That picture makes that game look like a lot of fun. Maybe I should check it out.
Here’s some great 5 player light games:
Through the Desert is an incredibly simple route building game with a lot more depth than initially appears. It feels sort of like an abstract like Go, but plays great with 5 players and has awesome candy colored camels.
Adrenaline is basically Unreal Tournament the board game that plays best at exactly 5. It’s a simple area-control game with the twist that the areas you’re controlling are other people’s health bars. Great for anyone who’d get nostalgic for 90s style FPS aesthetics or people who want to kill each-other with light strategic decisions.
Ethnos is kind of like Ticket to Ride, but with fantasy warfare and area control instead of building train routes. There are 7 random special abilities (from a set of 14) each game which makes it feel a bit different. Really quick and a bit too simple if you’re going to play it a lot, but great if it’s just played once or twice that night. Great up to 6 players.
I was obsessed with the digital version of Throught the Desert for weeks. I was probably playing 12-15 games a day. Seems like tabulations score would be kind of annoying with the physical version.
I really recommend it. It’s my #1 crowd pleaser. Only one simple choice every turn: Go further into the temple, or turn around. Keep going and you have the chance of more treasure, but you risk losing everything you’ve collected. And as people drop out, your score can be even bigger. Great push your luck game.
The deluxe version supports up to 8. It has variations and more cards.
Yeah it’s a bit rough tabulating scores but not too bad. It’s way quicker and easier than Concordia, for instance. It helps that a big part is waterholes which have tokens and things add up to 5 a lot.
You might try Unstable Unicorns. We still pull out Cards Against Humanity now and then but this is the current larger group, up to 8, favorite. You can even throw in the NSFW expansion to get a that extra Humanity feel to it. Okay, they play very differently but this game is really fun and the most competitive and accepted and enjoyed game we have right now.
I’ll plug my current favorite hidden traitor game that’s perfect with 5:
Dark Moon
It’s a very simplified version of Battlestar Galactica. The space combat is gone, there is no movement, damage is the only way to lose, and cards are replaced with dice for a Liar’s Dice kind of deal. Everyone gets to choose 1 of 2 crises drawn at the end of their turn without telling everyone else what the other one was. The group has to make the target number with die rolls, but 4 out of 6 of the facings are negative numbers and everyone rolls in secret. Everyone has to submit at least one, so a traitor sabotage attempt will be passed off as “I rolled all negatives there was nothing I could do” and you have to decide if they’re telling the truth.
I love it. It’s totally obsoleted BSG for me. Simpler, easier to teach, plays faster, and better bluffing mechanics for the traitors instead of the open card counting in BSG.
Plus you can get it off BGG market for like $15.
There’s also an active kickstarter for the sequel!
50ish hours to go, you can add on the original and 2 expansions for an additional 90ish bucks. They are GREAT but the base game plays awesome even without them.
Friday night we played the last scenario* in Arkham Horror 3. Veils of whatever. It’s a hard one. We played it twice and failed both times with 2 investigators. It did, however, let me say that replayabiity isn’t a big concern with the game. For the scenarios, 3/4 had the same general pattern: do the good thing twice you win; the bad thing happens twice, you lose. For me the fun is the investigators and the encounters.
The game mechanics I still like. While the game takes about 3 hours, it plays fast. If you get up to hit the loo, you will come back to people waiting on your turn. In EH and AH2, the mythos phase can drag. That is not the case in AH3.
*The scenarios don’t go in order. It was just the one we hadn’t played yet,
Ooh, never heard of this one. Might go over well with the intended crowd.
damn you Tom, your description of Fantasy Flight’s New Angeles is RIGHT up my ally! Added to wish list and using all my willpower NOT to impulse buy!
It’s a very active game. Everyone is paying attention all the time, you’re trying to build a stable of unicorns and your friends are taking them or destroying them. You get this perfect card to stop your friend from taking your perfectly good breeding unicorn so you Neigh that card to stop and then on the left someone turns them into pandas. Lots of chaos and the expansion are just fun. Since it’s a card game it’s ulra portable too.
5 player game suggestions:
LAST WILL aka Bruster’s Millions. A great 5 player game.
If you want something a little heavier TZOLKIN (**with the expansion). Both these games have serious staying power. They’re easy to teach and yet still brain burning enough that people will want to play them again and again.
ADVENTURERS (if you can find it) a fun beer and pretzel game. MISSON RED PLANET (or Citadels done right). 7WONDERS if it wasn’t mentioned. I’ll keep thinking.
Just grabbed a copy, along with Incan Gold.
Thanks for suggesting it!
T’Zolkin is AWESOME
Yes, this is one that is part of the regular games to go kit. It’s basically the opening scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark as a treasure grab.
5-Player Game Suggestions:
Cataclysm (Western Allies / USA / USSR / Germany-Italy / Japan)
Both Here I Stand and Virgin Queen play best with 6 but work with 5. Virgin Queen is better though.
Dice Town is light, easy to learn, high on interaction. It’s also very tactile as you get a cup and poker dice to roll every turn. It lets you rob banks or build an empire through poker hands.
Everybody I’ve played it with really enjoys it, gamer or not.
I didn’t mention Dice Town because it can drag with 5 players and more, but another one I really like.