What are some of the best two player board games for date night? As a couple who games regularly, I’ve written extensively about two player board games for date night. One article stands out above all others: “What are some of the best two player board games for date night?”
That article explores the best two player board games for date night and the top games for couples to enjoy together.
Here’s the thing: that post is quite old. We still play many two player board games for date night from that list. However, we’ve also fallen in love with many newer options. I decided to write this follow-up list of the best two player board games for date night.
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How do you pick the best game for date night?
Consider Table Space and Game Length
You need to watch two big factors when grabbing the best 2 player board game for date night. First is table space. Second is play time.
Choose the best 2 player board that doesn’t hog too much table space. This matters especially at restaurants. Restaurant tables start out cluttered before your food arrives. Food takes up even more room if you plan to snack while playing.
Game length is crucial. Consider how long you’ll wait for food or drinks. Think about venues that rotate tables frequently. Most pubs welcome couples who spend hours there (as long as you buy drinks). Your favorite diner probably wants you to eat and leave.
Lighting Matters for Date Night Gaming
Here’s something I didn’t cover in the last article: lighting. We’ve discovered that certain games work better for date night. Look for high contrast, large text, and clear iconography. This matters especially when you don’t know your exact plans.
Places tend to dim the lights as night progresses. Those high-contrast components let you keep playing when this happens.
Think About Communication Requirements
I didn’t think of this last time either. Consider how much communication each game needs. This matters for two reasons. You don’t want to be too loud in quaint or romantic settings. It’s also hard to play chatty games once a noisy live band starts playing.
Our Current Top Three Picks
My top three games cover all these considerations: Zensu, Rack-O, and Point Salad.
Zensu gets the most play from us right now. It’s a 2 player board abstract strategy game. It has a chess-like feel without any complexity.
Rack-O is a true classic. We fell back in love when we discovered our favorite local brewery had a copy on their game shelf.
Point Salad has a bit more meat on it. It’s a card-driven engine builder in just a single deck of cards.
I must call out The Duke from the old list. We continue to enjoy it every time we play. It’s still one of our favorites. We haven’t grown tired of this game at all.
What are some of best two player boardgames for date night?
What are the best games to play as a couple? Your decision often depends on where you expect to play. In general, you want small, quick games with high-contrast components. That’s not always the case, though.
Board Games with a Quick Playtime and a Small Footprint for 2-Players
These games fit on small coffee tables or small standing bar tables. You can play them in under twenty minutes.
Sirens
Sirens is perfect for this category. You play as sirens in this 18-card game. You compete to create the most compelling song. Your goal is to lure sailors to your side of the cliffs. You draft and lay out cards to create a song. You can use an app to actually listen to it. My wife loves the art style in this game. It plays off the style of figures you find on ancient Grecian urns.
boop.
Next up is boop. This is a cute two-player-only board game about cats jumping on a bed. The bed is the board. It even features a quilted playing area. Each turn, players play kittens onto the bed. These kittens boop away any other kittens they’re placed next to. You’re trying to get three kittens in a row to upgrade them to cats. Cats can boop both cats and kittens. However, kittens can’t boop cats. Get three cats in a row to win.
Drop It
Drop It has become one of my favorite dexterity games of all time. Maybe I should call this one a physics game instead. Drop It is all about dropping different geometric shapes into a vertical tray, Tetris style. It has surprising depth. You only score if you’re not touching anything the same color or shape as the dropped piece. Points are awarded based on how high that piece sits. You get bonus points if it lands within any bonus circles.
The game works just as well with three or four players as it does with two. You can play with even more if you split into teams.
Catch the Moon
For a true dexterity game, check out Catch the Moon. Players try to reach the moon by building a precarious stack of ladders. It features a plastic base and a variety of differently shaped birchwood ladders. Each turn, players roll a die. Then they place a lightweight wooden ladder. It must touch exactly one other ladder, exactly two other ladders, or become the highest point in the growing structure.
A player makes the moon sad when they cause things to topple. The same happens if any ladder touches the cloud base or the table. That player collects a moon tear. The player with the least tears at the end wins. Here’s a bonus for date night: you can play the game competitively or cooperatively. It’s also great with up to four players.
Rack-O
I grew up playing Rack-O with my parents and grandmother. Then I pretty much forgot about the game. One night, my wife and I were at a local brewery. I noticed they had a copy available for people to play. I grabbed the game and showed it to my wife. She had never heard of it. We spent the rest of that night drinking beers and playing Rack-O.
Rack-O has become one of our favorite date night games since then. We especially love it when our date night involves adult beverages. It’s light and fast enough to play while hanging out and chatting.
Sushi Go!
We discovered another game because one of our favorite spots had a copy. Sushi Go! is a quick-playing card drafting game. It doesn’t require much table space at all. You get a hand of sushi cards. Pick one to keep, then pass the rest to your opponent. They pick a card to keep and pass the rest back to you. The cards you keep become a tableau. They score points at the end of the game. Each different type of sushi has its own scoring system.
Check out Sushi Go! Party for something with a bit more punch. It lets you play games with different mixes of sushi types.
Datenight board games with medium game time and a small footprint
These games don’t take up a lot of table space. You’ll have a hard time fitting them in before a meal arrives, though. They also aren’t long enough to make you feel guilty about staying too long while finishing drinks.
Point Salad
I’m putting Point Salad at the top of this list. Its game length can range from quick to medium. The rulebook suggests playing three times in a row when playing with two players. You total your score across all three games. One single round plays quite quickly. However, a full two-player game with three rounds takes longer.
Playing Point Salad is quite simple. The cards are two-sided. One side shows a vegetable. The other shows an end-game scoring option. You set up a market with three equal decks of cards. Flip two cards from each deck face-up. Each turn, you either take two veggie cards from the market or take a scoring card from the top of one deck. The scoring cards show different point values for different combinations of veggies. Keep drafting until the cards run out. Then players calculate their scores based on the point cards they took.
AEG has also released Point City. We haven’t tried it yet. It’s supposed to be just a bit heavier than Point Salad. That sounds great to me.
The Duke
The Duke is a two-player abstract chess-like game. We still play it regularly. Like in chess, you try to capture one of your opponent’s pieces. Here’s the neat bit: the pieces show how they move right on their tiles. Each side has different moves. After each move, you flip them. This changes what’s currently possible with that piece.
I had The Duke on my previous list. The game has been re-released since then. The new version is called The Duke: Lords Legacy. This is the same game. It comes with everything from The Duke in a new improved box. It includes a clarified rulebook, plus the Arthurian Legends expansion and five brand new tiles.
Zensu
Zensu is another abstract strategy game. People call many of these games chess-like. Zensu is a Shogi-like game. It’s based on the Japanese version of chess. This game puts the “Easy to Learn, Hard to Master” tagline right on the box. Like The Duke, this game features pieces that show how they move. You don’t flip them over this time, though. Instead, this is a perfect information boardgamegeek Link: Buy The Duke on boardgamegeek. Your goal is to get one of your pieces to the opposite side before your opponent does the same.
Two-player games with a medium footprint and quick game time
These games are quick to play but take up some room. You won’t need a full table. They probably won’t fit on those round coffee shop tables, though. These work nicely when only two of you sit at a four-seater.
Kitara
Kitara is a folk-on-a-map area majority game with an Afro-Fantasy theme. It’s one of the few games of this genre that works really well with only two players. The game includes a special smaller two-player board. It has less space on the map and takes up less physical space on a table. Players draft cards. These cards determine how many units they get and how many actions they get with those units. Combat is deterministic. The larger army pushes the smaller army out. Units never die. They just have to retreat.
Lost Cities
I honestly have no idea why Lost Cities wasn’t included in my original date night game article. This is a two-player-only card game. My wife and I played a ton of it back when we were actually dating. A local coffee shop downtown had a copy. I would meet Deanna during her lunch break. We often played a round or two of Lost Cities.
It’s a classic card game from famed game designer Reiner Knizia. It features hand management, push your luck, card counting, and memory aspects. It’s a very tight game with a lot of tension. I still love it as much as I did some twenty-plus years ago.
Dice Kingdoms of Valeria
Dice Kingdoms of Valeria is a roll-and-write game set in the Valeria Universe. It’s a standalone Valeria game. Players roll dice and activate their citizens. This is similar to how resource generation works in Valeria Card Kingdoms. The active player selects one die. They use it to take an action. The value on that die indicates how powerful the action is. Use your actions to explore the map, battle monsters, hire new citizens, build monuments, and more.
The game works with up to five players. It’s particularly quick and tight with just two. It doesn’t need a lot of room, especially if you use the box lid to roll in. Check out my review of Dice Kingdoms of Valeria for more info. If you’re looking for added replayability, check out my review of The Winter Expansion for Dice Kingdoms of Valeria.
Date night board games with a medium footprint and medium gametime
These games require a bit of space and more time to play. They’re best for a coffee shop or a slow night at your favorite restaurant. They work at places that don’t mind you taking up a table for a couple of hours.
KAPOW!
KAPOW! is a superhero vs. super-villain battling game. It features customizable dice. One of you picks a hero. The other picks a villain. You get a player board and a starting set of dice. Set up a screen in front of you and roll your dice. Use them to attack, defend, and upgrade your hero. Upgrades let you gain additional dice or more faces for your customizable dice. KAPOW! is very asymmetric. Each hero and villain plays very differently. This is due to their unique powers and starting dice.
Two versions exist: KAPOW! Volume 1 and KAPOW! Volume 2. Each volume features a different set of six characters. The rest of the game is identical. You can combine the two sets to mix and match characters or even play with four players.
Star Realms: Frontiers
Next up, I have Star Realms: Frontiers. I had the original version of Star Realms on my last two-player date night game list. I wanted to call out Star Realms: Frontiers on this new list. It introduces cooperative play to the classic deck-building game. I think this makes it particularly perfect for date night play. This newer box set also allows four-player games out of the box. It features an entirely new deck of cards.
My wife and I both still adore the original Star Realms. Our love for this game was reignited when we discovered Frontiers. Check out my Star Realms Frontiers review for the full story. We’ve been playing this one a lot lately. We play both with the new cooperative rules and as the standard two-player duel.
Illiterati
Illiterati is a cooperative word-building game. I think of it as Bananagrams for Hobby Gamers. I’m calling it out here because I had Bananagrams on my last date-night game recommendation list. I think this is a good replacement.
Players are rogue librarians in Illiterati. You try to save the world’s books from the evil Illiterati. You do this by forming words out of letters and binding books. Your words must match the current targets. What I love most is that this game is cooperative. My wife is much better than I am at word games. That usually means it’s no fun for me to play against her. With Illiterati, her skills just mean our team does better together.
Dulce
Dulce is what people now call a BINGO game. This is an engine-building game about building a confectionary empire. Every round, a card is flipped over. Each player finds their own personal version of that card. Each card is a different confectionary. Players must decide what to do with it. They can build the building. They can flip the card and use it to plant ingredients in their field. Or they can discard it to produce desserts.
I love how everyone gets the same input. By the end of the game, each player has their own thing going on. Many people have called this a multi-player solitaire game. They aren’t wrong. That’s what makes it work just as great with two players as with more.
Disney Lorcana
The last game I’d recommend in this category is Disney Lorcana. This takes up some room and a bit of time. That time can vary, though. This is the new hotness in the world of collectible card games. Lorcana lets you battle with your favorite Disney scenes, characters, events, and songs. You can play at any player count. A two-player duel just feels right somehow.
You can start off by picking up a couple of pre-made starter decks. Each starter is packaged with one booster pack. You can see if you enjoy customizing a deck. If that’s your thing, you can start picking up more cards.
Two-player board games with a large footprint and medium game time
These games need a good-sized table. They either have central boards or require a larger playing area for each player. These games are too big for most restaurants. They do work at some pubs and cafes with larger tables that aren’t overly busy.
Terraforming Mars Ares Expedition
I put Race for the Galaxy on our last date night game list. That leads me to putting Terraforming Mars Ares Expedition on this new list. Imagine if Terraforming Mars and Race for the Galaxy had a baby. This game would be it. It features a much smaller map of Mars and an action selection system. The system is very similar to Race for the Galaxy. It still has all the tableau-building goodness from Terraforming Mars. It also plays in about an hour. This makes it a better date night game than either of the originals.
Disney Sorcerer’s Arena Epic Alliances
Disney Sorcerer’s Arena Epic Alliances is a two-player card-driven skirmish wargame. You battle your favorite Disney and Pixar Characters. Each player builds a team of three characters. Each character has its own deck of cards. Mash these decks together. Take the battle to the arena board while using some of the best-looking standees I’ve ever seen. Despite the Disney theme, this is a very solid, tactical, and strategic skirmish game. It’s approachable enough for new players and deep enough for hobby wargamers. All of that with no miniatures to assemble or paint.
The Castles of Burgundy
I saved The Castles of Burgundy for the end of this section. It can take a long time to play, especially when you’re first learning. Once you and your partner know the game, it plays very quickly. You can usually fire off more than one play in a night. This is a fantastic drafting game from Stefan Feld. It’s been around for a long time. I wanted to call it out here for two reasons.
First, my wife and I recently rediscovered this classic. We played online through Board Game Arena. Playing there got me to dust off our physical copy. We’ve now played it many times since. Second, there’s a new shiny The Castles of Burgundy Special Edition out there. It looks truly amazing.
Whatever version you prefer, The Castles of Burgundy is one of the best two-player games ever published.
Date night game suggestions with a large footprint and longer playtime
These final games are ones you’ll probably want to save for stay-at-home date nights. You might return to these after a nice dinner out. Or play them after dinner at home. Personally, I have played two of these games at a coffee shop. It was one that didn’t mind us spending the afternoon and putting a couple of tables together.
Tapestry
Tapestry is one of my wife’s favorite games. It plays surprisingly well with only two players. You can play this anachronistic civilization-building game as a head-to-head battle. Or toss in an automata to make things more interesting and more cutthroat. I’ll admit I prefer the game with more players. I also love that when it’s just Deanna and me, we can still sit down and play one of her favorite games.
Marrakesh
The hot game in our house right now is Marrakesh, from the Stefan Feld City Collection. Most of the games in that series are rethemes. This one is a brand-new game. It is a very component-heavy Euro game. It’s perfect for longtime Feld fans and experienced gamers. We have managed to play this on a date night at a coffee shop. You’re probably better off playing this one at home, though. It’s a table hog. It’s also a game full of tons of tiny components with no spares.
I know Marrakesh won’t be for everyone. It’s a beautifully juicy point salad with a lot going on. It has a limited option tree, which helps keep the game manageable. We have the original full version. If you’re considering taking the game out of the house, you probably want the new Marrakesh Essential Edition. It features condensed player boards and fewer wooden components.
Lost Ruins of Arnak
The hybrid deck-building and worker placement game Lost Ruins of Arnak is a favorite in our house. It has been since we first picked it up. We love playing this at all player counts. We noticed it’s particularly engaging and cutthroat at just two players. There’s a real rush to try to buy the good cards, advance up the temple tracks, defeat the right monster, or explore the perfect area. You want to beat your partner to that thing you really want.
Here’s the thing: in Arnak, there are so many different paths to victory. There are so many ways to go. Getting cut off in one direction doesn’t necessarily ruin your chances of winning. There’s always another valid option available. That’s part of the fun.
HeroQuest
The last game on my list today is HeroQuest. I’m putting it here because it’s a game my wife and I played through back when we were actually dating. I took on the role of the evil Zargon. My wife played all four of the adventuring characters. We played through the entire campaign as our relationship grew. This game will always hold a special place in my heart.
I didn’t put Heroquest on my original list. The game had been out of print for years. It was lost in the world of red tape and copyright. That has since changed. Hasbro published a new version of Heroquest through their Pulse crowdfunding platform. It features the same original gameplay but with updated artwork and miniatures. Plus, they’re also continuing to produce new content for the game.
Check out these other great two player game articles
- https://thecardboardcrew.com/?p=240
- https://thecardboardcrew.com/?p=219
- https://thecardboardcrew.com/?p=181
- https://thecardboardcrew.com/?p=66
I’m sure there are plenty of other great date night board games out there. What’s a best 2 player board game you and your partner enjoy playing that I missed? Let me know about it in the comments below!
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