While there are plenty of two-player board games that are excellent, board games for couples to play together deserve their own special sub-category. A lot of two-player games are pretty hardcore war board games or abstracts, for example, which are difficult categories for couples to agree over. Even if you can avoid such niche picks, two-player games also have a tendency to be fiercely competitive, which might also be a bad idea unless you’re both super forgiving. So here are our picks of the best games that balance the competitive and the cooperative, and the luck with the strategy, just so you can find a sweet spot to enjoy together.
TL;DR The Best Board Games for Couples
- Race to the Raft
- Sky Team
- The Search for Lost Species
- Fog of Love
- Patchwork
- Codenames Duet
- The Adventures of Robin Hood
- Hive
- Onitama
- Five Tribes
- The Fox in the Forest
- 7 Wonders: Duel
- Schotten Totten
Race to the Raft
Some of you may remember the movement puzzle games that were popular in the early days of the internet: they’re a clear predecessor to this bright and absorbing board game about guiding finicky cats to safety. Each cat will only travel over one colour of terrain, so it’s your job to work together to build a path for it to reach a raft before a blazing fire cuts it off. Your goal is hampered by the random nature of terrain cards you draw, the likelihood you’ll cut off another cat’s route with each play, and limited communication rules that may see you meowing desperately at one another to try and get a point across. Both challenging and hilarious, the game offers more than 80 scenarios of ever-increasing difficulty.
Sky Team: Prepare for Landing
What better way to say “I love you” than to take a flight together to an exotic destination? That’s what you get to do in Sky Team, with the notable catch that you’re playing as the pilot and co-pilot, and you have to work together to land the plane first. It’s far harder than it sounds: both of you have your own pool of dice and sets of instruments you must attend to using the results. Some of them even require you to balance the two values assigned by each player, a task made even trickier by the fact you can’t discuss strategy during the placement phase. At least that should avoid the potential for arguments when you find the dice pool is running short, the plane is tilting at a dangerous angle and there’s a queue of air traffic in front of you for the runway.
The Search for Lost Species
Boasting an appealing theme and an ever-shifting puzzle dynamic, this app-driven game sees players racing to map the ecology of an island and discover a long-lost animal. This engaging skin hides a logic puzzle of fiendish complexity. Each animal on the island has several rules dictating where it lives: some of them are fixed and some change from game to game, revealed by the app as the players research. They must use these rules, and clues from their island exploration, to figure out what hexes hold which species and slowly pin down the location of the mysterious beast. It’s complex but plays quickly once mastered, and every game is a fresh puzzle thanks to the app. You can even work together against the app, although you’ll have to share one playing piece.
Fog of Love
We have to start a list like this with a game designed specifically to tell the story of a couple in a relationship. However, it isn’t your relationship but one that you’ll create between a pair of fictitious characters and then go on to explore its nuances and ups and downs. Although there’s a certain amount of blue and pink in the visuals it’s also open to same-sex relationships, too. Your couple each get a brew of secret traits and destinies and then go on to play through a number of scenes, making choices based on traits that affect the outcome. As an experimental game, there is no winner here in the strict sense, but you’ll win by enjoying a fascinating journey through an imagined relationship instead.
Patchwork
Patchwork works because it’s a super simple synthesis of several clever concepts in one small package. Players buy geometric pieces using buttons to try and form a quilt with as few holes in it as possible. Each purchase also moves you forward on a time track, which intermittently earns you extra buttons or very useful single-square patches for your quilt, but the person last on the time track always takes the next turn. This lets you set up interesting plays like planning for double turns or trying to leapfrog your opponent to snatch a one-square patch. Gently addictive while it transfixes several parts of your brain at once, it’s no wonder it won a slew of awards and nominations.
Codenames Duet
The original Codenames was a rare breakout hit into the wider world of party games. Players laid out a grid of cards with words on them. Then one player per team had to give out single-word clues to try and link multiple words together in order to help their teammates identify which cards were coded to their side. Codenames: Duet is very similar but it’s been refined for two into a much sleeker cooperative game. Now you’re trying to find fifteen clues between you before a timer runs out. Because you both take turns giving clues, downtime while someone thinks of a clue to give is almost eliminated, bringing a fun slice of party game magic to the table with just the two of you.
The Adventures of Robin Hood
Unlike the other games on this list, The Adventures of Robin Hood is a narrative-driven title where you retell the legend of the famous outlaw across nine scenarios. But it brings all sorts of clever ideas to the formula, making it intriguing and engaging to play. There are no board spaces for starters: instead, you measure your progress across the map with a long base on your wooden playing piece, trying to stay in printed shadows and out of sight of guards. The board is like an advent calendar, with hundreds of numbered pieces you can lift out and flip over to create the feel of a living, dynamic world you encounter by looking up the numbers in the included book. Can you and your partner work together to save Nottingham from the clutches of the evil Sheriff before Guy of Gisborne hunts you down?