Spice up your next game night: Try these games to play with your friends
As we enter 2021 with coronavirus vaccinations slowly rolling out, the hope is we can one day soon gather with friends for at least a night in. It might be awhile before we can go to a bar, movie theater, or concert with friends. But hopefully, we can safely go to someone’s house or apartment for a movie night or game night.
Having friends over for game night is an incredibly fun & safe way to spend time with friends. While some places allow small gatherings, others aren’t quite ready to open yet. However, if you decide to gather, you can make it a BYOB & BYOF for a night of food, drinks, and games to enjoy each other’s company.
If you’re tired of playing the same old Monopoly, Clue, or the Game of Life, there are plenty of games to play with friends. You couldn’t tell by going to Target or Walmart, but many independent game creators exist and produce games a thousand times better than what you can find at Target. However, we’ve found plenty of fun games at Target, and a few made the list as well.
Secret Hitler
Secret Hitler was created in 2016 and grew a massive following. The party game pits a team of Fascists & Liberals against each other to save Germany from the Nazi party. The Fascists win by electing Hitler as Chancellor or enacting six fascists policies. The only catch is Hitler doesn’t know who his allies are. The Liberals win by killing Hitler or enacting five liberal policies.
The game is so much fun to play with friends, especially with those who get mad when falsely accused. You’ll need at least five players, so it’s perfect for large groups. Depending on how many people are playing, games take anywhere between twenty to forty-five minutes. However, it’s a straightforward game with only a few rules about game flow.
The game costs $35 and can be bought on secrethitler.com or Amazon. If you’re worried about if your friends will like the game, you can go to the game’s website and print out a free paper version of the game. If you’re still meeting virtually with friends, there is an online version of the game through tabletopia.com. Make sure you use Discord to communicate with friends if you play the online version.
Movie trivia games
If you & your friends are into movie trivia, you need to get Blockbuster from Target or anywhere else you shop. Blockbuster is a very fun team trivia game all about naming movies.
The lightning round is precisely that – it’s a back & forth battle of naming as many movies you can on a given category. Then you enter the movie round, where you get your partner to name three movies by giving them one word, a quote, or acting it out. The first team to get all eight genres wins.
Because it’s teams, you’ll need at least four people to play. Blockbuster also has an expansion pack with additional movies & genres. It’s the perfect game for a competitive group of movie buffs.
If you’re looking for a challenge, pick up Cinephile from Amazon or cinephilegame.com. The game has six game modes, all about movies. However, you need to be a true cinephile to play some of the more expert-level modes. Don’t feel confined to six-game mode because the company invites fans to make their own. They’re always looking for new game modes, and if they like a submission, they publish it on their website.
One Night Ultimate Werewolf
If you’ve ever played Mafia or Werewolf, then you’ve played One Night. The game adds more roles to the traditional Mafia game and is helpful if you don’t have a creative storyteller to run Mafia or only have three or five friends playing.
The objective is to kill the werewolf. Everyone gets a unique role and performs specific tasks during the night phase. When everyone opens their eyes from the night phase, you start figuring out who’s the werewolf.
One Night is another game perfect for groups where people get frustrated when they’re falsely accused. The game flow is easy and comes with an app to help dictate the game’s pace. In the app, you select the roles you’re using and how long you want the night & voting phases to take. Then you’re off to the race. Because the game doesn’t take that long, you can zip through a few rounds in an hour.
One Night also has expansion games you can combine while playing. These games include Vampires, Aliens, and Supervillains. They also have additional rules to follow. We recommend buying Werewolf first and then adding more games to your collection.
Superfight
If you & your friends easily argue over who would win a fight, bigfoot or a yeti, then Superfight is for you. Superfight is a card game where you build a character to put in a fight. It’s full of classic fighters like monsters & fictional killers and some of the funniest pop culture references like Martha Stewart & “Karen”.
You might be thinking to yourself, “How would Martha Stewart ever beat a bigfoot?”. Well, that’s where the second part comes in. You also pick two attributes to add to your character. It could be something like she’s 100 feet tall or equipped with a weapon or attributes as she can turn to steel. You can also make your own cards to add to the deck.
The base game is $30, but there are plenty of expansion decks to spice up your game. They have decks that affect the fight, like adding a location or changing it from a fight to the death to a bake off. Then some decks add more characters or attributions to the game. There are R-rated decks & decks about sci-fi, Game of Thrones, and Christmas, just to name a few. Expansion decks cost $15 each.
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Have a game recommendation? Let us know in the comments.
