After spending multiple months in quarantine, there are numerous concerns as to how to socialize with friends. People have utilized phone calls, outdoor meetups/lunches, or even zoom parties but none of those options really offer a way for people to effectively interact through something other than talking or limiting activities while completely social distancing. However, online games provide a great way of interacting in numerous different ways. This list describes just a few online multiplayer games (along with some similar ones) that can be easily picked up and played with friends without any prior experience or extensive gaming knowledge.

Overcooked 2

This cooking game is all about communication and coordination as players work with different environments, hazards, and cooking ingredients to make dishes on time. Overcooked 2 is a great game to play with friends (especially people aren’t experienced with it) as the chaos and yelling that erupts as people try to complete tasks without burning the kitchen down is very entertaining. Levels range from tossing chicken from a moving raft on a river to making hamburgers while different platforms (and the ingredients on top of them) goes falling into the water. Each of these new obstacles challenge players to communicate their needs and hone their skills in the game, something that often leads to more yelling and madness (the fun sort.)

Games similar to Overcooked 2: Overcooked, Moving Out, Tools Up, The Stretchers

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Stardew Valley

Note: Stardew Valley on mobile devices do not offer multiplayer

Although primarily known as a single-player game, Stardew Valley is a life simulator game that offers a complete multiplayer experience for those who want to experience the game with friends. Many life simulator games focus on either slowly building up an area to the user’s specifications or creating a survivable environment in a dangerous world, but Stardew Valley manages to combine both experiences. It leans closer into relaxed, normal life simulator games with the main character being put as the owner of a farm in Stardew Valley that the player must build up over the years. However, Stardew Valley captures the anxieties of more dangerous settings with both the explorable mines and time sensitive components where instead of the player being attacked by monsters at night, they are threatened by the fate of their crops going out of season. Also, Stardew Valley is not a land devoid of the fantastical with the aforementioned mines containing dangerous monsters and numerous hints of magic shown throughout the valley. Players can do a plethora of things from mining to farming to romancing fellow towns people and the quick timer (about 13 minutes in real life is one day in game) makes every day feel chock full of things that need to be done before night. In regard to the multiplayer element, Stardew Valley is a game that allows one to four people to live on a farm at a time with minimal differences in the base gameplay. However, there are numerous things one can do in the game with friends from competing to see who can earn the most money, working to complete the mine, or just splitting tasks amongst the group to complete the game faster.

Games similar to Stardew Valley: Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Don’t Starve, The Survivalist, Terraria, Harvest Moon (single player only)

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Mario Kart 8 Deluxe

The premise of Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is what the box art suggests – Mario characters racing

around in go-carts except there’s not just go-carts to race in, there’s characters not from Mario,

and there’s a multitude of items and tracks to make things… interesting. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is

an excellent game to play with friends every so often because of a combination of multiple

factors – the quick pacing, the simple controls, the different options, the unique tracks, and the

party modes such as Coin Runners or Renegade Roundup. Although one of the main things that

makes Mario Kart 8 Deluxe the party game that it is, is the different items that allow players to

move up and down the leaderboard in an instant. It is chaotic, uncertain, and very fun with the

items as players of varying skills become just a bit closer together with the occasional bullet bill

or blue shell.

There aren’t many new and popular kart games similar to Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, but Nintendo has numerous party games like Super Smash Bros Ultimate and the Mario Party games

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Any Jackbox Party Pack

Jackbox Party Packs are basically various packs (there are currently seven packs) that contain five different games each consisting of numerous goals, themes, and experience. These games are pretty much made for groups of friends to play with them with all of them having multiplayer compatibility. The Jackbox games also cover a wide variety of concepts with games ranging from giving short answers to various prompts (Quiplash), attempting to out rap each other (Mad Verse City), and finding two aliens by putting people through numerous prompts or actions (Push the Button.) By looking at which packs contain which games, groups of friends can decide on which pack (or packs) would provide the best games for the group to bond over. Only one person needs to buy a pack to play the games within as the system of setting up a Jackbox game can be surmised in two steps – first, the person who bought the game somehow shares their screen with the game on it with the other players (maybe a zoom screen share) and second, the people playing the game joins on a separate device via the code on the game screen.

Games similar to Jackbox Games: Skribbl.io, Kahoot Quizzes, sharing random online quizzes