Looking after board games and puzzles

Board games are unusually durable objects that are usually stored badly. A boxed game can last decades; the two things that end them early are moisture and weight, and both are entirely avoidable.

Puzzles are more fragile than games and get treated as though they were less so. Here is the practical version of looking after both.

Store boxes flat, but not in a tall stack

Game boxes are designed to take vertical load through their corners, and they do it well up to a point. A stack of eight puts the bottom box under a load it was not made for, and the lid gradually splays.

Four boxes to a stack is a reasonable working limit. Shelves at the right height are better than fewer, taller stacks.

Never store a game on its side with loose components

Standing a box vertically like a book is tempting and works only if the insert holds everything. Where it does not, every component ends up in a heap at one end, which crushes cards and bends boards.

If you want vertical storage, bag the components first. Then it is fine and it saves an enormous amount of shelf space.

Warped boards come from damp, not from heat

A folding board is card laminated on both sides. When one side takes up more moisture than the other, it curls — which is why games stored in basements and garages warp and games stored in living rooms do not.

A mildly warped board can often be recovered by laying it flat under even weight for a week in a dry room. A badly warped one usually cannot.

Card sleeves are worth it selectively

Sleeving protects against wear at the edges and against spills, and it makes shuffling easier on linen-finish cards. It also adds bulk, and a fully sleeved deck often no longer fits the insert.

The games worth sleeving are the ones with small decks played frequently. Sleeving a 200-card deck played twice a year is effort spent in the wrong place.

Bag components by function, not by colour

Small resealable bags cut setup time dramatically, but only if they are grouped the way setup happens. One bag per player colour is intuitive and slower than one bag per component type, because setup distributes by type.

This is the single change that most reduces the time between deciding to play and actually playing.

Missing pieces are usually replaceable

Most publishers will supply a replacement component for a game still in print, often free. It is worth asking before writing a game off, and it is worth doing early — a game with one missing piece stops being played immediately and the rest of it stays perfect.

Keep the insert and the rulebook; both are needed to identify the part.

Puzzle boxes take load badly

A puzzle box is thinner card than a game box and is usually only half full, so it crushes. Puzzles should be at the top of a stack or on their own shelf, never underneath games.

A crushed puzzle box is a cosmetic problem until the lid stops seating, at which point pieces escape.

Storing a part-built puzzle

A board or a roll-up mat is the only reliable answer. Moving a part-built puzzle on a tablecloth is a well-known way to lose an evening’s work, and stacking a tray on top of it is worse.

More on the options in jigsaw puzzle boards and storage.

Cleaning components

Wooden and plastic pieces take a damp cloth. Cards do not — a slightly damp card never fully flattens. For a sticky card, a dry microfibre cloth and patience is the whole toolkit.

Never put any game component in a dishwasher, however plastic it looks.

What this means when buying

Component quality is worth paying for on a game you expect to play often, and largely irrelevant on one you expect to play twice. That is a judgement about your table rather than about the game, and it is the sort of thing the counter can talk through — the number is on the contact page.

The full range is on the shop page, and delivery, returns and payment are covered in the FAQ.

The insert question

Most factory inserts are designed to hold the components as they were shipped, unsleeved and unsorted, which is not how the game exists after the first play. Once cards are sleeved or components are bagged, the insert frequently stops fitting, and people either force the lid or throw the insert away. Neither is ideal — a forced lid splays the box, and a discarded insert means everything moves in transit.

The usual answer is to keep the insert but stop using it as intended: remove the card wells, keep the deeper compartments for bagged components, and let the board sit flat on top. Foam-core and third-party inserts exist and are excellent for games you play weekly, though they are rarely worth it for anything else. What matters is that the box closes flat and nothing shifts when it is carried, because a box that rattles is a box that is grinding its own components together.