Thanksgiving has a built-in game window and everybody knows it: the hour and a half while dinner finishes cooking, when the kitchen is full and the children are underfoot. A memory station at the kids' table converts that hour into a tournament — highest round survives, loser refills the water glasses.
The mixed-age crowd is the thing to plan for, and matching games handle it better than most: the easy board keeps the six-year-olds in play, and hard mode gives the teenagers and uncles something to quietly compete over while the adults argue about the stuffing.
It is also the polite answer to "can I have the iPad" at 2pm, when the honest alternative is a screen the length of a film.
Choose your difficulty
Every thanksgiving game runs at three levels — easy, medium and hard — switched inside the game at any time. Start easy for little ones, or jump to hard if you fancy the challenge.