Mumsnet Talk

Best game I think for any age range is Jenga.

My DD then aged 3 beat the entire family, 3 generations, 7 times one Christmas. 3 years on she is still awesome at it.

Oh kiery you got there first with Ticket to Ride 11yr old DSD loves it and I am totally addicted. Not strictly a board game but 'Dominion' is a fantastically addictive card based game for older children and adults. A good one for anyone over about 5 i reckon is 'No one but us Chickens'. For thinkers I would strongly recommend 'Pandemic' as well. All available on line. Games rock in our household!

Sorry, just read back and everyone got there first with Ticket to Ride!

Mine are 5 and 8. My DM bought coppit it at at charity shop. It is like crack cocaine. No wait sherbet dibs abs are like crack cocaine, they just like playing coppit all the fucking time a lot.

agree gulo gulo is a great one for when you have very young children playing, because their tiny fingers are an advantage to them and they can beat the grown ups.

Mine love 3d snakes and ladders
pictionary, monopoly, cluedo, guess who, game of life to name but a few,

Rummikub is very good for older kids

Not a board game as such, but Pass the Bomb is great fun, again for older kids and adults. It is fast and does not last too long.

Pass the Bomb Junior, much better/easier but more fun than the normal version.
UNO

They are our fail safe games, everyone loves them and everyone can play them from our two year old (with a little help) up to Grandma. DCs are 2, 5, 10, and 12.

snap and go fish with cards - very simple
memory - you can play with themed cards or with special packs -or normal cards
snakes and ladders
draughts - and variations of these

we also have a few of the haba games - the orchard game and witches / storm they are very nice simple games for even young children - we saw families all over a campsite in france playing them all and bought them and haven't looked back

my daughter love snap! - for older people you play Animal Snap. Each person is an animal and you can only get their cards if intead of saying snap you make the sound their "animal" makes

Bartimaeus- great game suggestion! Don't slink away! I'm going to play that this evening with my crew! They'll love it!

Has anyone mentioned good old UNO?

It's a really easy card game that spans the generations.

We played it on holiday 3 forty year olds, a 10 year old, a 7 year old and a 6 year old.

The adults kind of play each other at a more cruel competitive level.

Rapidough is great - like pictionary but with plasticine - my niece loved it last year (she was 4), although really she just sat playing with the dough while we played the game!!

Have just ordered family pictionary which looks quite good.

The Really Nasty Horseracing game is great for adults!

These are all brilliant thanks, Can anyone direct me to the ones that take 15/20 minutes? My two (8 & 10) like to play a family game after tea but we don't have a lot of time before bed and with a new addition due in the next few weeks we will be even more pushed. They love uno extreme, sorry, and flipping monopoly which takes hours and never gets finished so I will be getting monopoly deal for christmas!

Cranium family edition takes 15 minutes max. We usually go round twice as it's over so quickly!

Ah thanks Erebus

We always played loads of card games as a family and Pig was always a favourite as it's so quick, lots of fun and very easy for new people to understand. An excellent game to play with foreign exchange students too!

Also good to play with very competitive people my brother because there is no winner, just a loser (in a nice way) and no point scoring.

Can't believe no one has mentioned Settlers of Catan. All our family (5-14) love it, although the youngest has to play in a team with someone else. Can take a long time, but much more interesting than Monopoly.

Also we love UNO, and that's usually quick - and very accessible for all ages.

Boggle (not for a 2 year old but in a few years maybe!)

Yahtzee!

I have a fab game called Dread Pirate (may keep 16 yo amused and has shiny treasures).

Happy Families (preferably with the old, non-happy illustrations which are really gross but 'the way it should be'.)

MixMath is a Maths version of Scrabble my family like (but I hate maths personally...)

Uno, Ludo, Simpsons Board game, Jigsaws, Monopoly all firm favourites in my childhood home! I think 2yo is probably going to be waiting a couple of years before they really have the patience for any board game so concentrate on the older ones likes and hopefully littlest will grow up wanting to be on a team or join in with what can become a great Christmas tradition

My dc from age 2 to age 15 all love pictureka, it's great because anyone can play and it's not about skill so anyone can join in

The older ones love battleship, cluedo and guess who

Settlers of catan is fucking AWESOME. Probably not for a 2yo, but now you've mentioned a 5yo playing, I should give it a go with DD.

DH and I were given it as a wedding present! Much better than all that crockery

In fact my DSS, who was 16 at the time and is ultra-competitive when it comes to games, was so desperate to play it that night that he said in front of all the guests in the bar "let's play it now, you can consummate later"

fuzzp

Can you still get Buccaneer? Happy childhood memories...

Zooloretto is one we like.

We bought it from amazon.de

http://www.amazon.de/Abacusspiele-03071-Zooloretto-Spiel-Jahres/dp/B000R3G914/

The instructions are in German but you can get the English ones online.

Cheaper than buying in the UK.

linkable click: www.amazon.de/Abacusspiele-03071-Zooloretto-Spiel-Jahres/dp/B000R3G914/

Ooh I've not tried zooloretto but the coloretto one is great, my friends have it

Another good card game is Bohnanza.

I think Zooloretto is basically the same as Coloretto but less abstract, you get cute animals (including babies).

We like Yspahan too, but it's more of a teen to adult game.