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The 20 best online board games on PCRoll out
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Image credit:The Pokemon Company, Playdek, Handelabra Games, Konami, Nacon, Dire Wolf
Image credit:The Pokemon Company, Playdek, Handelabra Games, Konami, Nacon, Dire Wolf
We weren’t allowed to meet up in person for a few years there, so everyone went a bit doolally for physical board games once doctors said we could cough directly into each other’s eyeballs. We’ve all calmed down a bit now, but our love for the board game hasn’t diminished. That’s why we’ve put together our list ofthe best board games on PC- that is, the best digital versions of popular board games that you can play online.
The physical quality of board games is something people like about them, it’s true, but there are lots of reasons why digital board games are sometimes better. First of all, everything is already set for you - meeples, tokens, dice, and all - which means you don’t have to spend ages jenga-ing everything out of and then back into a box. Another benefit is the price. Dropping a bunch of cash on a board game you’re not sure you’ll like will make your wallet cry, so digital games are a great way to play for cheap, but also a way of testing the waters. After all, you can always buy the physical copy later on. Finally, board games on PC can be played with pals all around the world at a moment’s notice. How hard is it to get four adults to come over to hang at once? Exactly.
We’ve tried to be as diverse as possible with our list of the best board games on PC, from card games to political wrangling, to horror - but you might find that your own favourite board game isn’t in the final group. If that happens it means it was number 21, but if you make a good enough case for why it should be included, then it might get added the next time we update our list!
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The best online board games on PC
20. D&D Lords of Waterdeep
Image credit:Playdek
D&D Lords Of Waterdeep has existed as a beloved board game for over a decade at this point, and you can see that fans were excited when it came to PC. Players put on the masks of the anonymous rulers of the titular port city (hey, it’s where Gale of Waterdeep is from!), and as such it’s about winning control of the city from the shadows. You aren’t getting your hands dirty yourself; rather, you place your agents around the cty to gather adventurer resources - themed around the classic D&D character classes - collect money, or find quests to complete with those adventurers. Quests are important, because they’re how you earn victory points, and whoever has the most VP at the end has won the game.
That end might come sooner than you think, as Lords Of Waterdeep plays out over just 8 rounds, making it quick and accessible, while also requiring some thought and strategy. There’s a lot of intrigue and secrecy going on around the table, to the extent that you don’t have to reveal which Lord Of Waterdeep you’re playing until the end of the game - at which point you could smugly hoover up a load of bonus points from completing the right kinds of quests, and win the whole game. It’s a game you can play with friends and family alike - as long as you’re not squeamish about stabbing them in the back.
19. Spirit Island
Image credit:Handelabra Games
Spirit Island is a proper gem. It’s a cooperative board game in the vein of something like Pandemic that flips the dispiritingly widespread trope of colonial expansion in tabletop games (coughCatancough) on its head.
As a board game, Spirit Island can be a tad intimidating for those looking to step up from the simpler rules of Pandemic - a shame, as it absolutely deserves to become a co-op classic in its own right. The polished PC version solves that problem, handling the crunch for you so you can focus on getting a lot of colonisers to poop their pants. If that’s not worth your money alone, I don’t know what is.
18. Nemesis: Lockdown
Image credit:Awaken Realms
Nemesis: Lockdown - The Board Game could generously be described as “Alien with the serial numbers filed off”. That’s certainly no criticism, as this co-op survival-horror gem gets as close as any tabletop game has to capturing the deadly cat-and-mouse tension of the Greatest Movie Ever Made™.
The aim is to try and complete your personal objectives before you get out of dodge, with the main obstacle being a lot of ‘orrible space monsters obsessed with turning you into astronaut mincemeat. You might face some threats from your fellow crewmates too, as their objectives may involve them turning traitor and plotting for your own demise rather than helping you all survive.
Nemesis: Lockdown is wonderfully brutal and punishing, and the perfect antidote for when you trust your friends and fellow human beings a little too much.
17. Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel
Image credit:Konami
Yu-Gi-Oh! has had plenty of video games in its 25-odd years of being the go-to trading card game for weebs and fans of frankly upsetting levels of text-kerning. Those have mostly been attempts to recreate the experience of being one of its anime characters battling your way through school/the Shadow Realm, rather than a more faithful adaptation of the physical TCG itself.
Master Duel finally gives the veteran card game a proper rival to the likes of MTG Arena, offering up a free-to-play way to get into Yu-Gi-Oh! that doesn’t involve you either having to know the latest anime series or remember exactly how the hell Pendulum Summoning works. (I do this for a job, and I can’t tell you.)
It’s really good too, being both generous with its freebies - you’ll build up packs and gems aplenty, with the option to buy more if you like (of course) - and highly polished in its visuals, with fun animated pals to hang out and watch you from the sidelines and a load of different battlefields that will crack as you take damage. If you’ve always wondered what the fuss is about or just have a hankering to relive days of trading Blue-Eyes White Dragon for Dark Magician on the playground, Master Duel is an excellent way to jump (back) into the card game.
16. Blood Bowl 2
Image credit:Nacon
Blood Bowlis a the combination of Warhammer and American Football, and it’s execution is so grim, so over-the-top in its brutality, that it’s form as a Games Workshop board game with teams of little painted plastic miniatures found popularity in other countries arguably faster than the actual sport.
The animations, from the elves standing their all hoity-toity with their helmets under the arms, to the forces of Chaos barely keeping themselves together, and even the coin toss at the start and celebration dances on scoring, are delightful, and there are a pair of commentators giving appropriate colour, too. It’s really hard to dislike Blood Bowl 2, honestly.
15. Magic: The Gathering Arena
What Is Magic: The Gathering Arena?Watch on YouTube
What Is Magic: The Gathering Arena?
Magic: The Gathering is the biggest trading card game in the world. It’s been around for decades and taken a few stabs at crossing over to the digital world in that time, but it was only with 2019’sMagic: The Gathering Arenathat it felt like it really hit its stride on PC. Arena is the same MTG you know from the tabletop, but translated into a fast-flowing, visually impressive app that sees it step up to the likes of digital-only card games such asHearthstone. Arena also lets you unlock some of the physical cards you buy in the game for free, so you don’t need to buy everything twice to keep your collection across paper and pixels.
With plenty of popular Magic: The Gathering formats from the original collectable card game, as well as some new formats exclusive to the digital version, and the chance to play upcoming sets a little ahead of their release, Arena proves MTG isn’t going anywhere but up for a while.
14. Through The Ages
13. Dune: Imperium
Image credit:Dire Wolf
Denis Villeneuve’s recent Dune movies have uncorkedthe long-blocked reservoirof board games based on Frank Herbert’s sandy, spicy epic space books. While the original Dune board game from 1979 - re-released in 2019 - is still the cream of the crop, Dune: Imperium could well be the best modernDune gameof recent years. And it’s on PC too, fancy that.
Dune: Imperium focuses more on the political manoeuvring and spice-trade of Arrakis than the ruthless backstabbing and betrayal involved. In Imperium, you’re the head of one of the houses competing to control the planet, commanding your agents to go out and collect spice, earn coin and build up your military might to fend off your rival houses’ own machinations.
That boils down to choosing one of several different action spaces each turn, typically giving you something - spice, money, troops, cards - that set you up for gaining victory points. Those VP might come through becoming best pals with the Fremen, Spacing Guild and other factions, warring with your rivals during a combat phase at the end of each round, or simply just trading shedloads of precious melange. Ideally, you’ll want to be doing a bit of everything.
12. Colt Express
Meanwhile, the marshal is on the hunt for the outlaws and will fill you full of lead if you end up in the same carriage, making it harder to draw a decent hand on future turns. On the tabletop, Colt Express already packed a visual punch thanks to an impressive 3D cardboard train - on PC, it looks just as stylish thanks to some slick animation and strong cartoon artwork. Hop on board and have a blast.
11. Twilight Struggle
Set during the Cold War,Twilight Struggleis almost as tense as the period that inspired it. Two players each take control of the US and USSR, working to exert their influence over the rest of the world as the nuclear threat simmers over to boiling point. Each card is based on actual historical events, with particular actions increasing the DEFCON level and driving either side closer to the brink of nuclear war.
10. Splendor
If you’re looking for something to pick up after the likes of Catan and Carcassonne, start here.
9. Pokémon TCG Live
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/The Pokémon Company
Remember being a kid, clutching your deck of cards in your sweaty hand and getting so het up about them that eventually your school banned Pokémon cards from the premesis because the children were all taking it Too Seriously? Having that laminated folder with the space all ready for a Shiny Charizard? You can still play Pokémon with physical cards, of course, but now there’s an offical, easier alternative. Pokémon TCG Live: I choose you!
This has all your standard Pokémon stuff, but in digital form. You can with your custom decks, and battle against friends and strangers in tournaments or quickie battles, all in a swish digital arena. TCG Live replaced TCG Online in 2023, and a big change is that, despite the name implying trading it ditched the trading marketplace in favour of a crafting system, more in line with other modern card games.
Though this does remove the trading bit of Pokémon that you remember being of life or death importance when you were 9, it has made the game more free-to-play friendly, putting paid to the absurd pricing you’d see in the market place. Very little of the magic is lost in this version, and in fact it’s better in some ways because you don’t have to deal with that whole thing where someone “accidentally” knocks the damage tokens and then spends ages arguing about how many HP their Gastly actually has left.
8. Railroad Ink Challenge
Railroad Ink Challenge is a streamlined version of a popular board game called Railroad Ink (and there’s a physical version of both the original Railroad Ink and of Challenge too, if you like what you play). It’s a rip-roaring good time, combining speed and expansion with the need for careful planning.
Games of this go quickly: you only have seven turns, building as much of your transport network out as possible. You need to connect exits around your particular board, and get points for growing your network with motorways, bridges, stations, that kind of thing. But you alsolosepoints for any connections you leave unfinished at the end, which is where that careful planning comes in. And as ever, there’s the addition of random chance with dice rolls - though Railroad Ink Challenge also throws in timed optional challenges to keep you on your toes. The quick way games play out gives this the “Just one more!” flavour of Pringles or a bag of popcorn, so it really blends the best of board games with all the advantages that a digital game offers.
7. Scythe: Digital Edition
Set in an alternative 1920s dieselpunk Europe where mechs are the latest innovation in war machinery,Scytheis an immersive strategy game where five different factions are all looking to stake their claim to the land around a mysterious city-state known as The Factory. Each of the factions has different starting abilities, but all can invest in their workers, mechs and buildings during the game to gather more resources, traverse the land and drive off their rivals in combat they have full control over.
With numerous ways to build your strength and amass points, Scythe opens up into a fascinating 4X experience with the lore and story of its world delivered through events and player decisions as they explore. Little wonder that artist Jakub Rozalski’s evocative 1920s-ish setting - which serves as the engrossing backdrop to Scythe - has since been expanded with video gameIron Harvest.
6. Flash Point: Fire Rescue
Flash Pointis the hottest board game on the tabletop - literally. Players are firefighters tackling burning blazes together, moving their squad of extinguishing experts through different buildings to put out flames and rescue survivors trapped inside.
Like in co-op board game classic Pandemic (which we haven’t included on this list because frankly its PC version sucks), the players' characters have different unique abilities to help them triumph. It’s how you use your team’s talents - from smashing through walls to reviving unconscious survivors - and coordinate your plan that’ll decide how you fare, though don’t expect it to be easy.
5. Wingspan
Wingspanhas been shouted out on RPS before, once making it into our Steam Fest best demos list as well as turning up in our Indies Uncovered streams. Matt Cox (RPS in peace) described it as an engine-building game, “where you start with nothing and wind up with a beautiful, point-spewing machine”. In Wingspan’s case this machine is made of birds.
4. The Lord Of The Rings: Adventure Card Game
3. Gloomhaven
Take control of your squad of weird and wonderful mercs to clear trade routes, open up the fantastical world again, and make loads of money in the process. There’s a range of different characters to choose from that stick with the RPG, D&D-esque classes you might be used to, but add unique spin. You’ve got the Soothsinger, which is a bard class, and the Scoundrel for fans of rogues, but then you also have classes like the Cragheart, an incredibly diverse class that can be specced for support, ranged attack or even a bit of tanking.
Your squad dives into dungeons to face off against various beasties and monsters in strategic combat that involves drawing cards, playing abilities, and keeping an eye on your exhaustion level, lest you have to force a retreat before you’re ready. Digi-Gloomhaven is nearly its full release, and has added online co-op and new monsters to contend with. Things have never looked gloomier!
2. Hive
1. Root
Root is so popular as a board game that whenever a new run of it is released into the wild, it quickly goes out of stock again. Thankfully the digital version exists to give us all a chance to conquer the forest. It’s a strategy game for 2-4 players with a bit of an asymmetrical tilt. Each player is controlling a faction trying to gain control of a vast woodland wilderness. The Marquise de Cat, the kind of Saruman-esque baddie harvesting the forest to feed industrial expansion, is up against the coalition of the Woodland Alliance, and The Eyrie Dynasties of big birds who ruled the forest before the Marquise took over. And then there’s the Vagabond, who’s mostly out for himself… unless he isn’t?
Each side gains victory points in different ways, and has different advantages and disadvantages in play. The dice rolls and cards you use to win fights and make different plays mean there’s a delicious edge of random chance that could tip things in anyone’s favour. There have been updates to the base game as well, with the most recent Riverfolk DLC adding two new factions to the mix. Root is so good that whenever you mention it to someone who plays it, they look away from you, eyes unfocused, and go: “God… Root is good though.”
For more board game and tabletop recommendations, reviews, news and video playthroughs, head over to Rock Paper Shotgun’s sibling siteDicebreaker.
