Suggest me a Board Game

What this tool does

It is game night, the shelf is full, everyone is hovering, and somehow no one can pick. Or it is just the two of you and you are about to reach for the same game you always play. This tool settles it. It pulls a board game at random from a large list, so you have one to set up instead of a standoff over the shelf.

Press the button for a game. Press it again for another. Ask for a few at once if you would rather choose from a short list. A random pick has a quiet advantage on game night, since it is much harder to argue with than someone's personal favorite.

How to use it

1. Number / Quantity. How many games to pull at once, from 1 to 100.
2. Generate. Pulls a fresh game, or a fresh set if you asked for several.
3. Starts with, Contains, Ends with. Optional filters that narrow the list before it picks. Leave them blank to draw from everything.
4. Copy. Copies the pick, or your shortlist, to the clipboard as plain text.

A game is on screen the moment the page loads, so there is always something to react to.

How it works

The list is fixed, and each press pulls one game from it at random, never the same twice inside a single set.

The filters let you aim. Contains keeps any game with your text in it, so typing catan narrows it to The Settlers of Catan, which is handy for checking whether a game you have heard of is on the list. The list is alphabetical, so Starts with goes by the first letter and ends with by the last.

What is on the list

It is a big shelf of board games, over two hundred of them, and it reaches well past the usual suspects. The household names are here, like Yahtzee and Ticket to Ride, alongside modern hobby favorites like Catan, Carcassonne, Pandemic, and Agricola, and heavier designer games like Arkham Horror, plus a few international titles you may not have met.

Because it spans light party games and deep strategy alike, a random pull can land anywhere, which is the point when you want a nudge out of your usual two or three. Take it as a shelf of ideas to spin, and use the Contains box when you want to check for a specific game.

Why nobody can agree on game night

The game-night stall is a small, friendly version of a well-studied effect. When there are a lot of options, people pick slowly, or freeze and fall back on the familiar. Sheena Iyengar and Mark Lepper showed it in a 2000 study where shoppers offered two dozen jams to taste bought far fewer than those offered six. A full game shelf does the same thing, and adding a group with different favorites only makes the deadlock worse.

Barry Schwartz called the broader pattern the paradox of choice, that more options often leave us less satisfied and slower to commit. A random pick steps around all of it. It puts one game on the table for everyone to react to, and a game that is actually being set up beats twenty that are still being debated while the evening slips away.

Picking the right game for the group

If the first pull does not fit the table, three quick questions sort it. The first is how many of you there are, since some games shine with two and others need four or five to come alive, so check the box on the game. The second is how long you have, because a twenty-minute filler and a three-hour epic are very different evenings. The third is the mood of the group, whether everyone wants something light and loud or is up for real strategy. Match the pick to those three and it usually lands, and another press is quick if it does not.

Questions people ask

Is it free, and does it save anything?

It is free with no sign-up, and nothing is stored. The picks run in your browser, so use Copy to keep a shortlist before you leave.

Can I get a few options at once?

Yes. Set the quantity to the number you want, up to 100, and press Generate for that many different games in one pull.

Are these games I need to own?

It suggests titles, so you play the ones you already have or use the list as a shopping and borrowing guide. It is a way to decide what to play, not a copy of the game itself.

Does it explain the rules?

No, it names a game rather than teaching it. Once you have a pick, a quick search turns up the rules and plenty of how-to-play videos.

References

1. Sheena Iyengar and Mark Lepper, "When Choice Is Demotivating: Can One Desire Too Much of a Good Thing?", Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2000, the study behind choice overload. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11138768/
2. Barry Schwartz, "The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less", his talk on how more options can lower satisfaction. https://www.ted.com/talks/barry_schwartz_the_paradox_of_choice