Top 10 Best Board Games – Brooke

After seeing what Jaden and Caleb list as their Best Board Games, it’s time to turn our attention to the female point of view with our daughter Brooke.

As with most pre-teenage girls, Brooke’s attention is mostly focused on her friends. She loves to hang with her friends, play with her stuffed animals, listen to One Direction, and play soccer. But she also loves one-on-one time with parents and enjoys playing games with the family (provided she isn’t currently at odds with her “annoying” brothers.)

So when she hits the board game closet, which are her favorite games to pull out to play?
You might be surprised. I know I’ve been surprised by Brooke numerous times, so I guess I should start expecting surprises.

Here’s Brooke’s list of favorite games.

Top 10 Best Board Games – BROOKE’s choice

The Resistance

While I didn’t think Brooke was too impressed with The Resistance when she first played it, she’s now constantly asking to play it. Whenever we have all 6 of us playing a game, Brooke calls for The Resistance. Whenever we get together with extended family and take some games with us, she makes sure The Resistance is in the bag. And when I pulled it out to play with the Boy Scouts when we had a game night a couple weeks ago, she was right there joining in with all the boys and having a blast. She can’t get enough.
See our full review of The Resistance.

Defenders of the Realm

I’m not surprised Defenders of the Realm is on her Top 10 list because I had already been surprised by Brooke about this cooperative board game. As I described in our full review of Defenders, I originally got the game thinking the boys would love it. A fantasy themed game with cool heroes all battling together to push back monster generals and minions sounds great for boys. But when Brooke saw it, she wanted in on the action. And she ate it up. She loved the game right from the start and continues to love it still.
See our full review (and Brooke’s video review) of Defenders of the Realm.

Sounds Like a Plan

Sounds Like a Plan is a great game for up to 8 people. If you’re familiar with Apples to Apples, you’ll know the basic game play – everyone throw in a card for their answer and the judge picks the one they like the best. However, the great thing in Sounds Like a Plan is that instead of just picking 1 response, the judge ranks them in order of preference. So the top answer awards 5 points, the next 4, and on down the line. We love that scoring because people don’t get left behind. But the real fun in the game is the funny combinations of “To-do” lists and the responses.
See our full review of Sounds Like a Plan.

Say Anything Family

Another great game to play when you’ve got a bigger group is Say Anything Family. Instead of placing canned responses into the judging pile, players get to write their own responses. And instead of all the scoring rest solely with the judge, players get to bet on which response they think the judge will pick. This way players feel a little more in control of how many points they earn each round. And when in doubt, always pick the funniest response out there – judges usually go for that stuff.
See our full review of Say Anything Family.

Ligretto Dice

Ligretto Dice is a quick-playing, dice racing game. When you just want a light, fun game with a lot of action, go for Ligretto Dice. It’s a scramble to roll your dice and place them in the right spot on the board before the other players get all their dice placed. The trick is that all the dice have to be placed in consecutive order. So if you’ve got a red 3, you can sit and wait for other players to place a red 1 and a red 2, but why wait when you can frantically re-roll and try for the red 1 yourself? It’s a mad dash and Brooke loves the fun.
See our full review of Ligretto Dice.

BANG!

BANG! was the game that started us on the path of doing board game and card game video reviews in the first place. Who knew that over 3 years later, we’d still be putting out reviews of fun family board games and that Brooke would still have BANG! on her Top 10 Best Board Games list. There’s simply something fun about hidden identity games (also why she loves The Resistance). And of course BANG! is a socially interactive game and that’s very appealing to Brooke. Or maybe she just loves the chance to target dad in a shootout.
See our full review of BANG!.

Curses

Brooke’s video review of Curses also goes back 3 years. Having Curses on her favorite games list just goes to show that kids love silly fun. And with Curses, the silliness piles up more and more as the game goes on. In Curses, players play Curse Cards on the other players which need to be followed or they’ll get a strike against them (3 strikes and you’re out). By the time you have multiple Curse Cards in front of you, it gets tougher to remember everything you need to do and things get pretty crazy – and funny.
See our full review of Curses.

Word on the Street

Here’s another party game to hit Brooke’s list. (Didn’t I mention that Brooke is very social and loves hanging with friends.) Word on the Street is a great team-vs-team party game. Party games that are set up for 2 teams to go at each other can always create some healthy competition. What makes Word on the Street a fun word game is that there really isn’t a lot of pressure on one person. If one person is having trouble coming up with a well fitting word to get more letters to their side of the street, chances are good that one of their teammates can come through for them.
See our full review of Word on the Street.

Forbidden Island

We’ve written a lot about Forbidden Island since it’s a fantastic family board game. We’ll continue to sing it’s praises. It’s a cooperative board game at a good entry level. Everyone works together with their unique roles and abilities to find the treasures and get off the island before it sinks. It’s simple to learn, isn’t long, has a lot of replayability because of the variable set up, and has terrific components and artwork. It’s also a great deal to get all of that in a family board game under $20. It’s definitely a “must have” family game.
See our full review of Forbidden Island.

Roll Through the Ages

A game based on dice can make for a great family game because with dice, you know that luck’s involved. And when luck’s involved, you know that the kids have a chance to beat their parents – a sweet element in great family games. And Roll Through the Ages has a lot of dice rolling in it. I like to refer to Roll Through the Ages as Yahtzee with a purpose. The game always seems to end just a couple turns too soon which leaves players begging to keep going or play again. It’s nice when they want the good times to keep going.
See our full review of Roll Through the Ages.