Happy Wednesday, dear readers! For today’s Holiday Gift Guide installment, Daily Dead is bringing you a bonanza of board games that genre fans would undoubtedly enjoy playing and sharing with other friends during this holiday season and beyond. We’re featuring a wide array of games, too, including this year’s horror-themed Trivial Pursuit, tons of geeky versions of other popular board games, Mondo’s The Thing-inspired game, Mixtape Massacre, and so much more.
And, because it’s become an annual tradition around here, Daily Dead will once again be giving away a prize pack of movies and goodies for 10 lucky readers, thanks to this year’s HGG sponsor, RLJE Films. Winners will receive one copy of the upcoming Christmas anthology All the Creatures Were Stirring, one other title from RLJE Films, and a few other horror-tastic surprises, just in time for the holidays. To enter, send an email to contest@dailydead.com with “Holiday Gift Guide” in the subject line, and be sure to include your full name and mailing address as well (limited to those who are eighteen years of age or older that live in the United States. Only one entry per household will be accepted).
The Thing: Infection at Outpost 31 Board Game
Stir-crazy Norwegians shooting first at a dog, then you. Their base—not unlike yours—left in ruin, littered with strange research notes and even stranger carcasses. A 100,000-year-old alien vessel uncovered in the ice.
Then some...thing...attacked your dogs and you put it down. But that was just the beginning. Power fluctuations, missing tools, shredded clothes, equipment destroyed—all that pales next to the preliminary conclusion of your scientists: at least one of you is probably already being impersonated by this lifeform!
You may not know who to trust, but you do know that out there, in the dark, The Thing is waiting for you to make a mistake.
But what if it’s already in here with you?
Trivial Pursuit: Horror Movie Edition
Perfect for thrill seekers and know-it-alls alike, TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Horror Movie Edition is a must-have for any game collection. Just when you thought it was safe, both specific details and multiple choices await to attack based on films such as Jaws, The Exorcist, The Hills Have Eyes, and A Nightmare on Elm Street. Whether your best bet is on a variety of slashers, bloodbaths, or mutants, test your wits on the titles that keep you up at night with TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Horror Movie Edition!
Mixtape Massacre is a tabletop board game where up to 6 players play as horror film archetypes and compete in a fictional 1986 killing spree to be remembered. With tons of references to 1980’s music and pop-culture – Mixtape Massacre will have you laughing while you’re slashing!
Monster Crunch! The Breakfast Battle Game
It's ok to play with your food! Pick your favorite Monster Cereal character and battle to see who can "eat" the most cereal. In this fast-paced game of luck and strategy, players collect as many Cereal Cards in their Bowls as they can. Each Monster has special powers to give you an advantage and help you gobble up the most cereal. Use Milk Tokens to combine Cereal Cards and take bigger bites. The Monster Cereal character that munches the most wins the game!
The game features Boo Berry, Count Chocula, Fruit Brute, Fruity Yummy Mummy, and Franken Berry.
Ultimate Werewolf: Deluxe Edition
In Ultimate Werewolf, you and any number of other players (as few as 7 and as many as 75) attempt to figure out who is a werewolf over the course of several game days and nights. Each day you'll choose a player (hopefully a werewolf) to eliminate.
Each night. ..the werewolves will eliminate a villager. Fortunately for you, some of the villagers have special powers, like the Seer, who learns the true identity of a player each night. The game continues until only villagers. ..or werewolves. ..remain.
Are you troubled by strange noises in the middle of the night? Do you experience feelings of dread in your basement or attic? Have you or your family ever seen a spook, specter, or ghost? If the answer is "yes," then don't wait another minute. Pick up the phone and call the professionals. Ghostbusters: The Board Game is an episodic adventure game for one to four players, who are charged with busting ghosts and sealing gates to the Spirit World. The game is customizable, cooperative, and highly replay able. It features unique illustrations and figures based on original artwork and designs by Dan Schoening, the artist of IDW's Ghostbusters comic book series. Each Ghostbuster has a distinct role and unlocks unique abilities by gaining experience. The game offers modes for different levels of players, making it accessible to beginners and challenging to experts. Now is your chance to save the world!
Ghostbusters II: The Board Game
Building on its highly-regarded predecessor, this massive stand-alone expansion has 1-4 players taking on the roles of the Ghostbusters as they investigate the Mood Slime that has flooded the city, causing earthquakes and riots in an attempt to bring Vigo and his minions back. Inspired by the Ghostbusters movies, comics, and toylines, the Campaigns have you taking on the Scoleri brothers, riding the Statue of Liberty, and battling through Vigo’s Ghost army. The numerous new Ghosts, enemy types, and Bosses will make busting an exhilarating challenge! There are many exciting new gameplay elements that add loads of complexity and fun. Equipment Cards offer an array powerful of Weapons, devious Traps, magical Tomes, and helpful Utilities that you’ll need to use to win. As you level up your Ghostbusters, the updated Character Cards will show you what you’ve unlocked, including abilities, Class-S Equipment, and use of the Ecto-1a’s Ecto-Tank. The Ecto-Tank is a fresh piece of technology installed in the Ghostbusters’ favorite ride that recycles negative Mood Slime into rule-bending bonuses!
Slash Cards: The Horror Movie Trivia Game
Slash Cards is a horror movie trivia game for 1-6 players. It consists of two card decks: The Trivia Deck, and The Categories Deck. The Trivia Deck contains 1,375 questions that span the entire history of horror cinema. The Categories Deck is used to play Slash Cards' two game modes: The Slasher and The Survivor. In The Slasher, players take turns drawing Category Cards and answering questions. The first player to collect a card from each of the game's five categories wins, but watch out! If you draw a Slash Card you forfeit all your cards and start over. In The Survivor, each player begins with a full suite of Category Cards. Each time a player answers a question incorrectly they lose one of their cards. The last player with at least one card in their hand is the winner. The trivia cards cover everything from the silent era all the way up to 2015, including questions about classics like The Exorcist and Halloween, lesser-known movies like Motel Hell and Session 9, and foreign horror films like Eyes Without A Face and REC. Horror fans of all levels will love Slash Cards.
The town of Arkham, Massachusetts is in a panic. Horrific and bizarre events have begun to occur with increasing frequency, and seem to point towards some disastrous cataclysmic event in the future. Only one small band of investigators can save Arkham from the Great Old Ones and utter destruction! Originally published by Chaosium, Inc., this new, updated edition of Arkham Horror features new artwork, as well as revised and expanded rules from the game's original creator, Richard Launius!
Escape Room in a Box: The Werewolf Experiment
Escape rooms are exciting immersion experiences in which participants are challenged to find clues, solve puzzles, and crack codes in under an hour if they want to escape. Now you and your friends can play the ultimate escape game at home—and the heat is on! A mad scientist is plotting to turn you and your friends into werewolves. Only if you and your team members can solve 19 2D and 3D puzzles in an hour will you be able to escape with your humanness intact! You'll have to work as a team—so put your heads together and let's see if you can escape. And there's help from the outside: players can connect with Amazon Alexa to enhance the gameplay of Escape Room in a Box: the Werewolf Experiment!
The creak of footsteps on the stairs, the smell of something foul and dead, the feel of something crawling down your back – this and more can be found this award-winning and highly acclaimed game of strategy and horror.
A Halloween House Party isn't complete without our Original Halloween Charades Game. Whether you're playing Family Charades, Charades for Kids, or Charades for Adults, this Halloween party pack is sure to bring life to the party!
1831 Peyrebeille, France. Times are tough for the common man. It's all your family can do to make ends meet as lowly innkeepers. Together you hatch a plan, so diabolical it just might work. Preying upon the wealthy travelers who frequent your establishment you've been led to commit robbery and even murder! However, the greed has caught up with you and now it's everyone for themselves. The Bloody Inn is a devilish game that pits family members against each other in a battle to see who can walk away with the most francs. No crime is too sinister, no traveler is safe! Hey, an innkeeper has to do what an innkeeper has to do!
The “Would You Rather” party game. Spark fun conversations - You won’t believe how messed up some of your friends’ preferences are. Endless combinations - With over 300 Poison Cards there are millions of possible card combinations.
A horrible crime has been committed on the grounds of Warwick Manor and it's up to the psychic investigators to get to the bottom of it. In Mysterium, one player takes on the role of the ghost and over the course of a week, tries to lead the investigators to their culprit. Each night the team will be met with visions, but what is the ghost trying to tell you? Can the psychics determine the weapon, location and killer or will a violent criminal pull off the perfect murder?
Escape Room: The Game from Spin Master Games is all the fun and excitement of popular escape rooms from the comfort of home. Play with family and friends and try to escape from multiple themed rooms before time runs out!
There’s a way out of each seemingly impossible scenario — it’s up to you and your team of 3-5 players to figure it out and get out in time. Solve puzzles, find clues, and work together to find a way out of the room.
Nyctophobia means fear of the dark. Welcome to the experiential table top game that is going to redefine what it means to play a game. Nyctophobia is a cooperative game of survival where up to four players must work together to escape a maniacal predator chasing them in a pitch black forest. But there's a wrinkle: would-be survivors play the game with Blackout glasses. Players cannot see the board and have to rely on touch to navigate their way to safety. So, are you afraid of the dark?
The Planet of The Apes Monopoly features custom illustrated art by Dave Perillo with a vintage feel from the classic 1968 science fiction film.
Can you survive the horrors of the Planet of the Apes? IDW Games, Twentieth Century Fox, and Richard Launius (Arkham Horror game designer) invite you to test your mettle against a savage and unfamiliar world. Planet of the Apes can be tackled solo or by up to four players working together, with each player representing a different personality aspect of stranded Astronaut Colonel George Taylor. With gameplay that will truly test your abilities to strategize and work together, you must overcome the challenges of this classic science fiction adventure. It’s a race against time, ferocious enemies, and the unsettling mystery of the Planet of the Apes!
Monopoly: The Nightmare Before Christmas 25 Years
Get a metacarpal grip on six metal tokens sculpted after unforgettable characters and subtle symbols from the film, such as Jack’s Skull, Evil Teddy, Sally, Oogie Boogie, Zombie Duck, and Mayor’s Hearse. Fans delighted by the film (and anything Nightmare-themed) will travel across a stylish game board to encounter familiar locations like Dr. Finkelstein’s Laboratory, Sally’s Alley, Oogie Boogie’s Casino, and Jack’s Tower, each with custom Title Deed cards and costs for their strategic consideration!
Trivial Pursuit: The Nightmare Before Christmas
It's the infamous Pumpkin King teaming up with America's favorite trivia game to bring you the frightful Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas quick play edition. 400 questions pertaining to the film's songs, characters, The Pumpkin King and behind the scenes fun facts. Packaged in a coffin shaped box.
Yahtzee: The Nightmare Before Christmas 25 Years
Play America’s all-time #1 dice game and celebrate 25 years of a cult classic with the Nightmare before Christmas Yahtzee. Ready for you to shake it up are custom dice featuring frightful movie characters including the Mayor, Oogie boogie, Sally and the pumpkin King himself.
High treachery and betrayal are behind the two mysteries to solve in game of Thrones clue. Featuring a double-sided game board, players choose to solve the murder mystery in the red keep or in Meereen. Who was responsible for plotting the murder? what weapon was used and where did the crime take place?
Featuring custom Game of Thrones packaging, stunning game design, and large, hand-sculpted custom tokens, the MONOPOLY: Game of Thrones Collector’s Edition Game will transport fans into a world of intrigue, valor, and betrayal. After all, when you play the MONOPOLY: Game of Thrones Collector’s Edition Game you win, or you go bankrupt!
RISK: Game of Thrones Edition Game escalates RISK, the classic game of strategic conquest, to an epic level of chaos and war in a battle for the Iron Throne.
Deadpool meets the Monopoly game like peanut butter and fried trout, it's a perfect match! In the Monopoly: Deadpool Edition game players build their own team of Mercs for money as they purchase the contracts of the world's best mercenaries. Some are Deadpool's allies, some are Deadpool’s from alternate universes, and one is just Deadpool in a maid outfit. Other players have to pay a fee when they land on Mercs.
Get ready to wheel and deal, buy vehicles like a chimichanga truck, and steal friends' stuff with the Cheap Shot and Low Blow spaces.
Deadpool makes his mark on adult gaming in Deadpool vs the World, a hilarious party game for mature audiences. Featuring 100 custom illustrations of Deadpool in very strange and unsightly situations, players face off against their friends by filling in the blanks on Caption cards to provide the most outrageous explanations of the Merc with a Mouth’s predicaments. The player who best describes Deadpool’s compromising situations wins the game.
Alexandria's been attacked! play to solve the mystery. Play as characters like Rick, Carol, Negan and Daryl and murder weapons include Katana, revolver and Lucille.
The apocalypse is here and life as you've known it has given way to a bloody chaotic fight for survival. Live to see another day in AMC's The Walking Dead MONOPOLY as you acquire and defend safeguard locations featured throughout the hit television series.
Trivial Pursuit: The Walking Dead
Test your knowledge of AMC’s The Walking Dead in this bite-size edition of Trivial Pursuit which features 600 questions from all 7 seasons of the popular television series, including characters, locations, events and episodes.
Play the classic shake, score & shout game or battle it out in apocalyptic Atlanta in the special edition of AMC’s The Walking Dead Yahtzee. Custom playing pieces including dice, game board pieces and character movers add a bloody twist as you roll high scoring dice combinations and fight for survival in a chaotic world.
One of your favorite Supernatural characters has been possessed & is committing terrible deeds! Now is the time for you to become the hunter and attempt to discover - WHO is possessed WHAT mystical object was used to open the demon portal, and WHERE the portal was opened! Was it Sam with the Revolver in the Rocky Mountains? Or Dean on the West Coast with the Winchester Journal?
The Supernatural Edition of Monopoly allows fans to buy, sell and trade famous monsters from the Supernatural TV series.
Supernatural fans test their knowledge of the TV Series with TRIVIAL PURSUIT®: Supernatural. This quick-play Trivial Pursuit game can be played on-the-go with its portable wedge holder. The 600 questions range in difficulty levels, so even super fans will be challenged! Six trivia categories include: The Winchester Brothers, Angels and Demons, Locations, Spells, Objects, and Rituals, Creatures and Join the Hunt.
Time for an Alien game night - Capture the Alien Queen! Alien vs Predator themed game board, weapons and suspects.
Battle Yahtzee: Alien vs Predator
It's time to pick a side in Battle YAHTZEE ALIEN VS PREDATOR! Players assume the character of Predator, Alien, Marine or Scientist and attack their enemies with classic dice roll combinations like Full House and Large Straight. Featuring glow in the dark dice, Battle chance die, custom scoreboards, and special powers for each character. Battle YAHTZEE ALIEN VS PREDATOR is an epic battle for survival! Last player alive wins the game!
The mystery game players love to solve again and again now has a Star Wars twist! In this Star Wars edition of the popular "who done it" Clue game, players move about the gameboard as one of their favorite Star Wars characters on an important a mission to foil Darth Vader's plans, and to save the Galaxy from destruction.
Monopoly: Star Wars 40th Anniversary Special Edition
It's the Fast-Dealing Property Trading Game taken to a galaxy far, far away! Celebrate the 40th anniversary of the original Star Wars movie with this special edition of the Monopoly game. Players can relive the story of Star Wars: A New Hope as they travel around the board as they compete to own it all.
Thanos Rising - Avengers: Infinity War is a cooperative dice and card game for 2-4 players. In the game, players will recruit heroes and assemble a team to face off against Thanos and his villainous forces in an effort to thwart him from accomplishing his master plan - collecting all six Infinity Stones to power the Infinity Gauntlet and wreak havoc on the very fabric of reality.
You and your teammates will take the roles of iconic Marvel heroes to lead teams from their uniquely powered Team Bases into battle. 42 Asset Cards featuring heroes and villains are used to help you progress through the game, each with strengths of their own. Among the Asset cards, you’ll find characters from all over the Marvel Universe, including team leaders Captain America, Doctor Strange, Gamora, and Black Panther, heroes to recruit such as Bucky Barnes and Mantis, and villains to defeat like the general Outriders or the Children of Thanos, including Ebony Maw.
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In case you missed them, check here for more Horror Gift Guide ideas. We'd also like to wish you a very happy holidays from all of us at Daily Dead!
Heather A. Wixson was born and raised in the Chicago suburbs, until she followed her dreams and moved to Los Angeles in 2009. A 14-year veteran in the world of horror entertainment journalism, Wixson fell in love with genre films at a very early age, and has spent more than a decade as a writer and supporter of preserving the history of horror and science fiction cinema. Throughout her career, Wixson has contributed to several notable websites, including Fangoria, Dread Central, Terror Tube, and FEARnet, and she currently serves as the Managing Editor for Daily Dead, which has been her home since 2013. She's also written for both Fangoria Magazine & ReMind Magazine, and her latest book project, Monsters, Makeup & Effects: Volume One will be released on October 20, 2021.
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