Monopoly is the board game almost everyone has played. If you enjoy it, you enjoy board games. The problem was never your taste.
The problem is five specific things that happen while you play it, and modern board games have spent thirty years fixing them one at a time.
So this is not a list of ten good games. It is a map: five named problems, and the games that solve each one.
The five things that go wrong in Monopoly
None of these are about Monopoly being a bad game. They are about what it asks of the people at the table.
1. You can lose and still have to sit there
You run out of money, you are out, and the game continues without you. Once somebody is knocked out and reaches for their phone, the evening is over for everyone.
2. It runs long, and everyone knows it before the box opens
Length is not the issue. How much of it is spent waiting for other people to roll, count and pay is. When somebody says they have no time for board games, this is the memory they are answering.
3. By the middle, somebody has already won
Once one player owns a full colour group with houses on it, the rest of the table is finding out who comes second. That gap between the decision and the ending is the most frustrating stretch in the game.
4. The dice decide, and you carry out the decision
You roll, you move that many spaces, and the board tells you what happened to you. Luck is not the enemy. Luck you have no say over is. The fix is not removing chance, it is giving you something to do with it.
5. The negotiation turns into a real argument
The trading is the best part of Monopoly, and completely unstructured, so it tends to be won by whoever is most willing to hold the table hostage over a railroad. That is where the shouting comes from.
Which game fixes which problem
Two games per problem. Player counts and play times are the publishers’ own figures.
| The Monopoly problem | Play this | Players | Play time |
|---|---|---|---|
| Getting knocked out | Sushi Go Party! | 2 to 8 | 30 min |
| Getting knocked out | Munchkin | 3 to 6 | 1 to 2 hours |
| It runs too long | Santorini | 2 to 4 | 20 min |
| It runs too long | Splendor | 2 to 4 | 30 min |
| The leader runs away with it | Azul | 2 to 4 | 30 to 45 min |
| The leader runs away with it | Ticket to Ride | 2 to 5 | 30 to 60 min |
| The dice decide for you | Carcassonne | 2 to 5 | 30 to 45 min |
| The dice decide for you | Catan | 3 to 4 | 60 to 90 min |
| The arguing | Codenames | 4 to 8 or more | 15 min |
| The arguing | Dixit | 3 to 8 | 30 min |
If you only read the table: take Sushi Go Party!. The rest of this article is for the cases where it is not the answer.
The ten games
1. Sushi Go Party!
Fixes: elimination. Nobody is knocked out, and everyone picks a card at the same moment.
You keep one card from your hand, pass the rest, and repeat. The dishes you collect score differently each round.
Good for you if: You want the one game that works with the widest range of people.
Skip if: You wanted confrontation. The menu the rulebook recommends for a first game has none.
My take: the game that almost never fails. My own copy is actually Sushi Go, my brother’s version. Most people fall for the little dishes and never notice they are drafting at all.
2. Munchkin
Fixes: elimination, and nothing else here. It is the honest answer for one kind of group.
A card game mocking fantasy roleplaying. You fight monsters, take loot, level up, and sabotage everyone doing the same.
Good for you if: The fighting was your favourite part and you would rather keep it than fix it.
Skip if: Your complaint was length. Steve Jackson Games lists one to two hours.
I do not own Munchkin and have not played it, so there is no recommendation from me. The description comes from the publisher. The Dungeons & Dragons references it mocks are covered on Learning to Roleplay.
3. Santorini
Fixes: the length. Roxley lists 20 minutes, so you can play, lose and demand a rematch.
Two players build a Greek island upward, block by block, each trying to get a builder onto the third level.
Good for you if: You want the shortest jump out of Monopoly that still makes you think.
Skip if: You need to seat five people.
My take: still waiting to play this in person. I have only played it on Board Game Arena, so I will not tell you how the pieces feel. The god powers seem counterintuitive, then essential.
4. Splendor
Fixes: the length, without losing the feeling of building something. Space Cowboys lists 30 minutes.
You collect gem tokens and spend them on cards, and those cards become permanent discounts on everything you buy later.
Good for you if: What you liked was watching your position grow. No rent, no jail.
Skip if: You want a loud, social game.
My take: simple to learn, hard to find a winning strategy for. Dozens of games with my partner plus a good number on Board Game Arena. When I watch the nobles I lose, and when I forget them it goes better.
5. Azul
Fixes: the runaway leader. The biggest points are not scored until the game is already over.
You take coloured tiles from shared displays onto your own board, completing rows without picking up tiles you cannot place.
Good for you if: You hated watching someone pull ahead early. The rulebook scores 2 points per row, 7 per column and 10 per complete colour, all at the end.
Skip if: You want table talk. Here you mostly build your own thing.
My take: calm, elegant and easy to teach. Years in my collection and a sure winner when very different people are at the table. It still gets competitive if the players are inclined that way.
6. Ticket to Ride
Fixes: the runaway leader. Much of everyone’s score sits on cards nobody else can see.
You collect train cards by colour and spend them claiming routes between cities, connecting the destinations on your tickets.
Good for you if: You want a classic family night where nobody knows who is winning until the end.
Skip if: You want negotiation or direct conflict. This is a parallel race.
My take: I only recently bought the physical copy, but I have played dozens of games, especially on Board Game Arena with my partner. The United States map is where I have lost the most. My partner is that good at it.
Something I did not expect: I travel the map in my head while I build it.
When I claim the two train cars between New York and Boston, I am not just placing plastic on a line. I am picturing that trip.
I have no idea if everyone plays like this. But it is why the map stays with me after the game is over, and Monopoly never did that.
FOTO: el mapa a media partida con rutas de varios colores ya reclamadas
7. Carcassonne
Fixes: luck you can do nothing about. You draw a random tile, then the whole decision is yours.
You add your tile to a shared map of roads, cities and fields, then decide whether to claim it.
Good for you if: Your complaint was that the dice played the game for you.
Skip if: You want everyone building separately. People will finish your cities.
My take: deceptively simple pieces, real end game tension. Two to four is the sweet spot with the base game. What gets me is trying to close a huge city and not knowing whether it will happen.
8. Catan
Fixes: luck you cannot use, while keeping the trading. Dice decide production, your building and your deals do not.
You settle an island, collect what your settlements touch, and trade for whatever the dice did not give you.
Good for you if: You want the closest replacement for Monopoly itself.
Skip if: You are shopping for two, or wanted to avoid arguments. The base box is listed for 3 to 4 players.
My take: still the reference point, though I have only played it on Board Game Arena. That is what turned Catan into the game keeping my partner and my best friend connected half a continent apart.
9. Codenames
Fixes: the arguing. The talking is still the game, but now it is on your own side of the table.
A grid of word cards. One person per team gives a one word clue and a number, and their team guesses which cards they meant.
Good for you if: You liked the negotiation and hated where it led. Fifteen minutes, your own team.
Skip if: You are two people at a kitchen table.
My take: better with a big, mixed group. One warning from a memorable disaster: be careful with humour around people who barely know you. A joke that landed wrong at my partner’s family table ended with a glass of wine across my cards, and part of the set has been unusable ever since.
FOTO: dos equipos alrededor de la mesa a media partida
10. Dixit
Fixes: the arguing, by removing what people argue about. Nothing to own, nothing to take.
One player describes an illustrated card with a phrase. Everyone else submits a card that could match, then the table votes.
Good for you if: You want the social half of Monopoly night without the conflict.
Skip if: You want to win by being right.
My take: more fun with strangers than with close friends, which is the opposite of what you would expect. After years of owning it, what still surprises me is how much is in the artwork.
Which one actually works with a Monopoly crowd
Fixing a problem on paper is not the same as surviving people who expected Monopoly.
Three things matter more than the mechanics there. It has to be explainable while everyone is still sitting down, it has to let somebody rejoin the conversation without losing, and it has to end before anyone asks how much longer it will be.
By that standard the shortlist is short: Sushi Go Party!, Codenames and Ticket to Ride.
I can’t tell you for sure which of these works best with people who only know Monopoly. I don’t know that about the groups I have played with.
What I can tell you is how my last game of Codenames went. There were six of us: my partner, me and four of her friends, in two teams of three.
It was the first game for all four of them. My partner and I had already played several times with my copy.
My feeling is that in Codenames, knowing the people at the table matters more than how many games you have played.
Start here if you only buy one
- You want the safest answer: Sushi Go Party! Half an hour, nobody eliminated, rules done before the drinks are poured.
- You mostly play as a couple: Santorini for twenty minutes of pure thinking, or Azul to take your time.
- You have a full, loud house: Codenames, and the arguing is the point.
- You want the real Monopoly replacement: Catan. Same shape of evening, better decisions, and it ends.
- You want a classic family game night: Ticket to Ride, or Carcassonne if your group likes getting in each other’s way.
I don’t think one game on this list is the worst pick for someone coming from Monopoly. It depends more on the person than on the game.
Santorini can look a bit childish at first, at least on the surface.
Munchkin is the one I would think twice about. I haven’t played it, but its humour is built on fantasy role-playing clichés. If that world does nothing for you, the jokes won’t land either.
What to read next
- Easy board games for beginners, the main hub, with all ten games in more depth.
- Ticket to Ride, for the family game night angle.
- Catan, for the closest replacement for a Monopoly evening.
- Carcassonne, for building a shared map instead of your own board.
- The best Carcassonne expansions, once the base game stops being enough.
How this article was written
Player counts and play times come from the publishers. Where I could not confirm a detail in a rulebook or on a publisher page, I left it out.
I own physical copies of Azul, Carcassonne, Codenames, Dixit, Splendor and Sushi Go Party!, and I have played all six with real people. I also own Ticket to Ride, but the box is still unopened and I have only played it on Board Game Arena.
Catan and Santorini I have only played on Board Game Arena, never on a table in front of me. Munchkin I do not own and have not played at all.
Using the Amazon links in this article helps me keep working on Board Game Newbie, at no extra cost to you. Thanks for reading, and I hope to see you at the table.