It’s November and many of us are planning for what is likely to be one of the most unusual Thanksgiving celebrations yet. For those of us that are lucky enough to have a large “bubble crew” to spend time with, we’re likely looking for anything to do that doesn’t involve talking about politics or COVID-19. For those of us whose “bubble crew” is our spouse, kids, and cats who we’ve been spending some more time with than usual, we just might be looking for something new to do that doesn’t involve staring at screens. How about a game?

These five games are our picks for the best cheap pick ups (ranging from $10-$19.99) for a larger group (an average of five players). They represent a diversity of different styles of play, themes, and player involvement levels but all have been selected because they are easy to teach, quick to start, and fun as heck to play. If you ask me, those are all qualities of a game that will go over well with a mixed group of family that includes weekly D&D-enthused kids as well as parents who “used to play a lot of Monopoly”.

We typically focus on two-player game experiences, however, we do have a lot of party and group games in our collection. Some of these work with a two-player variant but most do not.