If you’ve been practicing social distancing and following shelter-in-place regulations, it’s likely that you’ve organized almost every drawer, cleaned every space, called every family member and played every board game in the home. Trying to find ways to bring excitement and new experiences into your family and friend’s daily routine can be hard, but with the power of digital resources, it might just be a click away. Here are five fun and fresh activities we’ve found that can level up your quarantine:
Spice Up An Online Poker Tournament
It’s time to bring back poker nights, and if you’re planning to bring everyone together, there are a few essential things you should do in preparation. Beyond finding the right digital platform for gameplay or preparing guidelines for the tournament, brainstorm creative solutions for food, beverages, event themes and music. By leveraging delivery services and streaming platforms, you can give everyone a fun experience from far apart. Integrating a chat feature on top of this will help keep the connection close between players, and even allow for a game queue of players waiting to jump in!
Test Your Trivia Skills with Friends
Do you know your facts, and want to prove it? With the increasingly popular online game kit from Jackbox, you can play anything from trivia to charades to Pictionary, all from your personal device. By joining via web browser and entering a “room code,” you and your friends can all participate in a digitally-guided game experience and compete against each other to crown a champion. In addition to enhancing your socially-distanced party, Jackbox has also developed a series of mini-games to help parents and teachers who are educating children from home.
Rank Up in Group Video Game Adventures
We all know that the gaming industry continues to skyrocket as both a professional sport and recreational hobby — and many popular games can be played in groups, regardless of physical distance. In order to find out what games you can play online with friends, you need to look at both the console compatibility and game functionality. Knowing and identifying a few key terms will help you determine the right fit for your evening inside:
● Cross-Platform: A game is able to be played across multiple platforms, and potentially by multiple users. This means that an individual with Xbox and PS4 could play the same game together, even though they’re using a different console.
● Single System: This means that only users with the same console can play together. While there are many games that offer a cross-platform approach, a majority can only be played with the same technology.
Host a Digital Movie Night
We know that there’s only one thing better than binge-watching a TV show: binge-watching it with your friends. With extensions and applications like Netflix Party, Metastream and Scener, you can view your favorite shows and movies in real-time with others. Functionalities like emoji-reactions, chat boxes and pause buttons allow you to share your own commentary on the action in front of you.
Take a Class Together
Do you miss going to cooking classes, paint nights and happy hours? Many of the organizations that created these experiences are now shifting to digital. Joining via Zoom or Skype, you can experience everything from interactive pasta making to painting a masterpiece, all from the comfort of your home but with the company of your friends.
