What games are good to play during family dinner time?

[Givemestrengthorvodka]

We've gotten into the habit of playing yahtzee while we eat dinner. It's great as both DC (6 & 8) can play, takes no time to set up and it's quick and takes up little space. Are there any other games like are as quick and easy to get out and play that people would recommend?

We love UNO here

We often play 20 questions while waiting for the slowest child to finish eating!

We do the post it note on forehead guess who I am game, sometimes the standalone Harry Potter trivial pursuit questions and the one where you fold a piece of paper and pass it between you, each person draws a bit of a figure up to the fold, I’ve explained that one badly! Fold paper in 4, first person draws a head with just the neck lines coming over fold, then folds if so no one can see the head that’s been drawn, passes it along to next person, who does neck to waist portion and so on, at end you have a crazy drawing.

Connect 4

Do you have an Alexa? We do song relays. Pick a theme and everyone had a turn to pick a song that matches the theme. Or someone starts off choosing a song and the next person has to pick one which links to the first in some way, then so on round the table

Song relays is a fab idea - we will do that. We’ve been playing name that tune, there’s loads on YouTube, but not at
Table.

We play "would you rather" a lot. The weirder the options, the more the discussion (arguments) over which is the better option ;)

Also we play top trumps with no cards. So someone says "type of animal", everyone thinks of one in their head (or writes it down, if likely to be dishonest and change their choice!), and then the leader of that round announces the category - eg - "this animal has to carry you on its back to London" (or whatever), then everyone reveals their chosen animal and the fighting over who should score the highest points for that round begins.

Basically we just play games that lead to a lot of friendly banter and arguement over utterly pointless things...

Or, pass the pigs is good.

I have a book called The Floor is Lava by Ivan Brett (I think...). It's a fab book full of games to play at the table or in the car, paper games, memory games, improv, number games, word play. I use it a lot at school as starters or last ten minutes on a Friday afternoon stuff. Highly recommend it. We play lots at the dinner table.

Go retro for quick and easy and suitable for dinner table -

Ludo (dd liked frustration version)
Snakes and ladders
20 questions (no kit required and can start interesting conversations)
Name that tune/buzzcocks intro round (one person hums/table drums a song and others have to guess - if the person humming can't carry a tune - like my poor mum - it's HILARIOUS! Even more so as the kids grow into teens and start humming chart stuff you've never heard of!! )
Guess who
Pictionary
Game of life (I get dd a retro board game every Xmas to play she LOVED this one most but also thoroughly enjoys others but she now turns them into drinking games at uni  sometimes she sends me videos and it's quite odd!)
Trivial pursuit (family edition)

Or

You can go REALLY vintage with pencil and paper games

Hangman
Beetle drive (doesn't have to be a beetle pick any 6 or 12 component drawing you like, when dd was little we'd have princesses, wizards, teddy bears...)

Battleship (yep originally a pencil and paper game!)
Noughts and crosses (as a round - gets REALLY competitive!)
Finish the story(one person writes a sentence fold the top down so next person can't see what they've written and they write a sentence etc etc - again often hilarious results!)

Card games are good for teaching quick mental arithmetic and logic

@loveablequalities your post reminded me of when my siblings and I used to copy the adventure game on bbc back then

We have what we call The Four Letter Argument. We got the idea from Taskmaster.

The Rules:
Only one person may talk at a time.
The speaker may only say one sentence between 2-10 words long. Obviously not the same sentence each time.
The last word must be 4 letters long.
Different last 4 letter words each time.
No swearing.

It gets incredibly ridiculous. And increasingly imaginative and outrageous.

Consequences!

Sheet of paper and a pen each. Each of you writes someone's name at the top, folds the paper down to cover it and writes met. Everyone passes their sheet to the person on their left, who writes another name down, folds the paper over it and writes a locating word like in, on, under, at etc. Papers get passed on and the process repeated with he said, she said, but they, so they, and the consequence was. (You can choose almost any story structure, but you all have to do the same structure.) You then pass the papers along one last time and take turns unfolding and reading the stories out loud. Usually ends up with some ridiculous and hilarious nonsense.

These are brilliant suggestions - so many good games. Thank you!

Sleeping lions

UNO
Pass the parcel
Baby photo game
Guess the name of the food
Finish the poem (a variation on finish the story)
Guess what or how etc
Word games
Color coding games

Pass the pigs
Noughts and crosses
Squares
Hangman
Akinator (can also play this with alexa)

21
You start counting you can choose 1 number, 2 numbers or 3. Whoever says 21 is out.
Person 1, 1,2,3
Person 2, 4,5
Person 3, 6
Person 4, 7,8,9
Person 1, 10,11
Person 2, 12, 13, 14
Person 3, 15, 16, 17
Person 4, 18
Person 1, 19, 20
Person 2, 21 out!

The yes no game. You cNt answer a question with ye or no. Its harder than it sounds.

We play word games.
"I went on safari and I took ...." you have a theme, ,(eg fruit) and you have to go through the alphabet

So 1st person " I went on safari and I took and apple" 2nd person "I went on safari and I took a banana". You can choose so many different categories.

We also like the "I went to the shop and I bought..." again you can have a theme or go through the alphabet but this time you have to remember what the person has said before and add on.
So by the end you have to remember the whole list of what you went to the shop for..in order.

We often do it with seeing if everyone can figure out what ingredients are in the meal we're eating and what's on the table.