Friends, I need two kinds of gaming help.

First, card or board games built for two.

Second, neither of us know anything about gaming systems, but we have a brand new tv....sooooo....is it too late? Are we too old? Are there playable games that don't involve shooting up people or massacring invaded hordes of trolls? Are the fun adventure games for two that would be a whole lotta fun on a big screen tv?

We need to play more in our house. Any practical advice accepted.

#boardgames #gaming

@jkirkendall
We enjoy boardgames too, and so many to choose from. And I look for non-violent video games too; it seems wrong to be rewarded for punching/kicking/shooting people. A fav of mine is Cloudpunk, which has a great Blade Runner style soundtrack and involves making moral decisions rather than fighting. I play on PS5, but I think it’s on other platforms too.

@jkirkendall Morels is probably my favorite two player card game. It's pretty easy to pick up, and there's a good bit of strategy that keeps the game interesting and refreshing through many plays.

@jkirkendall If you get a Playstation you can play Unravel and Unravel 2. I played Unravel and really enjoyed it and just now found out about the sequel. I also played but never finished Firewatch. I never finished because my kids are Playstation hogs. There are adventure/puzzle games out there!

@jkirkendall It's never too late to learn to play games. And there are plenty of games that don't require you to have the most twitch of reflexes either. Lots of adventure and exploring to be had on pretty much any system you choose.I will say that your budget will dictate what you choose to some degree.

If you're looking for stuff that is more "family" based and built for people to play together it's hard to go wrong with a Switch. Not the most powerful of systems and it's about to be replaced with its successor, but Nintendo does know how to make good games that will likely fit into your preferred niche. Switch doesn't have the best third party support tho, so you would miss out on some good stuff.

Xbox is a good option if you roll with Game Pass. Lots of indie titles in there that are def worth the price of admission. A lot of them are on Swtich's E-shop but with Game Pass your monthly sub price saves you having to buy every game (unless you want to, of course). And a Series S is fairly cheap, more than enough of a system to handle those "smaller" experiences while also being capable of at least a decent option for the "heavier" games as well.

Sony is good for the big adventure games but a lot of them do involve a lot of killing things and people. And they are pricey boxes, with pricey controllers. They also have plenty of the smaller indie games as well. PSN Plus subscription nets you a big catalog of games to play right away and "free" games to keep every month. I do like my PS5 and what it's capable of, but I think (from what you say above) you'd maybe wanna skip Sony.

I'd say go online and check out the stores for each system. That should give you a good idea what system will suit you best.

Good luck picking up something and enjoy the gaming journey, hopefully 😀

@jkirkendall Lost Cities, Azul, and BoardGameGeek is a good resource site

@jkirkendall The Crew is a cooperative trick taking game, works well with two (out in two versions; I think Deep Sea is slightly better than Planet 9).

All of the variations on Pandemic are great co op games for two (or more).

Sky Team is two player only co op game.

@jkirkendall A few card games that are fun for two people: Cribbage (a classic card game played with a regular deck of cards), CuBirds (a fun game sort of like gin rummy, but with a special deck of cards of cubist-art birds on them), and Couch Skeletons (this is a fast, fun game that my wife and I love to play).

For a longer and more abstract board game you might try Azul. It’s inspired by the intricate artwork of the Alhambra in Granada, Spain. I think it would be ideal for two people, although you can play with up to four.)

#BoardGames
#Gaming

@jkirkendall Switch is probably most friendly to new gamers and non shoot-em-up type games. It Takes Two is a really cute cooperative puzzle game. The new Mario game (Wonder) has really cute cooperative mechanics as well. Happy Holidays and good luck on your search!

@jkirkendall In terms of video games designed for 2 people:

Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime
It Takes Two

Video games that work well in two players, but are more involved (will require learning how to play them):

Baldur's Gate 3
Civilization series
Grand strategy games (basically anything from Paradox)

Board/card games that work well for 2:

Watergate
Radlands
7 Wonders Duel
Spirit Island (this is my all-time favorite game)

@jkirkendall A Switch is a great option imho. You can get fun couch coop games like unravel and unravel 2. Untitled Goose Game also has a coop mode and is silly fun.

A racing game like Mario Kart can be a good time.

@jkirkendall botany is a beautiful board game that, IIRC, can be played with two players. Azul and Splendor are also two player compatible, I think.

@jkirkendall
For #boardgames it depends on your needs. Abstract games, I like to recomend Passtally or LYNK. Splendor Duel and 6 Wonders Duell (new in a Lord of the Rings adaption) are great as well.
Brand news Flatiron - awesome game, where you build the Flatiron building.
And for small games Fantasy Realms and Ohanami. 😊

@jkirkendall Two of my favorite video games are Portal and Rocket League, neither of which is combat-based. There are a ton of puzzle games, strategy games, cooperative games, party games, sports games, etc. that you can play on a game console. Shooters just tend to get a disproportionate amount of the attention.

@jkirkendall Will add a vote for the Switch with the TV connection. Our mid 20s daughter and I use Mario cart as a de-stressor. We’ve just started playing Clue on it. Haven’t decided how we feel about that one.

@jkirkendall
my family likes to play animal crossing -- each person plays on their own, but when you share a console you share an "island", and see the impacts of the other's play etc. solo but cooperative? idk.
kirby's epic yarn has a fun co-op mode, and is one that i play a lot with my mom.

super mario party or mario kart is a party classic for a reason - fun, easy game to spend time playing with one or more folks.

i don't know if it stands up as ONLY a two person game, but the rockstar game bully: scholarship edition has a two player mode that my family has historically DEEPLY enjoyed playing together at holiday events.

my family also has used the nintendo wii and switch ecosystems a lot for things like playing monopoly or uno or whatever across multiple households -- sounds like you're both in the same location, but it can be a fun way to hang out with friends too.

@jkirkendall

My kid has really enjoyed Sushi Go and Forbidden Island of late. I think both of those actually have 2 player mode but we may have adapted the rules so long ago that I don't remember. He's also obsessed with Uno. But we're limited by his minimal reading skills so there's a lot of games waiting in the wings at the moment.

We also get a *lot* of board games from our local library, which is my favourite way to try things out and see what works for us, so maybe check what your library has? The Clue Escape room games have been pretty fun library loans.

For video games: we went with the Nintendo Switch because it was more age appropriate (we got it when my kid was 4ish). The hands down best co-op game for us was Mario Odyssey, followed very closely by Yoshi's Crafted World (this was my favourite!) and Luigi's Mansion 3. Plus Animal Crossing. Nintendo has a good system of easing people into learning skills -- much better than a lot of the indie games we've played, though I'm sure we'll do more of those as we both level up our gaming skills. (We did like Unravel, for example, but got stuck at some point and haven't gone back yet.)

Note that a lot of these have a clear primary/secondary player balance so adults might want to flip who's in charge periodically. Amusingly, the reviews for Odyssey were all "and your kid can be the indestructible Cappy character" but I have no idea what kind of kids they have because there was zero chance my kid would let anyone else be Mario, even when that meant he had to learn all the skills himself. I got swapped in for one boss fight out of hundreds of hours of game play. 😂

@jkirkendall Look at my logged plays on BoardGameGeek. I pretty much only play games designed for two or works well with two. https://boardgamegeek.com/geekplay.php?userid=645071&redirect=1&startdate=&dateinput=&dateinput=&enddate=&action=bygame&subtype=boardgame

#BoardGames

@jkirkendall - another vote for Nintendo Switch, huge back catalog of couch co-op games (a new system is coming in 2025, probably, but that won't change how much fun can be had on the original Switch for years to come). Options: everything everyone else has said, plus many Mario or Kirby games have multiplayer; Just Dance; Snipperclips; Smash Brothers is a fighting game that can just be for fun.

@jkirkendall we have a throwback Atari that plugs into the tv. 😊

@jkirkendall it takes two. Start there.

@jkirkendall I think @AngelaPreston might have some suggestions for games that involving building & exploring?

@jkirkendall Switch is great for what you’re looking for. I can also tell you that Xbox, while reputationally more for fighting gamers, does have a great set of cooperative games / puzzles games / etc. You didn’t say what kind of Tv you bought but if it’s a Samsung you could just grab a controller and boot up the Xbox app to try it out. Or if you have a fire stick. You don’t even need a console.

For board games, a few that work particularly well for two:
- Eldritch Horror
- Seventh Continent / Seventh Citadel
- Sleeping Gods
- Legacy of Dragonholt
- Pandemic Legacy
- Jaipur
- Hardback

For video games:
Chants of Senaar is a great puzzle/adventure game that's fun to puzzle out together.
Outer Wilds similarly; it's single-player but it's fun to explore, hand off, and learn the mysteries together.

@arno_in_sing @jkirkendall

Lost Cities is so good.

@tx_tartan @jkirkendall

My SO and I love playing on BoardGameArena.com , and we're each paid subscribers.

We regularly play just together on Hanabi and Ticket to Ride (US & Europe with expansions, and Switzerland just added), and sometimes Martian Dice, Can't Stop, Potion Explosion, Sky Team, and others.

@jkirkendall Please check out It Takes Two, by Hazelight Studios, available on the #NintendoSwitch.

@amyshark I think Atrari was the LAST system I even played with!

@jkirkendall it’s great fun. You can even get the paddle controllers.

@SRLevine @jkirkendall

I wish I could be more help! The multiplayer games that I play are on PC. @f might have some suggestions - I think he and his wife play on their big screen.

For what it's worth, the games I have enjoyed a lot are Portal 2 and Raft. I like puzzle games and survival/crafting games.

My son has a Switch and he enjoys Minecraft and MarioKart with his friends.

Good luck finding something you can enjoy together!

@jkirkendall As @AngelaPreston mentioned, the wife and I love playing games together 🙂 For us, the gaming rig of choice has been the PlayStation .. mostly because of games like the "Horizon" series, or "Uncharted".

Unfortunately, though both of them involve shooting and killing though in the case of "Horizon", it's robot animals. We don't really enjoy the killing/fighting games but we did like those two because of the really well done stories.

If you leave out fighting games, it becomes harder to find two player games. I think "Unravel" was already mentioned and that was fun 🙂

But one thing which has made things a lot more fun for us on PlayStation has been the co-pilot feature ... though that might not be what it's called on PlayStation (or other platforms since I believe XBox has this too ..) Basically, you can play any single player game with two controllers and can take over from each other as you need.

Since this is a built-in feature (you do have to enable it in the PlayStation settings) this means that you can play any single-player game together 🙂

This feature did open up a lot more games for us to play together and one of the ones that we've enjoyed playing together this way has been "No Man's Sky", which is a space exploration game where you explore a vast universe.

Also, this site is always useful in finding good co-op games for the platform and genre of your choice:
https://www.co-optimus.com/

@SRLevine