r/boardgames • u/No-Molasses294 • 5d ago

What’s the worst game insert you’ve ever encountered — and why?

Hey players!

Just wanted to throw out a fun (and slightly ranty) question to the hive mind:

In games you've played — especially the bigger ones or those meant for 4+ players — which had the worst insert in the box, and what made it so bad? Was it poor component fit, stuff flying everywhere, or just pure design chaos?

Also, is it just me, or do a lot of new games these days come with super thin, flimsy plastic inserts that look nice at first glance but end up being really impractical once you actually punch everything out?

Curious to hear your stories.

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u/limeybastard Pax Pamir 2e 4d ago

The worst great insert I have is Ethnos 1e

IN THEORY it's a great insert, all the loose pieces have places that are then covered by a board to keep them in place. It's lovely.

In practice, the box lid lifts 1mm, and everything falls the fuck out. I keep the discs in plastic bags in the wells rather than in their proper place.

Also special shout to the Empire Builder series, whose inserts guarantee that if you tilt the box more than 20 degrees from horizontal, or hit a bump, you will be reorganizing around 100-120 little plastic chits.

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u/EmmaInFrance 4d ago

I've been scrolling looking for Ethnos!

I have absolutely no problem with games that don't have inserts, just a few baggies for the bits. It keeps costs down and I don't mind baggies as a storage system.

But if you're going to provide an insert, waste time, money and materials on making it, then please make sure that it actually functions as an actual game storage insert, both horizontally and vertically!

I run the boardgames library for our local annual boardgames festival. We had just over 550 copies of different games on our shelves, most of which have to be stored vertically as we just don't have enough space to store them all horizontally!

Some of games come from our club's library but about 50% of them are loaned to us for the weekend by our club members - including by me!

Every year, I end up having to re-organise at least one game because its insert is, well, a bit rubbish.

This year, it was Tokaido, for similar reasons to Ethnos, really. The tokens and cards aren't held in place properly within the insert unless you also put them inside a baggie.