rudimentary calculus to play). But if I ever met someone who could
only
play games like TimeLords, I'd start worrying about their mental health.