10 Insanely Fun Board Games You Should Play Right Now

[Celerity]

https://www.thrillist.com/entertainment/nation/best-new-board-games




If you've ever said, "Board games? More like bored games!" you should probably close this tab and go back to arguing in r/runescape. Not that some board games aren't boring. Anything that requires reading a 14-page instruction manual is off the table. And everyone's spent too much hard time with Monopoly and other family-gaming-night classics to get hugely excited about playing those in adulthood. (Except Clue. Clue rules.) You probably already know about great, modern classics like Settlers of Catan and Cranium. Here are 10 even more recent board games that every household should have in stock, boredom not included.




How to Rob a Bank

Number of players: 2-4
Play time: 30+ minutes
Who it’s for: Fans of Secret Hitler and Baby Driver
Why it’s great: It satisfies strategists by requiring cooperation, foresight, and friendly competition.
What it's about: One person's the bank, everyone else is a robber. Can the criminals successfully execute a heist without the bank interfering? Over the course of three rounds, the robbers have to get a certain number of money bags into the getaway car in order to win, all while dodging alarms, evading security guards, and trying not to get tackled. How to Rob a Bank won't teach you applicable skills for the real world, but it will teach you that pitting people against one another can have costly consequences, and that's perhaps a better lesson.
Buy it here





Machi Koro

Number of players: 2-4
Play time: 30 minutes
Who it’s for: Fans of Monopoly Deal and The Big Short
Why it’s great: For a brief moment, your hunger for power will be celebrated.
What it's about: This popular Japanese game moves fast. Your goal is to turn the town of Machi Koro into the bustling metropolis of your dreams by establishing businesses, making profits, building landmarks, and stealing business from other players who have their own plans in mind. On each turn, you roll the dice and hope that it matches the number on one of the buildings you own. If it does, you can take the action on that building's card, earn money, and invest in future structures. The first player to finish building all of their landmarks wins the game.
Buy it here





Carcassonne

Number of players: 2-5
Play time: 30-45 minutes
Who it’s for: Fans of Risk and Sid Meier’s Civilization
Why it’s great: Players can build off opponents’ work to steal their points, making it anyone’s game right up to the end.
What it's about: Drawing inspiration from France's fortified city Carcassonne, this game requires players to build a countryside, one tile at a time. As players place tiles, they create an elaborate map full of fields, rivers, roads, cities, and monasteries -- the question now is who will stake claim of each feature as it's completed. Carcassonne is anyone's territory, and players will have to disrupt their opponents' plans if they want to come out on top. May the most ruthless builder win.
Buy it here





Pandemic

Number of players: 2-4
Play time: 45 minutes
Who it’s for: Fans of Outbreak and Contagion
Why it’s great: Pandemic tosses you into a parallel world where humanity works together when problems come their way. Plus, you learn geography.
What it's about: You don't need a rulebook to tell you that the only way to stop a pandemic is by working together to minimize its spread. This cooperative strategy game removes competition from the equation -- you either prevent a pandemic together by controlling outbreaks and building research stations, or you go down together if it takes over. After you've mastered the classic Pandemic game, move on to its spinoffs -- the elaborate Pandemic Legacy seasons are a strategizer's dream.
Buy it here

snip

[Doreen]

1. Now give me some insanely fun board games for one player.

Board games for 3 players would be fine if it is geared toward two of the players being cats.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. Someone needs to come up with a board game that can be played with cats.

It could use pieces to be knocked off the board onto another board which would be the target. The cat or human who knocks the most pieces onto the highest-scoring locations on the target wins. In order to make it fair, the human would have to play the game like a cat.

[Doreen]

3. Hmmm, maybe that would work.

[Harker]

4. Cats make the rules.

Humans lose.

[Celerity]

5. ...

[Harker]

7. Bingo.

I've lived with as many as ten at a time.

A three-year-old Siberian Husky now. Sheesh.

[MFM008]

10. Yes

I have 3 cats that are just waiting to play
And plop their fatty selves on the board....

[marble falls]

13. I've been playing that game tooooo many years already. Sad whe I have to try thinking like a cat ...

they have no appreciation.

[Crowman2009]

12. Well with chess, you could text moves and board locations.

With other games, you could send pics or video clips of your moves if other people have the same board game.

[Happy Hoosier]

19. Many good games are available as free mobile apps.

I’ve played many, including Carcassonne and Castles of Mad King Ludwig.

[Wanderlust988]

6. I love Monopoly

But it can go on forever!

[DENVERPOPS]

17. Not if you play it using Trump's rules

You set up the board, arrange all the cards and pieces, and then give all the money to a player designated as TRUMP........

[Skinner]

9. This is a good list. I can personally vouch for a number of the games on it.

I give a big thumbs-up to:

+ Machi Koro
+ Carcassonne
+ Pandemic
+ Splendor
+ Azul
+ Qwirkle
+ Ticket to Ride

My kids like (but I don't):

+ Betrayal at House on the Hill

I've never played:

+ How to Rob a Bank
+ 5 Second Rule

[marble falls]

14. First a question: do you have a cat?

[Skinner]

15. lol no.

I have a dog.

[marble falls]

16. 'splains the "no cat". Splains why you have all the pieces to those game, too.

[littlemissmartypants]

11. Therapy is fun. Here are the details

Description from Amazon
Product description
In Therapy the Game, you move through the six stages of life answering fascinating and fun questions about everyday life. As you move your therapist's couch from Infancy to Seniority and stages between, you answer Insight questions drawn from actual psychological research (footnotes included).

Along the way you'll land in your opponents' therapy offices and they'll land in yours -- you get to be the therapist, and the patient. This is where you'll find out how well you know your friends and family, and how well they know you.

You go into Group Therapy with other players and find out surprising things about them, and yourself. You guess what most people see in Therapy Thinkblot pictures, and (if your issues are severe enough) find a way out of Psychosis!

Be the first player to get one peg from each stage of life -- filling up your therapy couch -- and then reach the finish space, and you win! Includes game board, 360 Stages of Life cards, 90 Therapy cards, 30 Thinkblots cards, Thinkblots booklet, 6 Therapy-couch movers, 36 Stages of Life pegs, 2 game dice, and game instructions.

So tell me, Celerity, would you play with me?

❤lmsp