Top 10 Board Games for Couples

my favorite person to play board games with is my wife we've played over a thousand games together but when it comes to playing Just the Two of Us there's a certain type of game we prefer what I call a couple's game it has to fit into our day we don't have four hour game nights together so we need something we can play in an hour or less and it has to be easy to get back into if we haven't played it in ages and ultimately it still has to keep us interested after many years of playing it if you're looking for a game to play with your partner even if they're not as into games as you are these are my top 10 recommendations more than any video I've ever made I would swear by these games if you want to buy any of them you can help me out by using the links below let's get to the list in sobec two players you're in an ancient Egyptian Market collecting Goods it's like a competitive shopping trip you're trying to get everything you want and stop your opponent from getting what they want on your turn you take something from the market in the line where the ank is pointing I'm gonna grab some Ivory I'm making a piano for dinner what makes the game so interesting is that when you take a tile it tells you where the ankle Point next so you know what tiles your opponent will be able to take sometimes getting what you want means they'll get something even better I know it's our 20th anniversary but that just means we've had so many of them that we're bored of them by now so can I go to the ball game convention okay then I won't feel bad about going to Ibiza with the girls even though it's on your birthday wait what it really makes you think twice about what you take because you can look ahead and predict what you'll get down the line one bad decision taking something that's exciting now could leave you with regret and failure just like your mum said would happen if you did drugs literally Chino you could achieve that without ever doing them but being picky comes at a price because every tile from the ant porn that you skip over goes into your corruption pile and if you end up with more corruption it gives points to your opponent it's such a great dilemma you have the option to cut corners but if you do it too much you'll live to regret it it's how politics used to work and when do you sell a set if you go early you get first dibs on these special tokens but if you get more of that type later you might not be able to sell them and goods left in your and go on your corruption pile there are also these powerful character tiles that you take face down so you don't know what your opponent has and it puts you on edge is it a gun in their pocket or just a banana I love that you can plan ahead in this game but I also love that you can puncture those plans and then if you're really good you can plan for the punctures but at a certain point that's just anxiety fungi also known as morels is a game that captures the everyday stresses of foraging for mushrooms as you walk through the woods together you take it in turns to pick some fungus from under your feet and no not your athlete's foot do you take the common honey fungus or the rare morale which tastes better but is a lot harder to come by because you need at least three of the same type to eat them you wouldn't want to heat your pan up over nothing so if you take a morel now how long is it going to sit in your hand before you get another two to cook it and with so many different types of fungi your hand is filling up with all this stuff that doesn't go together like you're buying clothes in TK Maxx which wouldn't be a problem if it weren't for your hand size you see the irony of this game is you don't have mushroom and if you want the jokes to get better than that you have to like And subscribe your tiny hands can only hold eight mushrooms at a time and it becomes a problem almost immediately at first you're gayly strolling through the forest without a care in the world yeah I think I'll have a porcini for free and in no time at all you're freaking out because you can't pick up the mushrooms you need babe it's your turn I know it's my turn but I need to take the porcini so I have three to cook them but I don't have space to take it and to make space I need to cook something but I don't have three of anything and to get three of something I need to take the porcini but I can't babe There are a few ways to make space like taking a basket which means you can carry more but if you do something sensible like that on your turn you won't be doing what you love taking mushrooms it'd be like going to McDonald's and having a salad and if you don't take a card now your opponent might grab it there's only enough of the better mushrooms for one of you to make a meal out of them leave chanterelle alone she She's mine don't personify the mushrooms John it's creepy you can take a mushroom further down the path by spending walking sticks to reach ahead and grab it but to get sticks you have to sell some mushrooms it means giving up on one dream so you can invest in another it's like selling your drum kit to pay for singing lessons thank God Phil Collins didn't have to like a pair of nepotism babies in fungi you're overwhelmed with good opportunities and you physically can't take all the other actors roles this game is a timely reminder that being rich is hard in schotten Totten also known as battleline you play as rival Scottish Clans fighting over a border but you actually don't attack each other you send your troops up to the line and they stand there like catwalk models facing each other off but never touching the player with the hottest models wins that battle for today's battle we've gone with a bagpiper an Archer and a muscle man all in a matching purple wow yours are way hotter I've just got three Wizards like many of the best two-player games it's competitive if I eat this cake that's less cake for you but it's not destructive I can't come into your house and bend all your cake Forks to win these Stones you're trying to build sets of cards that are stronger than your opponents and they work like poker hands the strongest is a run of the same color then three of a kind and so on the trouble is you have to put a card down every turn so you can't wait to collect better cards before you make plans you have to start committing immediately it's like you're a football manager who has to pick their Midfield before they even know what attackers are at the club okay I'll put the five here I guess and hopefully I'll draw the four or the six no okay great but how long do you wait for the perfect cards if you've got two more fives you could give up on a color run and get a three of a kind a bird in the hand is better than spending your whole life single because you're waiting for Dua Lipa to cool that's the heart of the game hope and compromise knowing when to be ambitious early twenties and when to give up on being a rock star and settle for a secure office job late twenties you also have to accept that you can't win all the stones so deciding where to put your best efforts is crucial if they come in early with a strong set you should probably let them have it and save your good cards for somewhere else so their best troops got all dolled up for an empty battle field the whole game is play a card then take a card it couldn't be simpler and yet the decision of which card to play and where is up there with the best in Caesar you're fighting over ancient Rome in the friendliest war game you'll ever play it puts the Civil into Civil War I'd quite like Sardinia if that's all right actually I'd also like Sardinia sorry well I must say I would really like Sardinia okay fine you clearly want Sardinia more than me every turn you place a token staking a claim to a region you're like two siblings dividing up your father's belongings putting a Post-It note on everything you want to keep well obviously I should take Sicily because me and Dad both love lemons I'm not letting you have Sicily you'll just put it straight on eBay I know it you place your tokens on the borders of a region and when it's filled up whoever has the most influence there wins control you're racing to get all your banners down to win win the game what's clever is that your tokens are split in two so you're adding strength to two regions at once on either side of the border and like having two birthday parties on one night you can either half-heartedly attend both and pressing no one or make a real impact at one and skip the other losing a friend or a foothold in Dalmatia in the process location is everything because if you win a region that's next to one you already own you get to place a banner on the border between them it's like if you get two seats next to each other at the cinema you also control the arm rest in between which is of great strategic importance it means you have to be careful not to let your opponent dominate one area because every adjacent region is worth double and its snowballs really quickly I can't let you take Italy when you've already got Sicily but they come as a pair Dad wouldn't want us to split them up or to argue but if you have both where am I supposed to go on holiday New Media sounds like an SDI the Magic Touch are these bonus tokens which go not to the winner of a region but the player who placed the last token there taken at the right time they're enough to swing a game in your favor and it tears you between focusing on key strategic positions and claiming the bonuses that will make you stronger but all the while at the mercy of your small hand of tokens even when there's a perfect place to send your Legions you might not have the type you need for that space it's Agony like for once you're actually excited to go to the gym but your Kit's in the wash and I love how reactive this game is you're constantly distracted from your strategy to respond to what your opponent is doing it's like trying to watch a film while looking after a two-year-old the longer you put off dealing with them the bigger and more irreversible the mass Arboretum is one of the most amazing agonizing brilliant unbearable card games you'll ever play you're planting rows of beautiful trees to create an idyllic Arboretum that will Delight the senses and soothe the soul stay go it up you're trying to create runs of trees for example collecting all the cherry blossoms and planting them in order from one to eight that's the dream okay I'll put the five cassia here and hopefully I'll get the six soon and you'll wait for that card like a prom date that you know deep down has stood you up next time she could show up any minute but you don't need a run of all the same tree to get points and the game is licking its lips waiting for you to give up on that dream and lower your standards you can put me in your Arboretum no thanks I'm waiting on someone else as long as the walk starts and ends with the same tree you'll score every tree in between no matter how ugly it is it's like a KitKat you can get away with 90 cheap wafer as long as you start and end with some nice chocolate come see my cherry blossoms look here's a cherry blossom then ignore that ignore that ignore that and to finish a cherry blossom it really is a wonderful cherry blossom Arboretum but if you do make an untainted run of the same tree you will score double points so that is still very much the dream and compromising on it feels like making a pizza with baby bells every turn you draw two cards then you plant one and discard one and decide which card to discard makes Sophie's Choice feel like picking a brand of bottled water imagine you're clearing out your house and with everything you get rid of you're not just saying I don't play this guitar you're saying I will never be the type of person that plays guitar I can't do it I can't get rid of anything you never touch your Royal poinciana's just get rid of one of them yeah but I've been meaning to get into Royal poinciana's for ages I've just been really busy there's a lot to keep up with on Twitter at the moment but you have to get rid of something so you put the guitar out by the bins and within seconds your neighbor picks it up what I didn't know you played guitar you don't have one in your flat yeah but I've been really meaning to get into it so thanks not only will you now never learn the guitar but you've got to live next door to a living embodiment of everything you could have been and that's not even the most evil bit of this game your points that you're working so hard on are not guaranteed you can have a delightful run of jacarandas and score exactly zero for it you only score for a type of tree if you have the most points of it left in your hand at the end of the game okay and Willows I've got seven uh-huh and I've got the eight so only I can score it soz but but you don't have any Willows yeah but you do I said SARS so a huge part of the game is keeping trees in your hand to fight over scoring should you play that seven to make your Arboretum better or keep it to protect yourself every time you draw a tree that they've got in theirs you want to keep it to screw them over but if you put all your energy into being negative trying to tear them down you'll end up with nothing positive for yourself #brexit you can't choose who you fall in love with and you can't change that one of the best couples games ever made is about the Watergate scandal one of you plays America's sweetheart Richard Nixon and the other players the pesky journalist that he would have gotten away with it if it wasn't for every round is a tug of war the journalist is trying to gain evidence by pulling it towards their side if they win them they can pin it to their pegboard they're trying to create a link from Nixon to two of their informants but if Nixon wins the evidence he can burn it and use it to block off a connection making it harder for the journalist meanwhile Nixon is trying to win political momentum these red tokens they need five to win the game so both sides have their Ultimate Prize to aim for but like a game of Capture the Flag if you focus too much on attack you'll leave your base undefended and make it too easy for your opponent to win in reality it's like five games of tug of war at once three evidence tokens the the momentum and the initiative which decides who gets one more card next round and you need that to stay ahead you're pulling at the ropes by playing cards and you can either use its value to move something that many spaces towards your side or you can play its action most of them have game-changing events that are so powerful you can only use them once and then you have to remove it from the game but when is the right time it's like you only have one grenade and you need to wait for enough zombies to collect before you throw it in and by burning that card in a blaze of glory you can no longer use its value in future tugs of War it's like blurting out that you hate someone blowing your cover when you would have got way more enjoyment from months a little snide remarks individually they don't seem like much but they have a bigger impact in the long run the theme makes the game seem more complicated than it is there's a visceral feeling to what you're doing in this game waiting for the right time to stick your neck out and attack as soon as you show your hand You're vulnerable if you come at the king you best not miss in Sherlock Holmes Consulting detective you step into a Sherlock Holmes novel by solving a crime together and not in that usual board game way of doing something oh I planted a tree no you didn't in this game you're actually given a mystery to solve and by the end you must work out who the culprit is and why it's like watching an episode of a detective show together it all starts with a dead body Courtney Allen was found shocked to death in an alley behind his office on the evening of March the 9th at approximately 7 PM by the Constable on patrol but instead of Following the TV detective around as they interview suspects and have some mod flirtation with their partner that won't resolve for another 22 Episodes you get to decide which leads to follow you could visit the victim's workplace or interview their brother or if you're listening closely you could find a lead that others wouldn't they said there was a cigarette at the crime scene so let's visit all the tobacco shops and see if they know something you look up the place you want to go in the book and read the encounter and it's written in the style of the novels it is evident that Walter kahoe has come up through the ranks and would be more comfortable in overalls than his present ill-fitting tweets and while you read it out your partner takes notes and tries to spot the subtle Clues the murderer isn't going to admit they did it but maybe their limp or their accent will connect them to evidence you already have so this guy isn't used to wearing a suit which means he recently got promoted which means he killed his boss's enemy does it this is why you never get promoted making those connections feels amazing like you're actually a detective and I love going back over my notes and discussing our theories with each other the cases are written like a proper whodunit so you start off thinking that one person is the killer then as the mystery unravels you keep changing your mind this is the one game that actually breaks my rule of being able to play it in under an hour and we don't usually finish a case in one sitting but it's super easy to pause it and come back to another night each box has 10 cases in once you've played a case you've solved it so you can't play it again it's the equivalent of a single mole 18 year old whiskey for board gamers it won't last forever so we bring it out as a treat on special occasions there are four boxes you can get the red one is my least favorite because it has the Jack the Ripper cases that are a lot darker and more unpleasant but you could start with any of the other three you don't have to play them in order and they're all great Patchwork is a puzzle game that plays on a deep human need to make things neat and tidy you're taking Tetra shapes and sewing them to your Patchwork quilt the goal is to fill up your personal board so you leave as few empty spaces as possible you are going to be so bad at this game I've seen you pack a suitcase I've seen you load the dishwasher and organize the fridge and put away the shopping so you agree I do more than you each turn you can only take from the next three shapes so your stride leaving to make something beautiful but working with Misfits like trying to write a song for the Spice Girls every new piece incapable of harmonizing with the others and threatening to create gaps that you'll never fill if I put it here it will ruin everything and if I put it here it will ruin everything oh if I flip it over and rotate it it will ruin everything so there's something intensely satisfying about finally slotting in a piece that perfectly fits your awkwardly shaped hole it's like finding true love to be clear the hole is in your heart so it hurts when you see the piece of your dreams and your opponent takes it the game creates a seething rivalry you can't tell them how much you need that piece until they take it like two single people at a wedding competing over the last available man who doesn't talk about crypto he's wasted on you as if he'd want to go near your moldy old quilt but as much as you want to you can't just focus on making it look neat you've got to get this quilt filled up each tile takes time to sew and you only have limited time to finish your quilt all retirements end eventually if you only take shapes that use up a lot of time you'll end the game with a half finished quilt that's not going to keep your grandkids warm and as punishment you lose two points for every empty space you soon learn that the trickier uglier pieces a much better value because you get more coverage for your money so now you're taking the shapes that will cause you problems like recruiting the troubled kid to the team because he's just so dang good at throwing baseballs then doing your best Sandra Bullock impression to help him fit in neatly because you're racing against your opponent to complete a perfect seven by seven square first to win seven points so you've got to be neat cheap and quick and it's that challenge that makes Patchwork so addictive I don't like chess as a couple's game because it always favors the experienced player Checkmate ah Checkmate Checkmate but it's only a matter of time I prefer to play onetama which has a feel of Chess but it levels the playing field by making it impossible to master because the movement of the pieces are controlled by cards and the cards you use are different every time time so a good strategy in one game won't work in the next to move a piece you play a card and the card tells you where you can move it which is great because you don't have to learn and remember how the pieces move it shows you like the options are lit up in an app just like in chess you're trying to take each other's Pieces by making an attack have you still not taken the bins out but by playing it you give that card to the other player so you're opening yourself up to them using it against you well since we're talking about the bin the last time you took it out you didn't clean up the bin juice you can use the cards to look ahead planning a few turns in advance and it's not just about if I move here then they'll do that but if I move here using this card which adds another layer to consider you'll still find yourself in those familiar stalemates knowing that if you take their piece they'll just take yours and often it will center around one card that you know if you use it it gives them the chance to take your king so they try to put you in a position where you have to use it it's satisfying thinking through a strategy and pulling it off just like you get from playing chess but onitama is less intense less serious it only lasts 20 minutes anyone can play it and you don't have to stay up all night hallucinating chessboards on the ceiling to be any good at it and sauce it's not just chess then laughs of all the many had to head two-player card games that could have made this list lost cities is the best and if you disagree with that you can argue with me about it on my Discord by becoming a patron of the channel it's so good that it inspired two other games on this list its designer Rhino kenencia came up with shot and Totten while making lost cities and Dan kasar credits it as his biggest inspiration for Arboretum in Lost Cities you play as rival adventurers there are five trails to explore and you go on Expeditions by playing cards of that color in order the longer the Expedition the better because every card you collect is worth that number in points it's a game of big risks and big rewards first of all Expeditions are expensive you can't just get the number 10 bus to a lost city you need to charter a flight for Indiana Jones and cover his hat budget every Expedition you start costs you minus 20 points so before you start one you might want to make sure you have enough cards to win that 20 points back and then some unlike shot and Totten and Arboretum the game lets you wait instead of playing a card onto an expedition you can discard it and draw a new one so you can build an expedition in your hand before committing but by trying to avoid one risk you're risking something else giving your opponent something they really need I'm giving away this tiny jug it's useless to me useless now we've got the full set it's worth millions wait I haven't let go of it but you said it's useless to you yeah but I don't want you to make millions that's not fair and you're risking running out of time to finish your Expeditions if you take too long getting ready to go out you'll have less time on the dance floor but if you can wait and pull off an expedition with eight or more cards you get a 20 point bonus so it's big rewards like that that make you want to spend even longer on your hair the biggest risk are these wages they will double triple or quadruple your score for that expedition big reward but if you end up with a minor score it will double that too massive risk you're effectively placing a bet on doing well and it's exactly the kind of alpha male bravado you'd expect from an adventurer not only will I find this lost city but I'm going to explore the out of it I bet you okay babe just don't forget to wear insect repellent oh come on I was being Alpha and because you have to make that bet at the start of the Expedition before you know what cards you'll get it's right for a comeuppance how was the lost city did you have fun I don't want to talk about it well it wouldn't be a lost city if everyone found it and the Rivalry in this game is exquisite it's like you're a pair of drunk explorers bragging to each other about what you'll achieve while secretly hating each other Chichen Itza more like Chichen it so not that hard to find good luck finding it without this douchebag what oh nothing I just said good luck finding it without this cool hat holding on to the cards Europe opponent needs is just the kind of passive aggression we love in a game and by pissing in your neighbor's pint glass some of it will inevitably Splash into yours because you'll have less space for Expedition Maps if your backpack is taken up with voodoo dolls Lost Cities doesn't reveal its Brilliance until a few plays when it takes off its glasses and you see it's been beautiful the whole time like the girl in She's All That a film released in 1999 this same year as Lost Cities because if you make a classic it stays relevant those are my top 10 couples games but what are yours let me know in the comments I share my next 10 favorite couples games with my patrons in my patreon newsletter support the channel and get extra recommendations at patreon.com actualol if you like this video please subscribe to see more like it and check out my older couples videos links to those and where you can buy the games in this video in the description below I'm John Perkins thanks for watching [Music]

Channel: Actualol

Views: 443,036

Keywords: Board games, Board game, board games for couples, new games, Board Games for 2 Players, Games for 2 people, Couples Games, Partner, Wife, Husband, Girlfriend, Boyfriend, Play with your partner, Top 10 Couples Games, Top 10, Actualol, 2 Player Games, Card Games, Best for 2 Players, Best Board Games, Family Board Games, New Board Games, Best Board Games 2022, 10 Couples Games, 10 Games for Couples, Top Ten, Games To Play With Your Wife, Shut Up And Sit Down, Two Player Games

Id: Xsalh1c5lVM

Length: 26min 54sec (1614 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 02 2022