Use Tabletop Simulator to playtest board games before you buy them

I'm using Tabletop Simulator as the example because it's what I use. There are plenty of other online platforms for board games.

Background

Every tabletop hobbyist I know is prone to impulse purchases and typically buys more games than they have time to play. I'm no different and I've had my fair share of purchases that I regret.

When I first got into solo board games, I didn't really know what to look for in a game. I simply glanced at the Boardgamegeek page and made a quick judgement based on review score, theme, and artstyle. Other times, I just looked at Top 10 lists and bought anything that looked interesting. Some games from back then still get regular playtime. Others, not so much...

My biggest regret: Legacy of Dragonholt. It has a good rating, long playtime, and is recommended for solo play. It sounded like a story focused RPG and I was really looking forward to see what a board game could do with that formula.

You can imagine my disappointment when I realized that is was just a glorified Choose-your-own-adventure book. The included map was neat and character creation offered the illusion of depth and, oh boy, what an illusion it was... It was so shallow and generic that I literally couldn't tell you a single story beat of the entire game. My full playthrough was only a couple of years ago and the fact that I remember nothing is more telling than anything else I could say.

Yes, all of these problems could have been solved with more research but my point is that I didn't even know what to look for back then.

Which leads me to the point of this post: Actually play the game before you buy it.

Tabletop Simulator

You don't need any extensive playtesting. Just a single scenario or session is usually enough for you to get a feeling for the game.

That's where Tabletop Simulator comes into play. It's by far my favorite method to play board games online and I can't recommend it enough. There is plenty of paid DLC but you don't need any of it. Most games have a free (user created) mod on the Steam Workshop that you can download for free.

I'm always impressed with the quality and scripting of some of these mods. Clever publishers even upload their own official versions because they realize what an effective advertisement tool it is.

An example of an excellent mod for a giant game: Star Wars: Rebellion
Solo modes are often included in the scripting: Nemesis
Even complex campaign games like Gloomhaven or Pandemic Legacy can be played, saved, and loaded with TTS.

Good scripts eliminate any setup time and you are free to play around with the game and it's assets. It's obviously not the same as physically handling the tokens and having the board in front of you on a table, but that's not important for what we are trying to do here. We just want to know if the game is fun or interesting enough to warrant spending real money on it.

Positive Example
A friend showed me Aeon's End and I liked it so much that I bought the core box on the same day. 

Negative Example
PARKS is a game I was eying for quite some time (solely based on the gorgeous artwork). Another friend had the same idea and so we played a game on TTS. We quickly came to the depressing realization that the game is so extremely basic that we wouldn't even want to play more than two sessions (even with the expansion).

Tl;dr

Before buying a game, actually play it online so you know that it is worth your money.