
Call your friends over for game night!
Do you catch yourself (and your friends) checking your phone every five minutes when you are all together? Ditch that phone and play a board game instead. Not only is it a great way to bond, socialise and have fun, it will also tell you a lot more about your friends—whether it is their vocabulary, wit, sense of humour, competitive spirit or the little quirks you never knew about. While games like Snakes and Ladders invoke childhood, playing classics like Scrabble or newer word games like Taboo make for an engaging evening that will have all of you ending up in throes of laughter. Read on for our list of top six board games.

#1: Uno is a classic
If card games are your thing, Uno is your best bet! An easy game where you need to get rid of all your cards to win, it has penalty cards like ‘Wild’ and ‘Draw 2’ and action cards like ‘Skip’ and ‘Reverse’ that will change the game in seconds, keeping your and your friends on your toes throughout.
Photo credit: vvoe / Shutterstock.com

#2 Strategise in Backgammon
Do you and your BFF enjoy strategy, tactics and calculating probability? Well, then Backgammon is the perfect game for you. One of the oldest game for two players, it involves the quintessential battle between luck and strategy. Played internationally in the style of chess tournaments too, it is perfect for those long, raining evenings when you want to strain those “mental” muscles and spend time with your friend too!

#3 Ludo is all about the roll!
Inspired by the old Indian game of Pachisi (said to have been played by the Pandavas and Kauravas in the great epic, Mahabharat), Ludo depends on the roll of the die as well as strategy. Playing with 2-3 friends, all you need to do is get 4 tokens from your corner of the board to the other—yes, it’s not as easy as it sounds!—to be crowned the winner.

#4 Go slow with Jenga!
Enliven a slumber party with this addicting game that will have all of you giggling in no time! Be delicate when your move each block and balance it on top on the 54-block tower or you’ll find yourself out! Did you know that Jenga means “to build” in Swahili? Yup, and if you are feeling philosophical you’ll see that it explores the age-old dilemma of stability vs stature as each block you stack on top makes the tower taller but more wobbly!
Photo credit: LunaseeStudios / Shutterstock.com

#5 Be a trader in Monopoly
Whether you are passionate about trading, real estate and investing or interested in learning more about them—Monopoly is the game that best presents the real world in a game format. The two most popular editions are the UK and the Desi Edition (the official Indian version), which contain landmarks like Trafalgar Square and Shivaji Chattrapati Station respectively. So watch out and make deals and bargains carefully—your friends may be more cutthroat than you think!
Photo credit: LunaseeStudios / Shutterstock.com

#6 Go Chinese with Mahjong
This 4-player game is one of the most popular games in South East Asia and, as its name suggests, originated in China. Played with 144 tiles based on Chinese symbols like dragon and bamboo, it is said to be very similar to the common Indian card game of Rummy. You and your friends will need to draw and discard tiles with the objective of building sets and the first one to make a complete set wins. Sounds fun, doesn’t it?
If you are thinking that some of our suggestions sound exotic, don’t worry, all these games are available on online stores like Snapdeal.com and Flipkart.com. So get your friends and family together and prepare to have a blast!
Written by Nirati Agarwal on 24th Sep 2014