The month of November is International Games Month! This is an initiative through the American Library Association and “is run by volunteers from around the world to reconnect communities through their libraries around the educational, recreational, and social value of all types of games.” If you would like to see more of their resources, including a list of games that you can print and play, check out their page at the Games & Gaming Roundtable website.

However! November is only the start of the season for games and gaming. With winter approaching, it’s finally time for some indoor games and activities. The titles below will keep you entertained with face-to-face games all winter long.

The Player’s Handbook: Everything a Player Needs to Create Heroic Characters for the World’s Greatest Roleplaying Game 

There isn’t much to be said about D&D that hasn’t been said already. This is 5^th and most recent version of the game that was originally released in 1974. Next year marks the game’s 50^th anniversary, and this tabletop roleplaying game is more popular than ever. If you’ve been intrigued by its presentation in Stranger Things or other pop culture references, you can check out a copy of the Player’s Handbook as well as the other two essential books to play the game, the Monster Manual and Dungeon Master’s Guide, and have all the ingredients necessary to start playing except for the dice. As a side note, did you know Google will roll dice for you?

Super Fun Family Card Games: 75 Games for All Ages

If you prefer your games to get straight to the point, you can get a lot of action out of this collection of games which all make use of a pack of standard playing cards. With rules for classic games like Rummy and lesser-known games like James Bond, you’re almost sure to get some entertainment out of this book. It’s also worth noting that it includes rules for single-player card games as well. You can play Solitaire with real cards instead of on your computer! If you don’t want to buy a deck of cards, you can find a printable set of playing cards here.

The Everything Tabletop Games Book: From Settler of Catan to Pandemic, Find Out Which Games to Choose, How to Play, and the Best Ways to Win!

When you’re not sure what board game is right for you, this book can help. It has rules and strategies for a lot of the popular games (Catan, Betrayal at House on the Hill, Small World, etc.). More importantly, though, it classifies those games into genres. So, if you know which kind of game you like, you get a list of other games that use similar design! For each game it also lists difficulty, number of players, estimated playtime, and age range, so you can know if a game is a good fit or if it is a little more complicated than you would like.

The Ultimate Micro-RPG: 40 Fast, Easy, and Fun Tabletop Games

Alright, so if you weren’t sold on Dungeons & Dragons or Troika! because of their complexity, but you still really want to try out a tabletop role-playing game, this book is the one for you. It’s a compendium of 40 different games to try out in a variety of settings, styles, and rules. Each game’s entire rules and requirements are listed on one double-sided page. This also makes it a great option for younger players, older players, or people that are short on time. The goal with most of these is to have a short setup time that doesn’t require preparation of any kind. These games can be a lot of fun because they don’t require the “serious” commitment that the games above would expect. If these kinds of games interest you, there’s also a lot of variety to be found online. The advantage of this book is the hand-selected titles to cut out some of the lower-quality titles.