We bond and create memories over Settlers of Catan. We fight over the free parking space in Monopoly. We even measure human (and artificial) intelligence in the 64 squares on a chess board.

Board games have quietly plugged themselves into American culture.

Historians estimate that board games have been around for thousands of years, predating the ancient Egyptian culture and even the written word. But while the themes have changed, one thing remains the same: board games have reflected the societal values of the day while also helping us understand our world.

A Bridge To The Afterlife

Historians can’t pinpoint the exact origins of board games, but it’s estimated they started to emerge around 3000 B.C. Journalist Tristan Donovan says early players used them for spiritual purposes.

“They became a religious ritual and a way to interact with the dead,” says Donovan, author of the book, " It’s All a Game: The History of Board Games from Monopoly to Settlers of Catan." “It represented a journey through the afterlife, and people thought it would be a way of learning your own fate, even though it was random dice rolls.”

Moral and religious undertones continued in board games, even as recently as the 19th century. Games like The Mansion of Happiness and the original version of The Game of Life drove home these ethical lessons.

“The Mansion of Happiness was a very simple Candyland-like game. Sometimes you get sent backward and sometimes you went forward. But one of the things that sent you back was [landing on a spot that represented] sin,” says Donovan.

The game’s definition of sin varied from getting caught in a moment of passion to working on the Sabbath. Landing on a sin space would get you sent to the game’s whipping post.

Donovan says it wouldn’t be until the 20th century that manufactured board games focused more on fun. But even then, the medium still wasn’t entirely a casual hobby.

More Than Fun And Games

Aside from moral lessons and bridges to the afterlife, board games were used to help plan and carry out attacks in the midst of war.

Donovan recalls a 1941 meeting in Tokyo, during which senior officers huddled around a table in a secret room. The officers were eyeing maps of the Pacific Ocean and data gathered by Japanese spies. Then, they split into two teams to play a tabletop game. One team played as the Japanese fleet and one commanded the American side. They were testing attack strategies on an American naval base in Hawaii to decide which plan would work best.

“When they were first planning the attack [on Pearl Harbor], the Japanese thought it was a slightly crazy idea,” Donovan noted, saying that many officers were against it. “But they decided to test it out on this very elaborate board game that takes days to play.”

In "It’s All a Game," Donovan details the team’s first plan, which was to sneak a fleet toward Hawaii. But due to the route they took, they failed, only to be discovered by the American team. After tweaking the fleet’s approach angle on the tabletop game, the Japanese officials found they could successfully approach Pearl Harbor without being detected. Three months later, Japanese fighters did devastating damage to the American fleet and killed more than 2,400 people.

When it comes to military planning, tabletop board games have fallen out of fashion. But war is still a big part of the gaming industry. In his book, Donovan says many recreational board games replicated that same strategy exercise the Japanese used during World War II. But one stood out: Risk. And its popularity continued throughout the 20th century, even when computer war games took started to challenge Risk’s dominance. Donovan writes:

“But while the hobby [of tabletop war games] became even more niche, Risk continued giving people across the world a lightweight taste of wargaming both in its original form and through a multitude of spin-offs, some of which bear almost no relations to [the] original.”

Changing Games

Board games are continually reinventing themselves. The Game of Life no longer focuses on Puritanical moral lessons. Instead, players are encouraged to complete the game by getting educated, employed, and spending a fulfilling time on Earth. Monopoly started out as a way of pushing back against capitalism in the early 20th century. Now, the game celebrates driving your opponents into bankruptcy. (Donovan calls it a spectacular backfire from the creator’s original vision).

The board game industry is also making changes so that games are more in tune with what consumers want. You can buy add-ons so that Monopoly isn’t a three-hour endeavor. Some incorporate a smartphone into their play. Other games, like Pandemic, eliminate the competition between players entirely and, instead, focus on a cooperative environment where all the players set out to beat the game.

And it seems to be working. Board game sales are booming, with the industry raking in billions of dollars a year. Analysts say it’s because people are able to groom a community and facilitate a conversation on social media. But Donovan says there’s something even deeper going on. “People are pushing back a bit against this idea that everything has to be digital that everything needs to be lived through a screen,” Donovan says. “I don’t think people are throwing their smartphones into the bin, but I think people want an escape from that.”