During social distancing you will probably find yourself with time to fill and less social connections than is normal for you. On the other hand, you may be quarantining with a house full of people and looking for something fun to do.
We’re all in this together, so we thought we’d take a look at some of our favorite games to play while we do our parts and stay apart.
Let’s take a look at Board Games in Apps
I am a big board game fan, normally playing hours worth of tabletop every weekend. So finding myself at home every weekend without them has been HARD. Here’s how I’ve been filling that gap and finding some virtual social connection while I do it.
Note: Please stay safe when playing app games. My Zynga (Words with Friends is a Zynga game) account info was caught up in a hack. It’s always a risk, so be careful and make sure you take all normal precautions, including in how you interact with strangers you play games with online.
Words with Friends
This friend always beats me.
This is a classic. I’ve played it on and off for years via Facebook, but only recently picked up the app version. Although the app version leaves much to be desired (MANY ads, and you will probably want to mute most conversations) the game itself is fun, and there are a TON of people to play against.
If you’re not familiar with Words with Friends, it is basically an online version of Scrabble. There are power ups that make it a little different, but I never use those. That would be for someone richer than me. I stick with the free stuff and have a great time.
I love that it automatically tells you if a word is usable or not. I learn new words this way because I’ll keep trying different combinations to find the highest score. If this is cheating, I embrace it proudly!
Right now, all the random games I play with people I don’t know feels a little bit like I’m replacing the sort of random interactions I’d normally have out and about: Chatting with a cashier or someone in line, hanging out in a bookstore, etc. Right now, it’s very much appreciated.
Lords of Waterdeep
The board is just beautifully translated to the app.
This is the digital version of a spin-off Dungeons & Dragons board game. You get a character and have to complete certain quests based on that character’s traits. It’s an excellent worker placement game.
It translates very well to iOS, but you’re going to want a big screen to play it on. You CAN play it on your phone and I do, but it’s very small. You definitely can’t read flavor text and may struggle with some other aspects of the game.
If you have a tablet, you’re golden. This app works great. You can run multiple games at a time, there always seems to be a lot of people playing online, and you don’t have to play in real time as long as you set a game length that allows for it (but you may annoy the people you’re playing with if you don’t take your turn in a timely manner.)
I do not recommend picking a 30 minute game. This game is usually not that short and it forfeits when you run out of time.
Mystic Vale on Switch
Aside from Board and App games there are quite a few good Switch games too. One I’ve thoroughly enjoyed reviewing recently is Mystic Vale.
This may be my most played Switch game.
You can read more about Mystic Vale in the review I wrote here, but in addition to everything I loved about playing with the AI, it has a good multiplayer option as well. I don’t see too many people online, but I have gotten a few games in. Unlike some other games, Mystic Vale doesn’t appear to require all players to have purchased a particular expansion to play it in multiplayer.
Just a reminder: Mystic Vale does require a Nintendo Switch Online subscription to play online.