With Christmas coming it would be good to get one or two new family games. Uno, Yahtzee and Jenga are big favourites at the moment. The kids are 12 and 7.

We quite liked Maponimos though rules might be a bit complex.

Ours (13, 11, 7) like Carcassonne. Nice and short, involves luck, but also some brains. Recommended. Oh, and Scrabble.

Saw a Star Wars themed Risk in Toys R Us the other day, going to be the in thing this christmas.

+1 for carcassonne. Love that game!

Carcassonne here too.
We also play lots of Dominion, much better than Carcassonne imo.

Pull my finger is always good!

Kill Doctor Lucky

(you can buy it as a board game but the original ethos of James Earnest games was that they were new rules for existing board game gubbins, so if you already have plenty of dice and counters you can download the board, rules and cards for free and print them out)

Point at the ginger is a perennial favourite.

Given the ages I’d punt for Carcassonne also, it’s easy to teach and brilliant. Maybe punt for Ticket to Ride also, rated 8+ so a go-er if you’ve got a bright 7yo.

Don’t panic. It’s funny just to hear some of the answers from younger kids.

we always have a good time playing Logo and Cranium.

Qwirkle is really good, simple rules that even the grandparents understand.

pitch & toss.

Science museum Brainbox games are really good

Played Logo with my kids and nieces a month ago. Never played it before. Will definitely play it again. Very good game that can be played with different levels of complexity depending on the kids’ ages.

Exploding Kittens? Even my wife likes that and she normally hates card games.

Failing that, Risk: World Domination

My current favourite is Flick ’em Up*. What’s better than sticking on some western soundtracks whilst you flick bullets at one another and trash talk in bad american accents?

Carcasonne, Ticket To Ride & King of Tokyo are also great and pretty accesible.

*yes, I know, cult of the new.

Ticket to ride, Discworld Ankh Morpork.

Mine are a little too young for Carcassonne, but then again they are also too young for:

[list]
[*]Sushi Go! (4 year old is now playing the full rules)[/*]
[*]Roll for it![/*]
[*]Brain Box – The world (they need help with the words, but are fine with the pictures.)[/*]
[*]We have a demo of Name 5 that is fun, but seems over priced.[/*]
[/list]

On our list for when the girls get a bit older:
[list]
[*]Tsuro (The 4 year old could play it now, she’s played a rip off version on my phone and enjoyed it. Just need to buy it sometime)[/*]
[*]King of Tokyo[/*]
[*]Carcasonne (although it might be harder to convince my wife that it’s not a board game)[/*]
[*]Cards against humanity (might have to wait a bit longer for this one… I hear Apples to Apples is the child friendly version[/*]
[/list]

Games are often cheaper to buy from the US. I usually go for Amazon.com unless it has a UK edition.

Tabletop is a good youtube program about games:
[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xu9RB-N4T3g[/video]
[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMtlQxJeWvc[/video]
[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6VpW4Vljr8[/video]

Cards against humanity (might have to wait a bit longer for this one… I hear Apples to Apples is the child friendly version

Lots of party games work quite well with kids. You’ll not get half their jokes but something like Snake Oil or even Dixit can have them in stitches if they have active imaginations.

Very simple dice game.

Use one dice.
First to score a hundred or over wins.
Youngest player throws first.
They keep throwing until they want to stick and bank their score,
but if they throw a 1 at any point,they lose everything for that turn.

You soon find out who the gamblers are going to be. 🙂

dobble

At potential risk of a piss taking: Lego Shave A Sheep

Cards Against Humanity?

King of Tokyo

..is ace. Nice tactile dice to throw, cartoon monsters, works for 2-6 players. Would imagine it’ll be fine even for younger kids with a bit of adult guidance.

Carcassonne works great too, but skip the farmer scoring if playing with younger kids.

Kids Monopoly.

Stak Bots is great fun.

Apples to Apples is simple and fun.

On the Tactile front, Cube Quest is pretty awesome (though not as good as Flick ’em Up) and would go down well with kids.

Hungry hungry hippos still play it with my brother and I’m 32 and he’s 27 epic game what you do is go too a weight watchers meeting and between you secretly split the group into two halves and pick one each and then scatter a family size bag of maltesers on the floor and cheer on your fatty’s

Best game ever devised!

Risk: if you want tantrums and fist fights

Snakes and Ladders is always great, like Fasthaggis dice idea Bravo

Blokus

Risk: if you want tantrums and fist fights

Every time someone mentions Risk it reminds me of just how much I hate it. A game which can take hours where, with a bad starting position, you can be insurmountably **** in the first turn.

Pandemic is good, but maybe a bit difficult at 7 – my three (9, 11 and 13) will happily leave the computer alone for the time it takes to play. It is also cooperative so you either all win or all lose so less opportunity for argument

MY kids ( 7 and 10) both enjoy Carcasonne and Sushi Go, but the family favourite is Camel Up where you bet on stacking racing camels

ron jeremy – just for you… might not want to watch it at work.

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCEqUn7If44[/video]

Every time someone mentions Risk it reminds me of just how much I hate it. A game which can take hours where, with a bad starting position, you can be insurmountably **** in the first turn.

“Modern” Risk isn’t like that, it uses a system of objectives that you go after – first player to 3 objectives wins. Plays quicker, starting position doesn’t matter much, way more fun to play. Of course, you can still do the long dragged-out total elimination game if you prefer.

Risk Legacy uses the same systems but the game itself develops over 15 games – new rules, adding/deleting things from the board or card decks, etc. Utterly brilliant if you can get the same 3-5 players together several times to play through it all.

“Modern” Risk isn’t like that, it uses a system of objectives that you go after – first player to 3 objectives wins. Plays quicker, starting position doesn’t matter much, way more fun to play. Of course, you can still do the long dragged-out total elimination game if you prefer.

I’ve played this and it’s undoubtedly a vast improvement but in the back of my head is the embittered child camped out in japan for 10 turns waiting for someone to stop scrapping over the middle east and administer a **** coup de gras.

Labyrinth?

We have the kids version and our 5 year old is just about okay with it and we enjoy it as well. I would think either the kids or the full version would be okay for older children.