At Christmas, nothing is better than gathering the family around the table to play a board game or TTRPG. However, picking what game to play can be tricky as hundreds of fantastic board games and TTRPGs are available on store shelves and online, covering every genre and theme imaginable. This task is even trickier if your group features a wide range of ages and experience levels, as you need to find something that will entertain everyone without overwhelming those new to the medium.
Thankfully, there are loads of board games and TTRPGs that combine memorable fun with accessible and intuitive design, meaning that no matter your family makeup, you can enjoy a fabulous, stress-free Christmas family game night.
Codenames
A Fun Guessing Game That The Whole Family Can Enjoy
Many consider Codenames the best modern party game, and it’s easy to see why. Designed by Vlaada Chvátil, Codenames starts with players shuffling the included cards and laying them out in a grid pattern. One player from each team is then appointed Spymaster and is given a special card showing which cards represent their team’s agents and which one is the dreaded assassin.
Each turn, the Spymaster must attempt to get their teammates to pick the cards representing their agents by giving them a one-word clue that links to the words on the card (for example, a Spymaster could say “Builder” to try and get their team to select cards marked Bricks, Stone, or House). The first team to pick all their agents wins. But beware, as choosing the assassin is an instant loss, forcing Spymasters and players to consider their actions carefully.
Hive
A Simple Strategy Board Game For 2 Players
In Hive, each player aims to use their team of insects to surround the opponent’s Queen Bee. To make this happen, each insect at your disposal moves differently. For example, the grasshopper can jump other tiles, the spider always moves three tiles, and the beetle can climb on top of other tiles, allowing it to move over obstacles while blocking the movement of other insects.
Hive stands out because it is a board game without a board, allowing it to be played on any flat surface. This, combined with its small number of pieces, makes it the perfect game to throw in your bag and pull out when you have some free time, making it the ideal game for people who travel a lot over the Christmas period. The game strikes a perfect balance between accessibility and strategy, as while the basic game can be learned in five minutes, those who spend more time with the game will find there is plenty of depth, giving it immense replayability.
Men At Work
A Fun Stacking Game That’s Perfect For Kids
Dexterity games are a fantastic choice for family game night as they’re usually highly intuitive, removing the intimidation factor that often puts newcomers off board games. Men At Work is a stunning example of the genre, as it’s an entertaining balancing game with plenty of unique twists that make it stand out from the pack.
The biggest twist is that this game requires players to balance two elements: long girders and little helmet-wearing builders. At the start of their turn, the player draws a card telling them what object to place and where to put it. But they must be careful as if a worker or a girder hits the table, the player loses one of their safety certificates. Lose all three certificates, and the player is out of the game. Having two different objects to balance adds extra difficulty and variety to the object-balancing formula. And, in a nice touch, the game comes with several alternative rule sets, allowing the complexity to be tweaked to fit your table’s needs. Because of this, Men At Work is the perfect Christmas game for families with younger children.
Love Letter
The Game Of Romance Becomes A Surprisingly Fast-Paced Party Game
Love Letter has had a meteoric rise to fame, quickly becoming one of the board games space’s most talked about games. It is easy to see why, as the game is effortless to learn and loads of fun, meaning that it’s a game players will come back to again and again.
In Love Letter, players have a hand of two cards, each with a value and an ability. Every turn, the player has to decide which card to keep in their hand and which to discard, aiming to either be the last player remaining or the one with the highest-value card when all cards have been drawn from the deck. What makes Love Letter so fun is how the various card abilities work together, leading to plenty of exciting gambits and unpredictable moments, meaning players will be on the edge of their seats the entire time.
Wavelength
The Guessing Game Of Specturms
Wavelength is a unique team party game built around an included spectrum wheel. At the start of each turn, one team member is nominated to be the psychic. The psychic draws a card with opposite concepts on each side (for example, Hot and Cold) before secretly turning the wheel and checking where the target has ended up. The psychic must then give their teammates a one-word clue to help them guess where the target sits on the spectrum.
The other team members must then decide where on the spectrum the clue sits. Once they’ve picked, the target is revealed, and the team gets points based on how near the target they are. Wavelength is a simple but enjoyable game that anyone can learn in a few minutes. Plus, the randomized target means that the game has loads of replay value, as even if a card is drawn multiple times, each round will play out differently making it a game you can play several times over the Christmas season.
Honey Heist
The Ultimate Heist Has A Furry Twist
Honey Heist is one of the most beloved TTRPGs ever released. The game casts players as a group of bears attempting to pull off the most daring heist the world has ever seen, stealing all of the honey from Honey Con 2017. Each player has two stats, Bear (which covers all bear-like actions) and Criminal (which covers everything else). When the player wants to attempt something with a chance of failure, they roll a D6, and if the roll is equal to or under the related stat, the action succeeds.
One of Honey Heist’s best elements is that many in-game events cause players to move points from their Criminal stat to their Bear stat (and vice-versa), keeping the action fresh and leading to loads of exciting, comical chaos. Combine this with some fantastic scene-setting roll tables, and you’re left with a game that’s easy to learn and quick to set up, making a perfect Christmas game for those new to TTRPGs.
Close the Loop on Your Way Out
A Game That Uses The Whole House
Close the Loop on Your Way Out is a single-page TTRPG that turns your house into a play space. The game is themed around time travel and starts with the players activating their device and getting thrown to another time. They first roll a D20 to work out what item they find in this new place and then roll a D12, a D6, and a D10 to work out when they arrive. In a nice touch, the game suggests that players find the items in the real world and bring them to the table.
After this, players learn what issue their time travel causes and have to think of a way to fix the problem using one of the items they collected in the first phase. Finally, once they’ve fixed it, players must roll dice again to return the objects to their proper place in time. But they must be careful because they could break the timeline if they don’t get it right. Close the Loop on Your Way Out combines freeform improv with fun dice mechanics, meaning it has something for everyone.
Beat the Habit
A Mad Monk Adventure With Plenty Of Comedy
While not a Christmas movie in the traditional sense, Monty Python and the Holy Grail is a film I always watch around the holidays. If your family also observes this tradition, then Beat The Habit is the game for you. In Beat the Habit, the players play as a group of monks on a mission to transport a cart full of beer kegs. One morning, the monks wake up feeling terrible and realize their kegs and carts have gone missing. The monks, not connecting this issue with their throbbing heads, believe the theft to be the devil’s doing and head out on a quest to get their beer back.
Beat the Habit is built around a delightfully simple resolution system. Each Monk has five stats (Beer, Guile, Intellect, Wisdom, and Might). Whenever a monk needs to make a check, they roll two dice, one for Fortune and one for Misfortune, and compare them to the linked stat, with different events happening if both dice pass, one dice passes, or none of them do. So, despite being easy to learn, this system leads to plenty of wacky situations that will keep players on their toes the entire game.
Vampire Couriers: Dusk Till Dawn Delivery
The Ultimate Advancement In Vampire Transportation
Being a vampire’s minion is a thankless job where you’ll perform many tricky and humiliating tasks. One such task is helping your Lord move, as while he rests soundly in his casket, you’re tasked with carrying him across harsh terrain and trying to get him through customs. Vampire Couriers: Dusk Till Dawn Delivery starts with players making their minions. Rather than numerical stats, minions have tags, two representing their skills and one representing their weaknesses.
When it comes time to perform a risk action, the player rolls two D6. They then add one for each relevant skill and remove one for each relevant weakness, with the total deciding if the action is a failure, a partial success, or a complete success. Vampire Couriers: Dusk Till Dawn Delivery combines a fun premise with easy-to-learn dice mechanics, making it an excellent game for people who want their Christmas games to feature some dark humor.
Mistakes Were Made
The Ultimate PR Simulator That’s Great For Improv Lovers
Mistakes Were Made is a fun party game about celebrity publicist doing their best to try and turn around bad press. In each round, one player is the celebrity, another is the publicist, and all other players act as the assembled press. Each round is split into three stages, and at the start of each stage, the publicist and the celebrity have a private conversation where the publicist gives the celebrity three rules they must follow during the phase. After this, the press gets to ask the celebrity five questions, which the celebrity must answer while sticking to the rules given to them.
After the answers, the press judges how the celebrity did. The celebrity gets points if they made themselves look worse, added to the scandal, or made the press or publicist laugh. However, the publicist gets points if the celebrity looks better, dodges a question, or breaks a rule. By the end of the game, the player with the most points wins. Mistakes Were Made is a delightfully chaotic improv game that is great for Christmas Eve parties, doubly so because it’s easy for players to drop in and out as needed.
