I know there are a lot of really innovative, clever and fun games out there, and a lot of indie makers that casual appreciators like me might not know about. Do you have a recommendation? Share it here. (You can mute replies if you don’t like getting a bunch of emails after posting.)
There are 25 cards with words on them laid out in a grid, and you have to say other words to get your teammates to guess which cards are yours, but you have to avoid them picking the other team's cards instead. It's really easy to understand once you get playing, and the gameplay is pretty fast
I've really been enjoying Temporum, a game of time travel (and resource management). I don't find it too difficult to pick up, the strategy isn't so deep that new players are going to feel dreadfully outclassed against people who have played more, and it isn't a name I hear popping up all the time.
Pandemic: save the world from four dastardly diseases - which keep coming back. A pure co-op and a serious classic of the genre, it's easy to learn and proves a challenge every play - even after years of games.
Once you've a good feel for Pandemic, Pandemic Legacy take the concept and adds in new elements with a changing game board and roles over the course of a 12 month campaign. It's the best board gaming experience I've ever had.
Ticket to Ride: build railroads across the United States and complete tickets (all while trying to thwart your opponents who are sneaking into Nashville before you, the bums).
For your kiddos, The Three Little Pigs is a great game for kids around 5 - build up houses but hope the Big Bad Wolf doesn't blow them down (complete with a spinner you're suppose to blow on)
Locally in Louisville, there's an active board game scene on Facebook for meet ups at game stores (mostly) - some of them have gaming libraries but I haven't been in person so I'm not sure what's the best one to reocmmend.
Lots of good recommendations in here. On the time travel front, I enjoy Temporum too, and I also love the Chrononauts series; great take on how certain events could have changed and could have affected other events. Plus those games are simple, fast, and cheap, and they play well solo or with a group.
On the co-op front, my favourite is The Goonies. Interesting puzzle, and feels like a great nod to the film. Other ones I like are the Forbidden series (Forbidden Island, Forbidden Desert, Forbidden Sky; Island is the simplest, the others add some more layers) and the various Pandemic games. Codenames: Duet is also great.
One of the card games I've gotten the most play out of recently is Ladder 29. It's a twist on traditional climbing/shedding games like President (also known as Scum, Asshole, etc) or Big Two, where you draft individual restrictions on your hand each round. Lots of fun, and it works well both with experienced gamers and with people who are newer to the hobby. (Need at least three people to make it work well, though.)
It's a little more silly than a lot of what's been mentioned here so far, but I get a big kick out of the new version of Fireball Island. Nothing like dropping fireball marbles into Vul-Kar and hoping they hit other people, or flicking ember marbles to try and knock other people over. And the expansions add more fun still with bees, snakes, cannonballs and so on.
Last one to shout out right now is The Networks. A bit more long (probably 90-120 minutes for your first play, drops to 60-90 after that, faster at lower player counts) and complicated than much of what's been mentioned here (easier than Agricola, though!), but it's a really fun card-drafting game about building your own TV network with some great humour. The various shows/stars etc are riffs on existing TV people and stars, and some of them always crack me up, like "Monday Night Foosball" and "An Hour Of Shouting." The gameplay's really solid, and this one's held up well for me over the last few years.
For young kids, I really like My First Orchard. It's coop and you just take turns rolling a die to put a colored fruit in a basket before the raven can catch it. You can teach colors and counting with it.
I like Pina Pirata as a starter game. It's like Uno, but with some weird extra rules like passing your hand to the left every time a monkey shows up. The art is full of animals as pirates, so kids can play, too.
There's a trivia game called Bezzerwizzer I'm a fan of. It's not your typical Trivial Pursuit style; you can rank your perceived knowledge of 20 categories based on tiles you draw, and a game can take 15-20 min or up to about an hour depending on how you implement a couple rules. It's one of only a couple games my friends will still play with me, too.
Longer game: My friends got me to play Agricola https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/31260/agricola with them recently and it was a blast even though I got massacred. Very strategic but much less conniving than the stuff we typically play.
Shorter games: If you can get 5+ people together, I highly recommend The Resistance, if you can't but want something similar (and much faster) pick up Coup
TROGDOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOR the Board Game, which is a co-op game from the Homestar Runner guys where you try to burninate the countryside, the peasants, and the thatched-roof cottages without getting ARROW'D
I'm going to throw in for Outfoxed, because it's a collaborative mystery solving game for the whole family, and I like the spirit of working together to win as a team rather than always having to play to win.
Not a board game, but there’s a card game my family enjoys called Five Crowns. It’s kinda like rummy and led to my sister and I nearly killing each other on Christmas morning last year.
I enjoyed playing this game with my family on vacation this summer: Codenames https://www.amazon.com/Czech-Games-00031CGE-Codenames/dp/B014Q1XX9S
There are 25 cards with words on them laid out in a grid, and you have to say other words to get your teammates to guess which cards are yours, but you have to avoid them picking the other team's cards instead. It's really easy to understand once you get playing, and the gameplay is pretty fast
I've really been enjoying Temporum, a game of time travel (and resource management). I don't find it too difficult to pick up, the strategy isn't so deep that new players are going to feel dreadfully outclassed against people who have played more, and it isn't a name I hear popping up all the time.
Pandemic: save the world from four dastardly diseases - which keep coming back. A pure co-op and a serious classic of the genre, it's easy to learn and proves a challenge every play - even after years of games.
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/30549/pandemic
Once you've a good feel for Pandemic, Pandemic Legacy take the concept and adds in new elements with a changing game board and roles over the course of a 12 month campaign. It's the best board gaming experience I've ever had.
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/161936/pandemic-legacy-season-1
Ticket to Ride: build railroads across the United States and complete tickets (all while trying to thwart your opponents who are sneaking into Nashville before you, the bums).
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/9209/ticket-ride
Wordsy: a word game for people who enjoy playing with words and not memorizing 2-letter words and turning Scrabble into a game of attrition.
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/208480/wordsy
For your kiddos, The Three Little Pigs is a great game for kids around 5 - build up houses but hope the Big Bad Wolf doesn't blow them down (complete with a spinner you're suppose to blow on)
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/135649/tales-games-three-little-pigs
Locally in Louisville, there's an active board game scene on Facebook for meet ups at game stores (mostly) - some of them have gaming libraries but I haven't been in person so I'm not sure what's the best one to reocmmend.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/louisvillecardboardgamers/
Pandemic and Ticket to Ride can be found at Target & Meijers, and Barnes & Nobles carries Wordsy (I believe).
Lots of good recommendations in here. On the time travel front, I enjoy Temporum too, and I also love the Chrononauts series; great take on how certain events could have changed and could have affected other events. Plus those games are simple, fast, and cheap, and they play well solo or with a group.
On the co-op front, my favourite is The Goonies. Interesting puzzle, and feels like a great nod to the film. Other ones I like are the Forbidden series (Forbidden Island, Forbidden Desert, Forbidden Sky; Island is the simplest, the others add some more layers) and the various Pandemic games. Codenames: Duet is also great.
One of the card games I've gotten the most play out of recently is Ladder 29. It's a twist on traditional climbing/shedding games like President (also known as Scum, Asshole, etc) or Big Two, where you draft individual restrictions on your hand each round. Lots of fun, and it works well both with experienced gamers and with people who are newer to the hobby. (Need at least three people to make it work well, though.)
It's a little more silly than a lot of what's been mentioned here so far, but I get a big kick out of the new version of Fireball Island. Nothing like dropping fireball marbles into Vul-Kar and hoping they hit other people, or flicking ember marbles to try and knock other people over. And the expansions add more fun still with bees, snakes, cannonballs and so on.
Last one to shout out right now is The Networks. A bit more long (probably 90-120 minutes for your first play, drops to 60-90 after that, faster at lower player counts) and complicated than much of what's been mentioned here (easier than Agricola, though!), but it's a really fun card-drafting game about building your own TV network with some great humour. The various shows/stars etc are riffs on existing TV people and stars, and some of them always crack me up, like "Monday Night Foosball" and "An Hour Of Shouting." The gameplay's really solid, and this one's held up well for me over the last few years.
For young kids, I really like My First Orchard. It's coop and you just take turns rolling a die to put a colored fruit in a basket before the raven can catch it. You can teach colors and counting with it.
I like Pina Pirata as a starter game. It's like Uno, but with some weird extra rules like passing your hand to the left every time a monkey shows up. The art is full of animals as pirates, so kids can play, too.
There's a trivia game called Bezzerwizzer I'm a fan of. It's not your typical Trivial Pursuit style; you can rank your perceived knowledge of 20 categories based on tiles you draw, and a game can take 15-20 min or up to about an hour depending on how you implement a couple rules. It's one of only a couple games my friends will still play with me, too.
Longer game: My friends got me to play Agricola https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/31260/agricola with them recently and it was a blast even though I got massacred. Very strategic but much less conniving than the stuff we typically play.
Shorter games: If you can get 5+ people together, I highly recommend The Resistance, if you can't but want something similar (and much faster) pick up Coup
5 Minute Dungeon is a great, quick party game.
TROGDOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOR the Board Game, which is a co-op game from the Homestar Runner guys where you try to burninate the countryside, the peasants, and the thatched-roof cottages without getting ARROW'D
I'm going to throw in for Outfoxed, because it's a collaborative mystery solving game for the whole family, and I like the spirit of working together to win as a team rather than always having to play to win.
https://gamewright.com/product/Outfoxed
I haven't played it, because it requires a bunch of people, but I really want to play Captain Sonar.
Not a board game, but there’s a card game my family enjoys called Five Crowns. It’s kinda like rummy and led to my sister and I nearly killing each other on Christmas morning last year.