Farm families are all about playing outside — we love the mud, the sun, the machines, and the animals. But some days, the weather just doesn’t cooperate. If you’ve been in some wicked rainstorms or blizzards, you know. So family time has to stay indoors, and that means having some of the best farming board games on hand.
Not that traditional Monopoly or Sorry or Battleship aren’t great, too, but in my family, with kids between the ages of 5 and 10, we gravitate toward games that have a farm theme to them. The kids like to ask questions, and they get to learn about animals and tools that we might not have on our farm (and it’s fun to ID different brands of tractors based on the cartoon drawings).
And board games certainly aren’t limited to just younger kids. Before our little ones were born, we served as a host family for international students, and the two teenagers who stayed with us for a couple of weeks absolutely loved the first board game on this list. And many of the ones in this list are perfect for adults!
Here are our picks for the best farming board games that you should have on hand for a rainy day:
Life on the Farm
Enter the fast moo-ving world of Dairy Farming, where market values vary with the roll of the dice. As you wind along the cow path, many real-life family farm experiences await you. Collect your Milk-Check when you pass the barn — buying more cows means a larger milk-check, but also increases your expenses. Build your heard to 60 cows plus the money you started with, and retire to win the game.
What the reviews say:
- Loving this game! We have family game night as often as we can. The adults and teenagers are having a ball. Highly recommend this game for family or friends. It is a little long but very fun
- We love this game! We love playing life and monopoly, and wanted to switch things up. Then I remembered this game which I used to have as a kid. It was great being able to play it with a bunch of College Ag Majors and all fight over stealing and loosing cows. It’s a great game and brings a lot of enjoyment!
The Farming Game
Whether you’re a real farmer or an urban dweller, you’ll find The Farming Game (known as The Game Invented in the Seat of a Tractor) is an accurate description of the business risks and gambles of farming. Players begin the game with 5,000 money in debt with 20 acres of inherited farmland. As players plant crops and sell livestock, they slowly work their way to success … that is if the elements cooperate. Farming has never been this much fun. For 2 to 6 players, ages 10 and up.
What the reviews say:
- This is a great game! It can teach some of the basics of accounting but it’s just fun. Great learning game! It’s like monopoly but doesn’t have any of the bad parts that makes you want to toss the board or choke other players because players aren’t really pitted directly against each other like in monopoly. It can be even better if you come up with some home brew rules. Quick tips: OTBs basically determine who will win the game. There are some Farmer’s Fate cards that are too mean. Fruit pays the best.
- I have fond memories of playing this game as a kid and recently bought it to play with my girlfriend while hibernating during the winter. Sadly she kicked my butt the first try. I love the game, but you do have to keep track of a few things on paper to make it easier. It is similar to monopoly, but you buy hay, grains, fruit and cows. I think it is a simplistic way to learn about farming, you have operating expenses that have to be subtracted from harvest revenue and there are always annoying expenses that show up. It doesn’t take eternity to win the game, maybe a couple of hours or a little more. I would definitely recommend buying it!
Farming Game — Kids
The little sibling to the previous entry, Farming Game — Kids helps develop skills in addition, subtraction, counting money, reading simple charts, and that most important lesson in farming, keeping a stiff upper lip when things aren’t going just right. For players ages 3-9 with three different playing levels.
What the reviews say:
- We grew up with the adult version of the farming game. This is meant to introduce children to the concepts used in the adult game. The best part of this game is that unlike most “child sized” versions of adult games this is interesting and unique and a complex version of the adult game, just with scaled down game play (shorter) and a range of complexity suited to a child’s developmental abilities.
- My young ones really enjoyed this. Nothing over the top in complexity, but just a board game of collecting various different fruits and vegetables and making money. Good introduction to making money, in a way feels like a lite-version of Monopoly in that regard.
Agricola
In Agricola (Latin for “farmer”), you’re a farmer in a wooden shack with your spouse and little else. On a turn, you get to take only two actions, one for you and one for the spouse, from all the possibilities you’ll find on a farm: collecting clay, wood or stone; building fences; and so on. You might think about having kids in order to get more work accomplished, but first you need to expand your house. And what are you going to feed all the little rug rats? Agricola is a turn based game. There are 14 game turns plus 6 harvest phases. Each player starts with two playing tokens (farmer and wife) and thus can take two actions per turn. There are multiple options, and while the game progresses, you’ll have more and more. Problem: Each action can be taken just once per turn, so it’s important to do some things with high preference. It yield countless strategy options: Sometimes it’s a good choice to stay on course, sometimes you better react on what your opponents do.
(And, to help get younger family members involved, Agricola has a Family Edition.)
What the reviews say:
- One of the best board games of all time! The rules will take a few minutes to run through, so it is probably not a good choice for small kids or people who are generally not interested board games, but if you’re with a group that enjoys a good board game, you need to add Agricola to your collection! I am a big fan of Catan, Risk, Ticket to Ride, and Monopoly and (in my opinion) Agricola tops all of them.
- I borrowed this from my local library & played it. I was instantly hooked. It gave you so many options & so many ways to build a farm. I know building a farm does not sound that exciting, but this game makes it fun. I play lots of board games & this is one of my top 2-3 games. I will play it anytime someone wants to play. If you like a great two player or family game this is a must have for your collection!
Viticulture Essential Edition
In the game, you find yourself in rustic, pre-modern Tuscany, where you’ve inherited a meager vineyard. You’ll have a few plots of land, an old crush pad, a tiny cellar, three workers, and the dream of owning the best winery in Italy. Your job is to allocate your workers and helpful visitors to complete various tasks throughout the year. Each season is different on a vineyard, so the workers have different tasks they can take care of in the summer and winter. There’s competition over those tasks, and often the first worker to arrive at each one has an advantage over the rest. Using those workers and visitors, you can expand your vineyard by building structures, planting vines, and filling wine orders as you work towards the goal of owning the most successful winery in Tuscany.
What the reviews say:
- Viticulture is one of my all time favourite games. It’s a worker placement game for 2-6 players, themed around growing grapes and producing wine. Your aim is to be the first to earn 20 points, which will trigger the game end, Over the course of several rounds, each corresponding to a year. Points are primarily earned by placing workers to grow grapes, which are then crushed into wine, in order to fulfill contracts that earn points and generate income. Along the way you can do many other things to earn points or help you in this process, such as by hiring summer and winter visitors or by building various structures.
- We’ve played this game almost every day since we got it two weeks ago. It’s fairly easy to learn, don’t let the many pieces intimidate you – most things are pretty self-explanatory and the rule book does a very good job clearing things up if you just read it. As you can guess there is really high replay value to it, and the rules are easily customizable to make it easier or, in our case, more challenging.
Farmageddon
Farmageddon is a frenetic farming game for two to four farmers. Plant big-money crops like Wary Squash or Grumpy Melon, but watch out — they’re a tasty target for other players! Protect your produce with Crop Insurance or Foul Manure, then hit your opponents with a Dust Bowl or Darn Gophers! Will you bring in the biggest bushel of crops … or will they be wiped out?
What the reviews say:
- The rules are pretty simple, and it plays great with group. It’s a clever and cute game to pull out for a quick 20-30 min. session of laughs.
- I picked this up as a game to play on Christmas eve with the family and it did not disappoint. Initially the rules seemed confusing, but after playing through one round I feel like everyone understood and enjoyed it. The object of the game is to be the farmer (player) with the most valuable crops in your harvest pile however this is much easier said then done as particular action cards like foreclosure (one player pays another player in order to take control of their crop) and thresher (destroys a planted crop) may hinder your progress.
Fun Farm
The animals have escaped from the farm! You need to bring them back before they get into trouble — and you want to do so faster than your opponents so that you can save more than them! In this fast-catching game, players compete to spot and catch the animal shown on the cards before all their opponents. Each round, the active player reveals the top card from the deck, placing it next to any others still on the table. Each card depicts an animal, a color for the black die, and one for the white die. The player then rolls both dice. If the color rolled on a die matches the one depicted for the same die on one of the face-up cards, players race to grab the depicted animal toy from the table. Whoever does so first claims the card, and once the deck runs out, whoever has the most cards wins! But if no cards is claimed, another one is revealed, without discarding those already visible. So it is not uncommon that animals have to be grabbed at the same turn.
What the reviews say:
- This is a very versatile game, can be with any age players. The game is simple, yet challenging. While it only takes about 10 minutes each play, you’ll want to play over and over again 🙂 With a little ingenuity, can be a very hilarious drinking game.
- What a great game! May seem a bit juvenile but once you play once you’ll want to keep playing. It’s great playing with a big group…but be forewarned…please ask people to cut their fingernails before playing 🙂
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