Best board games 2024

Imagine a wild hybrid between Pictionary and the game of telephone, and you’ve got Scrawl – a superbly simple party board game that we’ve found ourselves bringing to friends’ houses more than any other. You and your pals will be drawing pictures to match weird and wonderful prompts, then trying to guess just what in the heck your neighbor’s manic, er, scrawl is supposed to be. More than any other party board game we’ve played, it simply generates non-stop laughs from start to finish.

Each player gets a little clipboard with several wipe-clean drawing cards clipped to it, a marker pen, and a prompt card giving them the object, person, action, or abstract concept that they have to draw. You have just one minute to create your masterpiece, before passing it on to the next player, who then has another minute to work out what they think it is, write that on the next card, then pass their guess to the next person, who must then draw that, and so on.

This cycle continues until everybody gets their original clipboard back – at which point the pièce de résistance: everybody shares the bizarre journey from their original prompt, through all the group’s drawings, to the final product. Just like Telephone, expect it to match the prompt less than 1% of the time – and it’s all the more brilliant for it.

Ticket to Ride is positively the first modern board game you should play, the absolute best gateway game to the board gaming world. You’ll be collecting sets of colorful cards, and trading them in to place your adorable little trains down on the board, aiming to complete city-to-city routes across the US (other regions are playable in expansions).

To begin with, it’s calming and non-confrontational, but there’s only a certain number of routes to claim, and competition between players quickly starts to heat up, as you realize where your pals are trying to get to, and race to cut them off.

The rules are simple, making it quick and easy to teach and learn – but there’s enough player interaction to create a bit of drama, and just enough strategy to get your teeth into as a newbie. Most importantly, it really can be played with mixed groups of all ages and skill levels – perfect for families, or inducting non-gamer friends into the tabletop hobby!

Oink Games’ breakout hit Scout has deservedly won tons of awards – it’s a smart, quick-playing card game that delights the eye and tickles the brain by twisting accepted tabletop norms on their head. See, on the surface, it’s similar to classic playing card games like Rummy or Whist – you’re playing to collect and play sets or runs of numbered cards, by discarding and picking up cards each turn.

The twist is that you’re not allowed to change the orientation or order of cards in your hand – so if you want to play down that lovely set that could win you the round, you’ve got to find a way to get all those cards together first. This means you’re not just playing against your opponents, you’re also fighting the cards you’re holding, trying to plan ahead to get the big plays you need.

Scout might sound confusing, but it’s really not once you’ve spent 15 minutes or so getting to grips with it – and once you’ve grasped it, you’ll want to play it a lot. Which is convenient, because it’s dead cheap, well designed, and extremely portable.

Ah, Catan – a.k.a. The Settlers of Catan. First released in 1995, designed by beloved German designer, the late Klaus Teuber, this medieval-themed game about settling a desert island has survived and thrived for decades because, at its heart, it’s just reliably good fun for so many people.

Players compete to dominate the island by building settlements near key resources – grain, ore, wool, lumber, and brick – so they can rake in resource cards every turn and spend them on expanding their empire. Things start off benign, but there’s only room on this little island for one player to build the roads, cities, and extra buildings they need to win – so it gets competitive fast.

Because it’s so simple, however, it’s incredibly easy to go from not knowing the game at all, to keenly working out your tactics and plotting how to outmaneuver your rivals. Once you’ve topped out with the base game, we can recommend the best Catan expansions to tack on, too.

Strategy board game aficionados may sneer at Catan occasionally, but they’re wrong to – this famous masterpiece has a place in every collection.

How often do you think about the Roman Empire? If the answer is anything more than ‘never’, there’s a good chance you’ll enjoy 7 Wonders Duel, a streamlined, fast-playing game for two that has you building your own ancient civilization from scratch.

Choosing fresh cards from a shared selection each turn, you’ll add them to your city to either generate more resources to pay for later card plays, or build your way through one of various paths to victory. You can win by cultivating the best city overall; building a great wonder of the world; excelling in scientific advancement; or dominating your opponent with superior military might.

Like its big sibling – the original 7 Wonders – this game uses rivalry over the cards on offer to create competition – you could pick the card you need, or you could discard something you think your opponent fancies, and collect some coins as a payoff. It’s a highly satisfying, tightly designed experience that packs most of the strategic welly of the main, multiplayer version, but converts it perfectly to suit two players.

Read our 7 Wonders Duel review.

Let’s clear one thing up straight away: this isn’t a game about ducks, but fraudulent doctors. In The Quacks of Quedlinburg, players compete to brew the most valuable potion through fraught, push-your-luck bag-building mechanics. Randomly draw chips from a bag to add to your swirling cauldron, hoping for the most valuable picks that will increase the score of your brew. But fill your pot too quickly, and it might explode, leaving you with nothing to peddle at the market.

While this exquisite family board game plays out across nine rounds, ‘fortune teller’ cards impose special rules that disrupt play, and certain chips give you additional actions.

Choose carefully when to add chips to your potion, and when to put them back in your bag – always trying to bolster your chances of drawing a high-scoring option, and remove pernicious ‘cherry bombs’ that might explode your concoction. Keep track of what chips you’re drawing, and pay attention to the bursting seams of your pot.

The Quacks of Quedlinburg excels because of its near-perfect player information. Each player creates a set bag of chips, allowing you to keep track of your odds, and plan accordingly. With limited available actions on any one turn, and no overly demanding strategic depth, it’s a perfect family board game when you’re looking for something that will push your tabletop experience – but not drown you in mechanical detail.

Read our Quacks of Quedlinburg review.

Cooperative board games have taken off in recent years, but to our minds none has yet surpassed the 2008 smash hit Pandemic, which does such a good job of nailing board game teamwork that we still play it regularly over a decade later (even though some world events in 2019-2020 kind of made the theme a little dicey for a while).

In this game, four deadly, brightly colored diseases have each simultaneously infected a large part of the world map. You and your pals each play one of a variety of disease-fighting specialists – with every player granted one specific, powerful ability to use. Every turn, the diseases will spread quickly across the planet, and – as a team – you must plan out your limited actions to contain their growth and develop cures for all four as quickly as possible.

Be warned: while the rules aren’t complicated – we stand by our 2 / 5 complexity rating – the game is a genuine challenge, you’ll have to learn to make the most of all your characters’ abilities in combination with each other, while racing against disease outbreaks that can come at any time. Luckily, working together to achieve that is endlessly satisfying, and Pandemic is a genuine thrill every time we play.

Check out our full Pandemic review by Tim Linward for more in-depth thoughts on this time-tested classic.

Warhammer board games haven’t always been a great success, but at Wargamer we adore both, and so were overjoyed when we found Warhammer 40k Combat Arena such a legitimate winner. If you love the epic sci-fi vibes of Warhammer 40k, but don’t fancy a full scale miniature wargame, this 30-45 minute skirmish game might be the perfect fit.

The premise is, blessedly, much simpler than the expansive lore of 40k generally is: you play as four powerful heroes from various Warhammer 40k factions, trapped in an arena by a twisted alien puppet master, and forced to fight it out. Each hero gets unique, card powered abilities to damage or outmaneuver their foes across the board’s hex grid – with each champion excelling at different ranges and playstyles.

The controversial bit is that heroes activate in a random order each round, meaning one champ might get to act several times in one round – but a clever energy tracker system means that if you use all your powerful moves in one go, you’ll be at the end of the queue in the next. It adds up to a wonderfully fluid, unpredictable tactical battle game that’s an ideal dip into Warhammer for board game fans. Plus, you only have four minis to build and paint – read our guide to painting miniatures for a helping hand.

GW has released a few versions of this game over the years, and the most recent – Lair of the Beast, pictured above – is an update on the version we reviewed in 2022. But don’t worry, the gameplay is very similar, they just feature slightly different minis.

Read our Warhammer 40k Combat Arena review.

Honestly, even the best DnD board games haven’t often been showstoppers – but Betrayal at Baldur’s Gate hits a sweet spot by converting a brilliant existing game (Betrayal at House on the Hill) to a splendidly realized, famous DnD setting: the sprawling city of Baldur’s Gate. It came out in 2017, so you won’t find any of your favorite Baldur’s Gate 3 characters here – but the city itself makes an ideal home for Betrayal’s haunted house exploration and survival gameplay.

For the first portion of the game, you’ll explore Baldur’s Gate’s mysterious alleys and byways, discover rooms, and collect crucial items to help you survive. Then the Haunts begin, and your adventurers must run for their lives, making vital decisions to survive the DnD monsters on your tail.

Dungeons and Dragons mega-fans might be disappointed to find most of their favorite game mechanics missing here – but Betrayal at Baldur’s Gate earns its rating here for being the best board game experience you can have in DnD’s world. It’s pretty easy to learn, requires tactical thought and teamwork to master, and the DnD theme is rich enough to immerse lovers of Wizards of the Coast’s Forgotten Realms.

When it comes to travel board games, we at Wargamer aim higher than miniaturized versions of Monopoly or Scrabble – that’s why Cephalofair’s marvellous mini RPG adventure Gloomhaven: Buttons and Bugs takes the prize here.

If you haven’t heard of Gloomhaven, it’s one of the biggest and most influential RPG board games ever created, combining the length and depth of a DnD campaign with the physicality, board, cards, and tokens of a traditional board game. Only one thing: it’s absolutely massive, with hundreds of tiles, chits, miniatures, and extra bits.

Buttons and Bugs shrinks that expansive RPG experience into a tiny box, distilling all the heroes, tactical scenarios, and terrifying beasties down into a single player board game that fits on a small table and plays in half an hour – and the shocking thing is, it really works. Our resident Gloomhaven expert Mollie Russell managed to play it on a moving train using only a miniscule, odd-shaped table.

You lose some of the majesty of the real deal game, of course – miniatures are swapped for teeny colored cubes; many rules are slimmed down; and the story writing isn’t as inspired as the original. But in exchange you get a cheaper, more convenient board game that’s much easier for newbies to learn, and doesn’t need a forklift to carry around.

Read our Gloomhaven: Buttons and Bugs review.

Like escape room games, but want a mystery that properly immerses you in real detective work, with a proper whodunit to unravel via detailed, in-universe clues? Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective is simply the best. The game has far more in-depth storytelling than other murder mystery board games, with lengthy introductions to each case, and a variety of pleasingly authentic-feeling newspapers, police documents, and other clues you’ll have to pore through to get to the bottom of things.

Each case plays a bit like a choose-your-own-adventure book: you’ll pick a lead to follow, and turn to the relevant page of the case book to find dialog with in-game characters to read out, which changes depending on how much of the truth you’ve already uncovered. There’s an optional element of time pressure, as you try to unravel the clues in as few moves as possible – but you can ignore that and take it at your own pace (which we prefer).

There are four different ‘Investigations’ you can buy, and each contains multiple cases to solve – the Jack the Ripper box above is our favorite, but they’re all excellent. There are some niggles. Sherlock Holmes superfans might find nits to pick here or there; the ‘adventure gamebook’ element can be distracting as you try to look up the right page without seeing spoilers; and if we’re honest these boxes are a touch overpriced for the materials you get – but all things considered, Consulting Detective is the best detective board game around. The game, as Holmes says, is afoot!

If you like social deduction games with more meat on their bones, we can’t recommend Blood on the Clocktower enough, based on our extensive experience (that’s Wargamer and Network N staff playing in the picture above).

This beefy box expands on the ever popular ‘hidden roles’ genre, marrying cheeky bluffing antics with complex mechanics in a way that’ll please casual party game lovers and fans of brain-warping strategy board games. It’s a lot pricier than other social deduction games on the market, but there really is nothing else like it out there.

The core rules are essentially the same as any other hidden role game. One person among the players is a demon who kills innocent villagers in a ‘night phase’ where everyone has their eyes shut. They and their minions win the game if they can cull the majority of good players, while the noble players win if they can execute the demon before their numbers deplete.

Here’s how Blood on the Clocktower takes that formula and makes it even better. Firstly, everyone in town has a unique power which can help (or hinder) efforts to solve the mystery. This means no one is left twiddling their thumbs, and all players (even the storyteller who organizes and facilitates gameplay) have plenty to mull over. Different combinations of roles give the game endless replayability.

Secondly, when you die in this game, you can keep playing. Most social deduction games get boring fast if you’re killed on the first night, but murdered villagers can still speak, vote, and help their team.

All these features are packaged in a luxury box which helps set the grim, Gothic tone of the game. We recommend playing with a tense background soundtrack, and relishing in the reveal as everyone learns what really happened once the game is over.

Read our Blood on the Clocktower review.

War board games are very much our cup of tea around here, so it’s no mean achievement that 2023 release Undaunted Battle of Britain comes out top of the pile. It’s a thrilling WW2 aircraft dogfighting game that pits squadrons of British RAF and German Luftwaffe pilots against each other in a beautifully designed dance of death where every plane is a constantly moving target.

Built on the core of previous games in the series – some of the best WW2 board games ever created – Battle of Britain has you direct your warplanes across the hex-grid board using tactical card plays, but every hit you take knocks vital cards out of your deck and hand, making each turn feel like life or death.

Clever mechanics around Commander and Communications cards can recall some of those losses and bring you back into the fight, but every move has a cost – and while you’re pulling your squadron back into line, your opponent could be carefully repositioning to line up their next pinpoint attack.

Since the series’ debut game, Undaunted Normandy, came out in 2019, it’s been celebrated for translating the authentic tone and detailed tactical gameplay of traditional tabletop wargames into an accessible board game that anyone can play and enjoy. For our money, Undaunted Battle of Britain is the pinnacle of that formula, and an essential play for any wargamer.

Read our Undaunted Battle of Britain review.

We weren’t 100% sure about adding Frosthaven to this list. Cephalofair’s long-awaited Gloomhaven sequel has just had its second wave of printing; it’s not easy to get and its price stretches our “reasonably affordable” requirement to breaking point. We should wait.

There’s just this one problem, though: it’s extremely good. Frosthaven somehow manages to improve on all of its predecessor’s infamous accessibility issues without diluting its super-challenging, endlessly satisfying core gameplay loop. It represents a step up in overall difficulty, and there’s still tons of admin and record-keeping you’ll have to do – especially with all the extra campaign content and new character classes.

You’ll find it easier to get the hang of than Gloomhaven, thanks to vastly improved instructions, cleverly thought-out initial start-up guidance, and included component storage. It’s an outstanding example of a sequel building on the original’s strengths, patching up its weaknesses, and staking out new territory, all at once.

Instead of returning to a bustling city between quests, your home base is an isolated village in the world’s frozen North – and, instead of resting on your laurels at the bar or buying new armored trousers, you’re tasked with helping repair and upgrade its buildings (which in turn unlocks new skills, upgrades, and equipment for your party). Add in new systems for item crafting, alchemy, and more – and you’ve got a big-box RPG board game that’s just like Gloomhaven, but a bit better in more or less every way.

Read our Frosthaven review.

The last board game in our list, the mighty Brass: Birmingham is the most complex – but also the all-time best board game ever, according to a prestigious ranking of over 26,000 games on the BoardGameGeek forum. While we think Frosthaven may challenge it in the long run, we have to agree: Brass is brilliant.

A heavyweight economic strategy board game set in England during the industrial revolution, it’s all about making the right business decisions to build your own trading empire. You’ll need to secure key resources like coal, build factories and level up their technology to produce more valuable goods, and – crucially – plan your supply lines perfectly to ship your wares to market towns, all while balancing your budget and trying to block competition from your opponents.

If that sounds like a hefty strategic challenge, we haven’t told you the best bit yet: halfway through the game, the canals linking up your trade network are phased out to make way for the glorious age of the railway, causing an almighty shake-up, and opening up new tactical options as players race to build the best rail links for the competitive endgame.

The sheer weight of overlapping rules and systems in Brass make it a tough one to learn, and even harder to get good at – we certainly don’t recommend it to new board gamers. But it’s the world’s top ranked board game for a reason: once those systems click, and you start to understand the sublime clockwork steam engine that powers this game, it’s hands down one of the most engaging experiences you can have on the tabletop. Try it if you dare, you won’t regret it.