Games for Kids

Family game night has a failure mode we know too well. The game everyone agreed on turns out to be too long or too fiddly for the youngest player, somebody gets knocked out early, and the evening ends with a kid in tears and a half-played board on the table. The articles collected here are about the games that hold up with children actually playing rather than being carried, which right now means Ticket to Ride and Sequence.

Ticket to Ride is the easier sell. Our review explains why it works with almost any group and where it stumbles, while what age Ticket to Ride is really for digs into what the 8+ on the box means in practice and when a kid is genuinely ready for it. If your family mostly plays in pairs, read Ticket to Ride with two people first, because which map you own changes the answer completely.

Sequence is the other one we trust, especially in teams, where a younger player can lean on a partner without slowing the game down. Our Sequence review gives it 5/5 Bamboo and 4/5 Pandas, and the jack card guide settles the one-eyed and two-eyed jack rule that every table forgets at least once a night.