Learning to lose gracefully is a valuable lesson, but as my kids grow closer to competing with me as equals, losing stings them a little more, too.
I had heard that some cooperative board games lurk in the specialty stores beyond Target and Toys R Us. This Christmas I decided to do some research to locate a new family game for my lovely spouse and me to play with our kids (10 and 12) and any visitors.
Here's how I categorize games in terms of competitiveness and cooperation:
| Competitive | The games I grew up with like Monopoly or Sorry. I include games that encourage self-interested alliances, like teaming up on someone in Risk. |
| Teams | Players on one team cooperate against other teams. A lot of party games like Catch Phrase (one of our favorites) fall into this category. |
| 1 vs. Many | Games in which everyone else cooperates against a single player. Scotland Yard, mentioned below, is an example. |
| Cooperative | I think of these like group solitaire: all the players compete against the game itself. Either the team wins or the team loses. These are the games I wanted to explore this year. |
The lines aren't always clear. Some games start with a common goal, but later compel players to seek their own interests. Many games that purport to be cooperative feature a "traitor mechanic," revealing mid-game that one player is actually working against the others.
A friend curious about non-competitive games asked me to share my notes, so here's my list, with the games I like best for our family near the top.
BoardGameGeek.com and Games Magazine are great resources, as well as many other online reviews and vendors. These personal notes contain mistakes, I'm sure. I'll try to correct any that are reported.
I included links to Amazon for some of my favorites. For the others, try my favorite online source for boardgames: House Full of Games.
Once we've played any of these, I'll post an update.
Space Alert
| Players | 1—5 |
| Duration | Less than 30 minutes |
| Approx. cost | $39 |
| Theme | The board is a schematic of a spaceship. Players move around it and respond to various threats, working together to keep the spaceship intact. It comes with a CD that announces alerts and keeps the game on schedule. The CD's a bit gimmicky, but fun, I hope. |
| I liked | Short play-length. It's hard to find blocks of 90 minutes or more, and it's very hard to invite guests to a long game, because it takes a while to teach it, and generally people can't enjoy a game fully the first time anyway. |
| I didn't like | I'm concerned it might be a little abstract for my 10-year old, but I think the spaceship-under-threat theme will appeal to her. |
Forbidden Island
| Players | 2—4 |
| Duration | 30 minutes |
| Approx. cost | $14 |
| Theme | Players struggle to capture treasures from a sinking, tropical island and to evacuate everyone to safety. The island is made up of tiles randomly arranged each game. The difficulty is adjustable. |
| I liked | Apparently Pandemic is hugely popular, so I take it as a good sign that folks refer to this as Pandemic-lite. It's also inexpensive. |
Scotland Yard
| Players | 3—6 |
| Duration | 45 minutes |
| Approx. cost | $27 |
| Theme | One player is a crook. Others are detectives. The board is a map of London, showing subway stops and train stations and the like. The detectives are trying to position themselves at the same place as the crook to catch him, but all they have to go on are clues about what kind of transportation he took. |
| I liked | I sneaked this game in because I remember it fondly from my own childhood. It's easy to learn, and I like that it supports up to six players. |
| I didn't like | It's not really a cooperative game; it's a 1 vs. Many kind of game. Is there a risk that one detective will dominate the other players and tell them where to move? |
Castle Panic
| Players | 1—6 (best with 4?) |
| Duration | 60 minutes |
| Approx. cost | $25 |
| Theme | Players represent archers, knights, and swordsmen defending a cardboard castle as monsters close in. Players position themselves and trade cards that enable them to fight the monsters. |
| I liked | Very easy to learn. It's possible to play this in a truly cooperative fashion, although the primary game is designed to treat the most successful defender as "the winner." |
| I didn't like | I'm a little concerned the compressed-cardboard castle pieces won't stand up to wear. |
Shadows over Camelot
| Players | 3—7 |
| Duration | 90 minutes |
| Approx. cost | $40 |
| Theme | Players are knights of the round table. Various threats endanger Camelot and the players go on quests to defeat them. Cards are involved. |
| I liked | High-quality components. I've played some other games by Days of Wonder, and they generally do a nice job. |
| I didn't like | A little long for us. The reviews are mixed: people seem to love or hate this game, comparing it favorably or unfavorably to Battlestar Galactica. |
Pandemic
| Players | 2—4 |
| Duration | 45—60 minutes |
| Approx. cost | $25 |
| Theme | Players represent specialized roles in the Centers for Disease Control, trying to contain and cure disease outbreaks around a map of the world. Drawing and trading cards are involved. An optional $25 expansion allows for a 5th player and makes it possible to turn it into a competitive game in which one player betrays the others as a bio-terrorist. |
| I liked | This game is very popular with a loyal following. It's said to work well with just 2 players. The difficulty is adjustable. I think it might be a little educational too between its world map and epidemiological theme. |
| I didn't like | Camille wondered if the theme of deadly diseases spreading around the world is unpleasant and scary. After seeing that some players made big-eyed Sculpey figures to use in place of the wooden blocks representing the viruses, I'm not so sure, but I can see that the real-world setting might be scarier than Camelot or a spaceship. |
Red November
| Players | 3—8 |
| Duration | 60 minutes |
| Approx. cost | $19 |
| Theme | Players are on a sinking submarine with an over-heating reactor and a sea-monster outside. They cooperate to defend the vessel. The game board is a schematic of the sub. |
| I liked | The game seems to have a sense of humor; the art is simple and colorful. The price is attractive, and the components are said to be nice. |
| I didn't like | If the ship starts to sink, I believe the game becomes every-man-for-himself as players struggle to be first off. |
Break the Safe
| Players | 2—4 |
| Duration | 30 minutes |
| Approx. cost | $100 new or $20 used? |
| Theme | The gameboard is a building blueprint—it reminds me of Clue—with a big plastic 30-minute timer in the center. Players have to cooperate to defeat booby traps and obtain the four keys that stop the clock. |
| I liked | Very easy to learn; good for kids. It's by Mattel—I think this one actually was in stores like Toys R Us. |
| I didn't like | It's out of print—so I'd have to find it used online. Serious game-players say this game wears off quickly because it's so simple. |
Lord of the Rings
| Players | 2—5 |
| Duration | 60 minutes |
| Approx. cost | $35 |
| Theme | The players take on the roles of Hobbits, each with a special skill, and proceed through some of the action from the books, attempting to destroy the evil ring. |
| I liked | It's very popular. Somehow the gameboard and goals vary from one play to the next—I'm not sure how this works. |
| I didn't like | As I understand it, if one Hobbit dies, the others continue to play. I'd prefer a game that we all win or lose together. Also I'm concerned the rules might be a bit complicated. Is this game really for Lord of the Rings fans? |
My notes on the games below are less thorough because I dismissed these pretty quickly.
Vanished Planet
| Players | 1—6 |
| Duration | 60 minutes (possibly longer?) |
| Theme | In a science fiction setting, something threatens the players' home planets. They trade cards and manage resources in order to defeat the threat. |
| I didn't like | It had some great reviews, but the play time seemed long, and the game board, hexes on an outer space background, looked a little too abstract to appeal to our family. A review said the game appeals to "cerebral" players. Would it be too much work to enjoy or share with others? |
Sherlock Holmes, Consulting Detective
| Players | 1—6 |
| Duration | 60 minutes |
| Notes | This old game (1981), looked really interesting: perhaps more like a Choose Your Own Adventure story or a How to Host a Murder mystery than a game. It comes with a detailed map and some books. I'm curious, but wanted a more traditional board game. |
Betrayal at House on the Hill
| Players | 3—6 |
| Duration | 60 minutes |
| Notes | Looks great, but somebody always acts as a traitor, and I didn't want a game that would encourage us to backstab each other, or more specifically to impugn everything our little sister says. |
Defenders of the Realm
| Players | 1—4 |
| Duration | 90 minutes |
| Notes | It's reviewed very favorably, but described as a longer, more complex cousin to Pandemic. I guess if Forbidden Island is called Pandemic-Lite, then maybe this is Pandemic-Heavy? My family aren't serious gamers yet, so I avoided this one. |
Minion Hunter
| Players | 1—6 |
| Duration | 60 minutes |
| Approx. cost | |
| Theme | Players cooperate to stop various supernatural creatures from taking over a map of America. Kind of like Buffy the Vampire-Slayer? |
| I liked | It looks interesting and has many fans. |
| I didn't like | A bit pricey and hard-to-find. Too much like Dungeons and Dragons with its tracking of statistics like "empathy" and "stalking" and "combat"? Nightmare-inducing? |
Ghost Stories
| Players | 1—4 |
| Duration | 60 minutes |
| Notes | Popular and favorably reviewed, but said to be very difficult. I also wonder if the theme is a little difficult to share with new players, incorporating concepts like Taoist monks and Chinese myth. |
Fury of Dracula
| Players | 2—5 |
| Duration | 2 hours |
| Notes | A 1 vs. Many game that is likened to Scotland Yard, but very long and possibly nightmare-inducing. |
Arkham Horror
| Duration | 2 hours |
| Notes | This game gets a lot of attention and seems to be sort of an iconic cooperative game. But the spooky theme and long play time aren't right for us, and the rules are said to be difficult. |
Saboteur
| Players | 3—10 |
| Duration | 45 minutes |
| Approx. cost | $15 |
| Notes | Some players say it needs seven or more people to play well. I couldn't figure out if this game is ever truly cooperative, but at least some of the time, one player betrays the others. |
Witch of Salem
I saw it compared unfavorably to Arkham Horror.Space Hulk: Death Angel
A cooperative card game that seems reminiscent of the old Alien movie. I didn't want a card game.London's Burning
A solitaire game in which a player controls aircraft attempting to defeat the Luftwaffe in World War II. I understand there is a 2-player option, but we want at least 4 players.Descent: Journeys in the Dark
I avoided games like this and Doom because one player serves as a "game master," like in Dungeons and Dragons. I wanted a game that everyone could play without a moderator.Somewhere in China
The reviews seemed unfavorable.Maze
Supports two players only?These games all shared play-times of more than 2 hours. I know some families who dedicate that much time to gaming, but we're not among them. (Secretly I kind of wish we were . . . )
- Battlestar Galactica
- Middle-Earth Quest
- Thrilling Tales of Adventure
- Dark, Darker, Darkest
- Chill: Black Morn Manor
- Magic Realm
These games seemed more suitable for kids younger than our 10 and 12-year olds.
- Max
- Caves and Claws
These games made my initial list, but a quick check led me to believe they weren't truly cooperative.
- A Touch of Evil: The Supernatural Game
- Duels of Ages
- Last Night on Earth: Zombie Game (One vs. Many)
- Princess Ryan’s Star Marines
- Inkognito
- Vampire Hunter
- Republic of Rome
- Doom (One vs. Many)
- Shadow Hunters
- Svea Rike
- Battlestations
