Here’s my BGG cluster graph which basically shows that I’m a square peg that doesn’t fit very well into any particular hole. My wife Lisa has been telling me that for years but now she has statistical proof. Here’s how to interpret what it means:
The overall size of the gray blob is an indicator of how my top 10 favorite games fit in the clusters. The right side is Eurogames and the left side is Amerigames. The specific varieties of Euros and Amerigames are labeled on the axes. A blob skewed to the right represents a more Eurogame game or gamer, to the left more of an Amerigame(r). Up and down seem to be correlated with game ‘weight’ or approachability. Up is ‘lighter’, down is ‘heavier’.
Approximate meanings of the clusters:
- Euro-1: Core Eurogames, like Puerto Rico.
- Euro-2:Family Eurogames, typically lighter, like Settlers of Catan, Carcassonne and Ticket to Ride.
- Euro-3: Heavy Eurogames, such as El Grande or Tigris & Euphrates.
- Ameri-1:New style American games, typically with lots of plastic miniatures.
- Ameri-2: Wargames.
My best cluster match quality was 0.662309368191721 with:
- 100 Eurogamer (Type 3) (93 3 12962 54 9674)
- 78 Eurogamer (Type 1) (93 54 3 12962 9674)
- 39 Eurogamer (Type 2) (3 54 9674 93)
- 15 Amerigamer (Type 1) (3)
- 10 Amerigamer (Type 2) ()
A best cluster match quality result above 1 means I match that cluster fairly well. Below about 0.6, means I don’t match anything that well.
There’s a great geek list that describes the clustering and you can even try it out for yourself.