Let the games begin

 Black studied the board then moved one of her game pieces across several squares.

 Flood countered. "I win," he said.

 He had successfully hidden his identity as Jack the Ripper from Black throughout their 30-minute game of Mr. Jack last Saturday afternoon.

It was the November outing of Ides of Gaming, a monthly gathering of board game enthusiasts in the loft of the bustling Espresso Art near the University of Arizona's Main Gate. On this Saturday, about a dozen gamers played everything from Thurn and Taxis to Hall of Horror to Innovation, selecting games from dozens laid out on a large table.

Ten years ago, this scene would have been almost unimaginable in Tucson - a room of virtual strangers gathered around tables playing board games. But over the past several years, small groups of enthusiasts have rediscovered the joys of board games.

"It's something that I can do with a group of friends ... other than sit around a table and stare at each other," says 22-year-old Mike Merrill, who works at the locally owned Hat's Games store in midtown. "It's like picking up a deck of cards and playing poker. When it's somebody else's turn, people are chatting."

"Board games or games in general are a really awesome way to bring people together," says Lisette DeMars, a manager at Mrs. Tiggy Winkle's Toys on East Grant Road. "To sit down and play a 30-minute game together, it gives you a goal. It's a very easy way to have a positive community experience."

Game manufacturers have fueled the resurgence with the family game night ad campaign, encouraging families to discover a new game or reconnect with a classic. With the recession dragging on, the campaign seems to be working.

"Dollar for dollar I think you get more value out of board games," says Boyan "Bo" Radakovich, who has been playing board games since he was a kid and has been designing them for several years. He also helped found the Southern Arizona Gaming Association, which promotes board games and hosts gaming events.

"(For) $40 or $50 you get a board game you can play with multiple players over and over again," says Drew Kallen, manager of the Park Place Game Daze, which specializes in strategic games like Mr. Jack and Settlers of Catan.

Every second and fourth Sunday of the month, the Park Place store sets out games for shoppers to play.

"People bring their own games and I can get anything we need from the store," Kallen says.

It's a similar scene on Thursday evenings at Hat's Games. A handful of players gather weekly for the RTeam Gamers Club, picking among the store's sci-fi, military and fantasy games.

"That's the fun part: They are playing everything," says Hat's owner Dave Hat. "It's never the same game twice."

Hat opened the store in 2004 to fill the void left when Things for Thinkers closed. Some of his merchandise is from Thinkers' inventory.

Hat also followed his predecessor's philosophy of selling games that you can't find at big-box stores. Some of the titles he carries include Fantasy Flight, Thunderstone, Zombie Town and War Hammer 40000 "Dawn of War."

Game Daze, an Arizona chain with seven stores including two in Tucson, specializes in Euro and strategic games that include the popular Settlers of Catan games, Ticket To Ride, Small World and Quelf.

Kallen, who has a degree in film, says he describes new games to customers by comparing them to familiar games.

"I look at it like pitching a movie," he explains, then gives the example of Kingsburg, a game that he describes as a cross between Yahtzee and Settlers of Catan.

Thomas Deeny says Kingsburg is more like Yahtzee on steroids.

At last Saturday's Ides gathering, he and four other players rolled dice and accumulated small brown and gold blocks of wood onto their individual game boards. Players are lords sent from the king to administer frontier territories. The winner is the player who has best built up his territory to the king's liking.

While he enjoys the game's strategy, Deeny says he is most attracted to the social aspect of board games.

"You play with friends and meet new people," he says.

Deeny, Black and Radakovich organize the monthly Ides meeting. The trio also founded the Southern Arizona Gaming Association several years ago and in 2008 launched the RinCon board game convention.

It attracted 250 attendees that first year, Deeny says. The following year, the number doubled; this past October, about 625 people turned out during the weekend of Tucson Meet Yourself for the annual board game expo and demonstrations.

"Eventually it will be large enough where we can have a real staff and a real budget," says Radakovich, a San Diego transplant who came to Tucson five years ago for graduate school. "I'd like to see more children, but I think maybe what that needs is a separate game room."

The convention brought more customers into Hat's Games, which Hat runs with his wife, Samantha.

"Regardless of the economy or anything else, board game sales have been steady and reliable," he says.

In 2008, board game sales in the United States rose 6 percent to just shy of $800 million, according to the Toy Industry Association Inc. They have continued to post modest sales growth every year.

"Nowadays, people are looking for cheap, easy fun that they get a lot more use out of it," Radakovich says.

But more than that, players are looking for a way to reconnect with one another on a personal level.

"It brings people together," Radakovich says. "Everyone loves storytelling and everyone loves spending time with their friends. Board games give you a chance to spend time with your friends."

Or host a memorable post-wedding reception party.

When lifelong gamer Chris Barath got married last month, he and his wife invited some of the guests back to their Vail home to play board games.

"We had two or three games going," says the 38-year-old California transplant who is a computer systems administrator with Tucson Newspapers.

Barath, who got hooked on board games when he was a kid, says he's also dabbled in computer games. But there's no substitute for the social side of sitting around a table with several other people.

"If you want to play by yourself, computers are the way to go," says Radakovich, whose latest game, Alphabet Soup, is about to be released. "But if you have friends and spend time with your family, board games are the way to go."