Great 2 Player Board Games for Date Night

Every once in a while, when John and I don't really want to plan something for date night and don't feel like watching a movie, we'll wait for the kids to go to bed and play a board game. We don't have as many board games as John's parents have, but we definitely have three times as many as mine had growing up! Haha! That being said, I've had plenty of time to learn how to play a lot of new board games and definitely have a list of a few I prefer.

However, even with my list of favorites, there are some that are a little easier than others to play with only two people. So, any other games will just have to wait their turn for the limelight (lol) as I'm only going to share some of my favorite (and some, a bit simpler) games you can play with two people.

Above and Below

We got this game from my brother and sister in law and it immediately became one of my favorite games ever! In this game, you can gain resources, gain more workers, and go on expeditions to get more items that give you points at the end of the game.

Agricola

This is John's all time favorite board game. It's pretty complicated and definitely a strategy game. Basically, you have to try to earn points by planting crops and raising farm animals while also trying to get enough food for your family. If that makes it sound boring, I promise it's not! There are also extra cards that can switch things up and make the game more interesting.

Carcassonne

This is another one of my favorites. We first played it at my in laws' house and I immediately loved it! It's a little bit of a strategy game, but with enough luck to it that I'm not humiliated every time we play. lol. To play this game, players take turns placing their tiles next to other tiles and gaining points from completed roads, castles, and farmland.

Tsuro

This one is a super easy game where you each take turns placing tiles on the game board to try and keep your game token from falling off the edge of the board. It's fun but at the same time, simple enough that we can play it with our 5 year old if he ever wants to play a game.

Stratego

Now this is a game we actually owned growing up. It's also a pretty simple game where players try to find their opponents flag by battling and defeating the other person's game pieces. It's pretty easy and a fun, quick game to play.

Pay Day

This is just a fun, old, luck of the draw type of game. In this game, players go through a calendar game board and land on spaces making them receive money and pay bills (along with other random options like buying insurance and making investments). To be honest, I mostly included this game on the list because for some strange reason I have doubled or almost tripled John's score every time we've played this game... Seriously. When we play a hard core strategy game, John beats me every time. But when we play this not much strategy, luck game, I dominate. Haha!

Masterpiece

This is another older game that's still pretty fun. The first time we played this game with my mom, she would buy the artwork cards based on if she liked the picture rather than how much money she actually thought it was worth. To be honest, I don't remember who won, but that was definitely a different strategy. Haha!

Picture, Picture!

Once again, an older game (and the inspiration behind my "Picture, Picture Date Night" Idea). This game is simple and can last as long as you want as each round only lasts a minute or two with no set number of rounds. You are basically looking for objects in a picture whose names start with each letter of the alphabet. The person with the highest number of unique objects written down at the end wins.

Pente

Confession time... John mentioned this game to me as a good two player game, but I'm actually terrible at it. I'm not sure why but this game for me is like how "Pay Day" (from above) is for John. I lose every time we play this game... And it's a super simple game. It's basically like tic tac toe on a larger board and with slightly different rules. That being said, it's actually a good, quick game. I just happen to stink at it. lol.

Pandemic

If you want a two player game that won't end with someone getting upset and the other person sleeping on the sofa that night... then play Pandemic. Haha! Really though, this game is a cooperative board game where players play as a team against the game rather than against each other. In this game, you are trying to stop a disease from spreading to different cities throughout the world.
(As a side note, if you don't want to play this version of a cooperative game, my husband and I played Forbidden Island and it felt like the same exact game but without the disease aspect. In this game, you're trying to stop islands from sinking while collecting relics around the board.)

(Honorable mention was every card game I ever played growing up or with John... Skip-Bo, Uno, Phase 10, Wackee Six... But those technically aren't "board games" so they couldn't really make the list...)

Well, there it is. My list of 10 great two player games (or at least the first 10 great games we own or have played that came to my mind while writing this. Haha!). Looking at them all, they're all pretty different games but at the same time, they're all pretty fun and can turn any night into a free date night after you already own the game. I'll probably add games to my list as time goes on, but for now I'm going to go and try to convince John to play Pay Day again... ;)