Scrabble

One of the most popular games of all time that was, like Monopoly, invented during the Great Depression (in 1938). Alfred Butts invented the game based on the popularity of crossword puzzles at the time.

Scrabble is produced by Hasbro.

Clue: The Classic Detective Game

In 1943, Anthony E. Pratt of Britain developed the murder-mystery game Clue (called Cluedo in Britain); commercial production began in 1949. Clue has been one of the most popular board games ever produced.

The game of Clue may have been partially developed from an older American card game called “The King of Hearts Has Five Sons.” In that game, two cards are set aside and the object of the game is to be the first to identify them. A player asks another player if he holds certain cards. If that player has any of those cards, he secretly shows one of those cards to the player who asked the question. Players could keep track of the card requests on paper. These are major aspects of playing Clue.

See this interesting article on Clue and other “deduction” games.

Originally produced by Waddingtons in the UK and Parker Brothers in the U.S. and Canada, both were bought by Hasbro. There is also a smaller card-based version than is good as a travel version of the game.

Detection Games

Detection board games have been around at least since Clue which was introduced in 1943 (though that is thought to have been partially based on a much older card game called The King of Hearts Has Five Sons). Over the years more have been created. Some use the basic Clue game play with some additions, others include more roll-play and involve each player establishing their characters, up to full roll playing games such as the How To Host a Murder series (all 18 of them).

Clue

Scotland Yard

Inkognito

Adventure Games: Monochrome Inc.

Mysterium

Covert

Detective: City of Angels

Deception: Murder in Hong Kong

Orient Express

Letters From Whitechapel

Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective: The Baker Street Irregulars
Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective: Carlton House & Queen's Park
Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective: Jack the Ripper & West End Adventures
Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective: The Thames Murders & Other Cases

221B Baker Street: The Master Detective Game

Betrayal at House on the Hill

How To Host A Murder: The Last Train From Paris

How To Host A Murder: The Last Train From Paris

Not a board game, but a role playing game in which each “player” inhabits the role of the various characters in the murder mystery. Each person has a guide outlining their characters back-story and their place in the mystery.
In this case, a murder on a luxury train reminiscent of Agatha Christie’s, Murder on the Orient Express. 

How To Host A Murder

Role guides and script with train layout

Created and produced by Decipher Inc.

Trivial Pursuit

This trivia knowledge game was invented in Canada and began production in 1981. It became one the biggest selling board games of all time, with over 100 million produced by 2014. The questions test players knowledge on six categories: history, entertainment, geography, arts & literature, science & nature, and sports & leisure.

Besides the original edition, over 80 versions and additions have been made since 1981 such as Star Wars, Harry Potter, and The Lord of the Rings. Now produced by Hasbro.

Ticket to Ride

One of the biggest selling games of the last 15 years has been Ticket to Ride. As of 2024 18 million copies of the game have been sold. It was invented by British game designer Alan R. Moon and won many prestigious game awards in 2004 and 2005, including the 2004 Spiel des Jahres.

Game play consists in building railways to connect destinations on a map. The game is considered to be very easy to learn.

The original game was for North America (actually, the U.S. and Canada). It was followed shortly with Europe, then Germany, Rails & Sails and the Nordic Countries. Those are complete games, but there are many expansion available that provide new map boards and destination cards, variations on the rules, and sometimes additional components. (Note that the base game and most expansions are for 2-5 players, except Nordic Countries which is for 2-3 players. Numbers in brackets below indicate the player counts of the expansions that are other than 2-5.) Asia (4 or 6) & Legendary Asia, Poland (2-4), Japan & Italy, India (2-4) & Switzerland (2-3), The Heart of Africa, Nederland, United Kingdom (2-4) & Pennsylvania, France & The Old West (2-6 players). The expansion packages are used with the full (base) versions like TTR original and TTR Europe. The city based games are all stand-alone: Amsterdam, Berlin, London, New York City, and San Francisco. Ticket to Ride First Journey is a beginner version geared toward younger players. TTR - The Card Game is a much smaller version that would be a good travel version of the game.

TTR has teamed with Amazon to allow Alexa to be used as an additional player for the original TTR and TTR Europe.

TTR - Original

TTR Ride Europe

TTR Rails & Sails

TTR Nordic Countries

TTR Europe map and playing pieces

TTR Original

Actor Wil Weaton has a YouTube series on board games. He has a video on the original Ticket to Ride and on Ticket to Ride Europe.

Ticket to Ride video

Ticket to Ride Europe video

Expansions card packs for the games are available called USA 1910 for the original game and Europa 1912 for the Europe game. These are larger cards (closer to standard playing card size) that add more destinations and routes and a few variations in game play. Europa 1912 expands game play even further with the addition of warehouses and depots.

USA 1910

Europa 1912

See details on all the Ticket to Ride games including downloadable rules at the Days of Wonder website.

Golf card game

Golf is a two-deck card game that is easy to learn and fun to play.

Deck: 2 decks of regular playing cards, 4 to 7 players. (Use 1 deck for 2 or 3 players; use 3 decks for 8+ players.)
Rank of cards: Jack = -2; Queen = 12; King = 0; Ace = 1; all other cards are face value.
Object of the game: to get the lowest scoring hand in 9 rounds.
Number of players: 2 and up

Play:
1. 6 cards are dealt face down to each player; players may not look at their cards. Players arrange cards in a column of three pairs.

2. Remaining cards are placed in the middle of the table and the top card is placed face up beside the deck — this will be the discard pile.

3. The first player starts play by drawing from either the discard pile or from the top of the deck.

4.a. If the player draws from the top of the deck, the card is turned over. The player can choose to use the drawn card to replace a card from his hand or discard it.
i. If the card is discarded then one card from the player’s hand must be turned face up.
ii. If the player chooses to keep the drawn card then it replaces one from the player’s hand. The drawn card can replace either a face up or face down card in the player's hand. The discarded card is placed face up on the discard pile.
The exception to point i above is if the player has only one face-down card remaining. It is then an option for the player whether or not to turn over their last card. See points 6 and 7 below.

4.b. If the player draws from the discard pile, then one card from the player’s hand must be swapped for that card and placed in the discard pile. If the card to be swapped is face down then it is turned face up and then placed on the discard pile.

5. If a player has a matched pair of cards (side by side pairs), on the next play the pair (or pairs) can be discarded, provided a card has not been drawn from the deck or the discard pile. The player then proceeds to play the turn as usual (steps 3 & 4 above).

6. If the player's last face down cards is turned up, that player is finished and the remaining players have one more turn each. All cards are then turned face up and the points are tallied.

7. If the player who first turned all cards face up does not have a lower score than all other players then 10 points are added to that player’s score.

8. If all cards are played from the deck, play ceases. All cards are turned face up and the scores are tallied.

9. Nine hands are played and the lowest cumulative score wins.