Games To Play Online With Your Friends While We’re All Stuck At Home

Times are strange right now. It seems like everyone is holed up in their homes trying to flatten the curve and do their best to keep the coronavirus spread to a minimum. Meanwhile, we’ve been looking for new and creative ways to connect with their friends and family now that in-person hangouts aren’t possible for the foreseeable future. After a while, FaceTime and waving to your friends when you pass their apartments during a solo walk can get old. One thing we do have that didn’t exist during other pandemics throughout history is the internet which makes connecting much easier. A lot has changed, but not everything has to. We don’t have to skip game night. Every night can be game night now which is why we compiled a list of the best multiplayer apps like virtual board games and games you can stream with friends. 

Scroll through to get ideas for your next virtual game night or ways to keep yourself and your friends entertained while we wait out the coronavirus.

A perennial favorite for a reason, Words With Friends allows you to unleash your long-tucked away SAT prep vocabulary on friends and family. Play with friends or join a random game with other app users. 

Social distancing may feel like the ultimate game of social Uno, but a good virtual card game can do a lot to make you feel like you’re having a fun night in with your friends. While the game itself is pretty straightforward, the app takes the classic card game to the next level with tournaments, adventures, and new ways to play. Buddy up with a friend in 2v2 mode and use teamwork to win the game. If you have a little more time, get a tournament going. Or add some of Uno’s new rules like “discard all” where you can completely remove one color from your hand.

Love games where you have to make up an answer but have a terrible poker face? Well, now that everyone is self-quarantined, it doesn’t matter! If you’ve played Balderdash, the rules are pretty much the same. Choose from a number of categories, make up an answer to a question, and hope that your friends believe your answer is the real one. The more friends you convince, the more points you get.

Go back to your Mario Kart tournament days, no Gamecube required! Just because we’re all playing from our respective homes doesn’t mean that Mario Kart is any less cutthroat. Challenge up to seven of your friends from the convenience of your phone.

Monopoly is a classic rainy day game and it wouldn’t surprise us if it became a classic quarantine game as well. The app allows up to four players, but other than that the game is the same. One small exception. You can’t create your own rules like you can with the actual board game, which, admit it, we all did from time to time. Who knows, maybe with all this extra time we have, we’ll actually finish a few games.

Did you and your friends go to a weekly pub quiz? Now, you can make your own pub quiz at home. Just grab your favorite drinks, grab a friend, and download Quiz Up. The app tests your knowledge of a myriad of subjects ranging from Harry Potter trivia to American history. Each quiz is pretty short, only six questions long, and you only have 10 seconds to answer each question. The faster you answer, the more points you can get.

Warning: You might find out who is the Gordon Ramsay of your friend group by playing this game. In Overcooked 2, you and your friends are line cooks who must chop, cook, and prepare restaurant orders at lightning speed in order to make it to the next round. It’s for two to four players and works on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Switch, PC, and Mac. Whatever you do, just make sure that someone is on dicing duty.

Available on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC, or Mac, Fortnite: Save the World is the free-to-play version of the popular group game Fortnite. You and up to three friends must work together to collect resources, build barricades, and kill zombies in order to level up and win the game. 

Minecraft is whatever you want it to be. The sky – or rather the server – is the limit. You can explore new worlds or build one of your own with as many friends as the bandwidth can hold, or up to eight if you are playing the Xbox 360 version of the game. It is pretty much the sandbox of games. You can create whatever you want and make your world your own. As of last year, Minecraft is playable across platforms meaning that your friend on their PC, the one of an Xbox 360, and the other on PlayStation 4 can all play together in the same game.

Challenge your friends to a game of Pictionary by drawing ridiculous prompts using anything from your smartphone, tablet, laptop, or gaming console. The iOS app and streaming versions are free to users, but if you want it on your PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, or Xbox One, you’ll need to pay for the game. You might not need to shout your answers like if you were playing at a friend’s house, but you’ll likely get caught up in the game and shout them anyway.

One of the most famous, iconic role-playing games there is, Dungeons & Dragons is perfect for those who want to get lost in a fantasy adventure story when playing a video game. Knowing that the coronavirus has us all cooped up indoors, the creators of the game made all dungeons, raids, and expansion packs available to everyone through the end of April. So, if there was ever a time to try your hand at the game the Stranger Things kids love so much, now is the time.

Star Wars Battlefront 2
Originally released in 2005, Star Wars Battlefront 2 has become a beloved classic to Star Wars fans and video game lovers alike. Even casual fans will find that the game’s multiplayer campaigns quickly get you hooked. It starts with one game, and the next thing you know, you have to save the galaxy. Star Wars Battlefront 2 is available on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Windows PC. It’s also available online on Steam and GOG.