Top 15 best board games to play with the family this Christmas for iPhone and iPad (iOS)
Roll the dice, save the peace
Updated on November 27th, 2024. 5 games swapped.
Christmas should be a time for sharing and being sociable. If you're a gamer, though, you want to spend some time curled up alone for some quality screen time. All the more so if there were some hot new games or bits of hardware in your stocking.
So we feel we should remind you that on mobile, at least, there's an easy way to do both at once.
The App Store boasts a cracking selection of board game adaptations. These aren't your tired old classics but fresh, thrilling, and thoroughly modern titles. Games that the whole family will love. And at a fraction of the price and setup time of the real thing.
Gather them round with some of these, and get your screen time and some family time all at once.
1
Ticket to Ride
Ticket to Ride is a train route building game that is great for all age. Its appeal lies in it being both accessible and exciting. It's a variant of rummy, where you collect sets of coloured cards. But in Ticket to Ride you have to cash in your collection to claim routes on a board.
Sounds simple, but there's limited space available. So it's a heated race to get your trains down before someone blocks your way. It's not the best route to family harmony, but it is a hell of a lot of fun.
2
DADOO
DADOO is a board game that you've likely not played before. It brings something new and refreshing to your mobile device. Taking inspiration from Snacks-and-Ladders, this game has a bit of a card twist to make it unique. You can use power-ups and steal cards, trying to make sure that your family doesn't make it to the end of the board first.
3
Galaxy Trucker
Galaxy Trucker is a ludicrous title in which players build space ships out of spare pipes and then race them across the cosmos. Yet the mischievous sense of humour in the game masks a decent depth of strategy for those that want to search it out.
This works well as a pass and play game but, unusually for a board game adaptation, the solitaire version is even better. So you can still enjoy it for hours by yourself once everyone else has gone home.
4
Evergreen: The Board Game
Evergreen: The Board Game has you choosing a biome and trying to take over a map with it. You can add different plants on specific tile squares, finding light and growing your area. The graphics look very charming and there is a lot that can be done as you change and shape the world around you.
It's a less intensely competitive board game and more of an easy, slow burner when it comes to board games.
5
Lords of Waterdeep
Worker placement games are traditionally seen as hard and heavy. Mathematical games suited only to the geekiest end of the market. Lords of Waterdeep puts a lie to that stereotype.
OK, so it's set in the Dungeons and Dragons universe, so it's still geeky, but for good reasons. The game itself is easy to pick up, enthralling and occasionally very vicious.
6
Carcassonne (Asmodee)
One of the first hobby board games to come to mobile, and still one of the best. Carcassonne is a mixture between a strategy game and some strange collaborative art project.
Players take turns laying tiles to build a map of medieval France. But some surprisingly cut-throat strategy emerges in the race to claim towns and monasteries as your own.
7
Forbidden Island
If you want a simple co-operative game that can even young children can enjoy, look no further. Each player has a simple special ability. They have to use these in collaboration to try and rescue four treasures from a sinking island.
It's not very deep, but that hardly matters as tiles vanish beneath the waves and the tension ratchets up.
8
Catan Classic
If you haven't played the German import that kickstarted modern board gaming, now's the time to try it. It's a game of dice rolling, trading and spectacular land-grabs that anyone can pick up and play. Or, in this case, pass and play.
Catan's secret is using the bell curve of a pair of dice to make a game that's strategic but still random. All the banter of trading and resource thievery adds spice to an already beguiling mix.
9
Codenames
Codenames is a spy game, based on a physical game of the same name, where you are trying to figure out what spys on the board are your friends and which ones are your enemies. You can either be the person giving clues to your partner or the person listening to clues to pick the right cards on the board.
It's a fun game and you can play through a number of rounds all at the same time!
10
Hey, That's My Fish! HD
Who isn't going to love a family-friendly game full of cute widdle penguins at Christmas? Aww, look at those flippers and belly flops go as they race around the ice, trying to be the one to get the most fish! Aren't they adorable as they brutally box each other in to empty corners of the board, so their opponents can steal all the food?
The penguins hide what's actually a simple and challenging abstract game. A child could play it, indeed children love to play it, but it takes a certain fiendish genius to play it well.
11
Stone Age: Digital Edition
Stone Age: Digital Edition is a digital version of a phsyical game, where you are looking to manage a bunch of resources so that you can build up your civilization. There are different meeples that you can bring to areas of your village - gathering resources, rolling dice, and spending cards you have gathered.
It's a little more complex, but the presentation is one that feels a lot like a classic board game, with some visual upgrades.
12
Corporate Piranha
You can literally see the entire board in Corporate Piranha. It's a Monopoly-style game where you are looking to purchase different businesses and keep your money growing. There is a lot of investing and trying to plan out how to not run out of money.
You don't need to actually know about the stock market to play this game, thankfully, but if you are looking for a more intense game you can download and play against your family or people around the globe.
13
Monopoly Mobile
Monolpoly is a game that everyone knows, and at least one person in your family wants to play. Playing Monopoly on mobile will mean there are no discrepancies between the rules, the game won't go on forever, and nobody can be the banker and cheat. Plus there are kit scenes and new worlds to explore - perfect for bringing the game to a new era.
14
The Game of Life 2
The Game of Life 2 is another classic, brought to digital form, with some beautiful boards, cutscenes, and themes that are perfect for sharing with your family. In this game, you will be making big decisions, following various paths, spinning wheels and hoping to have the best life possible. There is currently even a snow-covered map for Christmas.
15
Clue/Cluedo
The last classic on this list, Cluedo (or Clue, for us Americans), Cludeo has you trying to solve a mystery, by moving around a massive house and trying to find clues. From there, you can figure out who did it, where, and with what, before accusing a member of your family of being a cold, hard killer!
Cluedo is always a fun time, and this digital form does the game justice.
