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Sitting around a wooden table in a fantasy-themed party room, Maurice “Moe” Tousignant and four others begin playing My City — a board game where players can physically alter the board with stickers to construct an evolving town.
For Tousignant, a local tabletop gamer who’s spent almost five decades rolling dice, shuffling cards, and moving pieces around countless game boards, a game night serves a much more sacred purpose.
“Personal connection — something you’re not going to get from your digital device or sitting in front of a screen,” said Tousignant. “You’re there with real people in the same space sharing an experience.”
Known to local gamers and online followers as “The Tabletop Bellhop,” Tousignant’s decades-long mission to ensure no one games alone comes from a deeply personal place. Growing up in the 1970s, he watched his father build a massive board game collection, but rarely have anyone to share it with.
Tousignant hosts regular community game nights across Windsor, bringing players together to try new tabletop games and build local connections. (Justin Escoto/CBC)
“I do remember one of my earliest memories is sitting on his lap at the dining room table while he painted miniatures,” he said.
What began as a podcast that launched after an auto-industry layoff eight years ago, has expanded into a popular blog and gaming resource where Tousignant acts as a mentor and guide; reviewing new releases, providing game night advice, and directing local players to gaming events across Windsor-Essex.
He also hosts the monthly Brews & Board Games, which introduces gamers, both beginner and season, to new games.
As thousands of new games hit the market each year, local tabletop gamers say they’ve seen an unprecedented boost in the hobby’s popularity, still driven by the resurgence of board games during the COVID-19 pandemic and the current boom of trading card games (TCGs) like Pokémon and Magic: The Gathering.
The tabletop gaming community in Windsor
While community pop-up events fill local venues, locally-owned hobby shops provide open tables and weekly tournaments.
Nigel Davis is a supervisor at Windsor’s Brimstone Games which sells board games, TCGs, and other hobby materials.
Davis says his passion for tabletop games began in grade five when he learned Magic: The Gathering for extra math credits.
“Board games I think have that almost timeless piece to them because it’s something you can get into and as long as you’re learning and playing, you always have someone to go up against and reshuffle and start again,” he said.
Nigel Davis is a supervisor at Brimstone Games, a local hobby shop that sells board games, TCGs and hobby accessories. (Justin Escoto/CBC)
Niko Jones is a frequenter of Brimstone Games and an avid Pokémon player who transitioned from video games to card games more than a year ago.
“With the tail end of COVID, it was a lot of the urge to go outside, play tabletops,” said Jones, noting how tabletop gaming gave him a reason to leave the house and make new friends.
“By kind of destigmatizing it and having more people in the community and more public about it, it does seem to be more welcoming for outsiders to join.”
Windsor-Essex resident Niko Jones has been an avid Pokémon Trading Card Game player for over a year. He’s standing next to Charizard, an iconic Pokémon. (Justin Escoto/CBC)Industry evolving beyond Monopoly-style games
David Kingsmill is the director of board game events for Breakout, an annual Toronto tabletop convention that draws over 2,000 attendees. Kingsmill says he’s seen the industry evolve from mainly traditional “roll-and-move” games like Monopoly into a wide-ranging array of tabletop experiences.
While digital entertainment and multiplayer video offers global reach, Kingsmill says board games provide a level of person-to-person engagement that screens don’t provide.
“If you go to a movie, you’re with your friends, but hopefully, you’re silent for two hours,” said Kingsmill. “With board games, you can sit around a table […] and spend two hours tearing each other to pieces with cardboard and dice, and have a really good time and connect, and be across the table from one another, and engage.
“Board games bring people together.”
Tousignant agrees.
“Just play some games,” he said. “Get together with folks and play some games. Do it with your family, your friends, your coworkers. It’s so easy to get into gaming right now.”
After nearly 50 years at the games table, Tousignant’s message remains simple:
“There’s space at the table for everyone,” he said, “as long as they welcome others.”