These days most multiplayer titles are online-only and lack a split screen option, seriously curtailing the options for a group of friends to play together in the same room.
Table top games obviously have an advantage there, bringing gamers together to socialize while beating the tar out of each other. For the gamer in your life who usually prefers console or PC titles, there are a ton of top games - board, card, and dice focused - that can draw them away from the screen and back to the dinner table.
Here we're taking a look at nine of the best games currently covering everything from humorous fantasy to Lovecraftian horror! With a few of these in tow, you've got the makings of an excellent weekly gaming get-together.
Red Dragon Inn
What do the adventurers do AFTER they've raided the dungeon and brought back their wagon loads of loot? They drink and gamble it away until the wee hours of the morning!
Your goal is to stay conscious despite copious shot-taking and be the last adventurer standing with a full coin purse. Along the way you can undertake all sorts of shady actions to lower your companion's fortitude or increase their alcohol intake. A truly fabulous gambling mini-game also shows up every now and again that throws an absolutely delightful wrench in the works.
There are some clear riffs on Magic: The Gathering, with the equivalent of instant interrupts, but its much easier to learn and people who have never done a complex card game of that style before can be up and running in about 10 minutes.
There are also loads of expansions allowing you to have 8 or more players at the same time and greatly expanding the character options, even letting you play as the wizard Zot's homicidal familiar Pooky. Throw in some house rules about having to take a shot when your character drinks and you've got a party on your hands with Red Dragon Inn!
Boss Monster
What's more fun than storming the villainous monster's lair, smashing through his defenses and traps, and stealing his loot? BEING the villainous monster and hand crafting that lair of course!
The idea in this deck building card game is to build the most diabolical dungeon possible to kill all the fighters, mages, clerics, and thieves who come knocking and amass an impressive stockpile of adventurer souls.
It's a bit more involved than the simpler card games, offering a satisfying balance of complexity and ease of play.
Betrayal at House On The Hill
This epic board game is sort of like 70 games in one, because each time you play you get a completely different scenario with a different player taking on the role of antagonist.
Scenarios could be anything from from werewolves hunting you down to escaping a haunted mansion and a whole lot more, with a huge range of objectives within the base mechanics. It's a great mixture of both cooperative gameplay and player versus player mayhem when the objective is revealed and one player becomes the bad guy.
Mars Attacks The Dice Game
This simple but addictive dice throwing game is really, really easy to learn and play, making it a great option for when new players are around or you don't want some big complicated set up.
The game sets you as the Martian invaders, rolling dice on different locations and hoping to destroy them before you get nuked. Much like with Zombie Dice, the mechanic forces you to either play longer while risking bad dice that could ruin your whole turn, or play conservatively with shorter turns and build up towards a victory over time.
Elder Sign
A much simplified version of the overly complex Arkham Horror and it's thousands of pieces, this high quality Fantasy Flight game splits the difference between dice rollers like Mars Attacks and really in-depth board games.
Although simplified, there's still a lot of strategy involved and many different character types to choose from, not to mention a ticking clock of doom that can really make the player's lives much harder.
For getting a first foot into the waters of Lovecraftian board games, this is an excellent place to start. This one even got a mobile version called Elder Sign: Omens available on Android.
Smash Up
A very literal title, this card game has you picking two different faction decks and shuffling them together for some very zany combinations - wizard fairies, dinosaur ninja, pirate aliens, and more.
Each faction follows the same basic gameplay rules, but has a slightly different focus to differentiate their styles. Zombies for instance focus on bringing cards out of your discard pile, while Ninja suddenly mess up something the opponent was about to do as they sneak out of the darkness.
Last Night On Earth
The definitive undead board game experience, this is easily one of the best zombie apocalypse titles on the market, with tons of varied scenarios and a huge roster of characters so the game is different every time.
Increasing that replayability are several excellent expansions that add new elements, like grave weapons for the zombie player, and you can freely download a ton of new scenarios from the web. If you want to get into zombie board games but aren't sure where to start, this is the place.
Drinking Quest
Now featuring two sequels for a trilogy of booze-filled wonder, this simple card game puts you on an RPG-style quest where you both pull cards and roll dice in hopes of achieving fantastic glory... but if you take damage or lose your loot, you have to drink! It's the perfect "beer and pretzels" style game for a fun night that's more about the foaming drinks than the actual gaming.
Quarriors
A dice-throwing game that is utterly obsessed with the letter Q for no apparent reason (quiddity, quarry, quake dragon...), this one has you throwing absurd numbers of dice in hopes of getting specific combos to catch creatures or cast spells. While its very fast paced, there's also a "deck building" element with the dice taking the place of cards for an interesting twist on a standard style.
This is just a brief sampling of the many high quality tabletop games out now on the market that will appeal to lovers of video games as well.
For even more board game fun, be sure to check out our list of "cross platform" games that started out as video games but made the leap to the tabletop.
What did you think of our list, and what games do you think should of made the cut?
Published: Sep 26, 2016 04:48 pm