Christmas has arrived and has given us all a new reason to go out and about. It’s a magical time in the year when friends and family gather around and spend quality time together, celebrating what’s most important; Being together. It indeed is cause for celebration. It is, however, also a cause of inviting your loved ones to engage in a tabletop adventure with you! And what better way to spend that time than playing a theme relevant game?
There are plenty of holiday themed board games out on the market and it’s safe to say that every single one of them is worth at least one try; but to save you some time and money, we’ve tried to select a few of the them that we believe are most worth checking out.
10. Monopoly – Christmas Edition
The original family board game makes a return with a special limited edition exclusively for Christmas, that includes extra tokens such as Santa and Rudolph. All the designs, figures and even bills in the game have been reimagined with a Christmas-y twist. The same old lovely gameplay plays out in a new glowing Christmas design.
There’s no point in describing this one any further because we all know and love Monopoly and now we have an excuse to bring it to the Christmas party!
9. Articulate – Christmas
The original Articulate was published by Drumond Park as a fast talking game where the player was challenged to describe as many card entries as possible in a limited amount of time. Articulate Christmas plays exactly the same way as it’s classic version, with a noticeable Christmas makeover.
Articulate is a very flexible game regarding the range of players, time and place. It can be easily set up, quickly explained and just as quickly understood. The gameplay is straightforward and familiar and for further provoking the Christmas spirit, the Christmas Edition of Articulate includes pictures of Christmas decorations, foods, songs, movies, etc.
The original game has sold well over 2 million copies and it’s earned its well-deserved popularity.
8. The Best Of Christmas Game
The Best of Christmas Game is another member of the LOGO style games published by Drumond Park. It features three different sets of question cards and a Christmas tree shaped board.
The Christmas Tree board has four “sides”. Two of these have a series of holes rising from the bottom to the top. The teams are racing to hang up all their decorations – starting at the bottom hole and rising to the top, as they answer questions correctly. Each time a question is answered correctly a decoration is “hung” into the next hole up. The winning team is the one that reaches the top and places the golden star on the tip of the Christmas tree sooner.
It’s an overall entertaining game for the family to sit down to, the only problem being that it’s not the most replayable of board games.
7. Christmas Rush
Yet another Christmas makeover for a popular game mechanic, Christmas Rush –published by Arizona GameCo- is a simplistic elimination based card game. You will laugh, cheer, sing, even shout and, if you are quick enough, savor a victorious game night this holiday while playing this engaging Christmas game with your family and friends.
The goal of the game is to collect four cards of a kind and yell out “Christmas Rush!” before any of the other players does so. You can play Christmas Rush with up to 8 players of 8 years and older and the instructions of the game are as simple as it gets. You can even play with one hand while you’re holding a mug full of eggnog in the other!
6. ‘Tis The Season Christmas – Trivia Game
Who doesn’t love a good Trivia game? And guess what? Yes, you guessed it. This one’s Christmas themed!
This game features more than 1800 Trivia questions from all of our most beloved Christmas specials and has sold over 2.5 million copies. Published by Anton Publications, this best-selling game is sure to spice up your Christmas parties as players or teams compete with each other answering questions from six different categories including movies, songs, history, television and more.
It’s great for finding out who paid attention during Christmas movie nights!
5. Christmas Charades
Going back to the classic titles, we can’t have a discussion about family games over Christmas and not mention Charades.
Published by Go!Games, Christmas Charades includes 220 phrases and words associated with the holidays to light the Christmas fire all the way up. The unique size of the packaging allows for easy mobility and due to its worldwide recognition, it’s unlikely that you’d ever face any difficulties while explaining the game to new players. According to the manufacturer anyone above the age of 8 can play this game but I doubt there’s any actual age restriction so, make sure you invite everyone to play.
4. Rudolph The Red-nosed Reindeer
You might have been waiting for something like this one.
Published by Aquarius in 2018, Rudolph The Red-nosed Reindeer Christmas Board Game is basically Snakes and Ladders through Santa’s glasses. The game board is a bit more twisted than the traditional version and everything is obviously decorated with the Christmas spirit.
The Christmas presents have been lost and Santa sends out an elite team of elves and reindeers to retrieve them and there can’t be any Christmas unless they succeed in their mission and in time. Gather your friends and family as you all journey through an icy winter wonderland on your quest to save Christmas. The player who retrieves the gifts to Santa before the others is the winner.
3. Santa Claus GO! Fish
Published by Arizona GameCo, this game was originally targeted at a very young audience but soon became one of the most popular family games.
Due to its simplicity and entertaining nature, this Christmas injected version of GO Fish is a great choice to fill out the time in your Christmas family gatherings. As I mentioned before, GO Fish was designed for children and it does a pretty good job of appealing to them as well as suiting their capabilities. Kids can play Go Fish by calling out an image name (“Do you have a Santa Claus?”) or number (“Do you have a TEN?”). This feature makes the game specially easier to play for younger children who don’t know numbers yet.
The illustrations are light hearted and they carry the signature looks and colors of Christmas, bringing the holiday spirit into your game sessions.
2. Christmas Carols and Songs Game
This one dates back all the way to the ’90s, but it’s aged pretty well. Happy Holidays! The Christmas Carols & Songs Game was published by Anton Publications and probably for children and young adults back then. However, nowadays, it’s the perfect amount of nostalgic musical vibes added to the family party for pretty much all ages.
This Trivia style game tests your knowledge of Christmas Carols and Songs and can include up to 6 players. A fun engaging game that just might become your newest Christmas tradition.
1. Unstable Unicorns – Christmas Expansion
Publisher TeeTurtle published this expansion pack in 2020, giving the famous board game Unstable Unicorns a fresh Christmas-y look.
Unstable Unicorns was one of Kickstarter’s top 100 most backed projects of all time in 2017 and it won the 2019 People’s Choice Award for Toy of the Year. The objective of Unstable Unicorns isn’t complicated at all: be the first player to collect 7 Unicorns. This can be done by sending them from your hand into your stable. However, things get tricky when you realize your opponents are trying to do the same thing while actively trying to keep you from reaching the objective.
This highly giftable expansion pack contains 36 cards and consists of holiday-themed characters, magic cards, upgrades, and downgrades.
The game also features several other expansions such as The Dragons expansion, The Unicorns of Legends expansion, etc. As well as an NSFW version for the more grown up players.
This game’s popularity is not without good reason and you will most definitely find it a lot of fun in the holidays.
Final Thoughts
To conclude this article, Christmas time is one of the—if not the best—times of playing family board games and fortunately, manufacturers and designers have kept this fact in mind as well.
There are a number of Christmas themed games that can bring an extra touch of joy to your parties. Keep in mind that your preferred game for the Christmas holidays doesn’t necessarily need to follow the theme.
What are your favorite board games to play on Christmas? Share your ideas in the comments section.
