10 Best PS3 Board and Card Games

Trivial Pursuit on PS3 is the 2009 video game version of the classic board game, made by EA Bright Light for Electronic Arts. You answer questions in six categories to move around the board. Answer correctly on the special squares to win the wedges, and once you hold all six you get to take on the final winning question. The questions are aimed at British players, so expect a lot about British TV and British sport.

The board game first came out in 1981 and was named to the Games Hall of Fame in 1993. Players recommend this version as a good pick when more people join in. It is the easiest game on this list to hand to someone who never plays video games.

Duels of the Planeswalkers is the video game of the collectible card game from Wizards of the Coast. Stainless Games made it, and the PS3 version came out on November 23, 2010. It follows the standard rules of Magic, so each player has a deck of cards made of lands and spells. The computer opponent only looks about three moves ahead.

By January 2011 the game had sold more than 500,000 copies on Xbox Live alone. A sequel, Duels of the Planeswalkers 2012, came to PS3 in June 2011. Players recommend the series for playing with a friend, and it helps if you already know trading card games.

Catan is the video game of the board game Settlers of Catan. Players compete to build the most successful colony on the island, trading resources with each other along the way. You spend resource cards to build roads and settlements, then upgrade settlements into cities. The first player to reach a set number of victory points, usually 10, wins. Game Republic, Exozet Games and Big Huge Games share the credit for the PS3 version.

The board game came out in Germany in 1995, published by Kosmos. Players still put this version on their lists of favourite PS3 games. If you already own the cardboard version, this is the one with no pieces to lose.

Risk: Factions is the board game of world domination with five factions, each with its own abilities. Electronic Arts published it. Stainless Games, who also made Duels of the Planeswalkers, built it with Powerhouse Animation Studios. You can play by the classic rules or try the objective-based and world conquest scenarios. Local and online multiplayer are both in, with leaderboards to see how you stack up.

Players recommend it to anyone who wants a strategy game for friends. A full game is quicker than a night with the cardboard box, too.

Monopoly Streets was made for the board game's 75th anniversary. EA Salt Lake developed it for Electronic Arts, and it came out on October 26, 2010. It turns the board into a living city that you see at street level, from the cheap motels on Baltic Avenue to the luxury suites on Boardwalk. The rules are the ones you know, with new features such as property auctions, and you can play friends live and online.

Players still recommend it. It is still Monopoly, so expect at least one argument about the rules.

Bakugan Battle Brawlers is the first video game based on the Bakugan series. Now Production made it and Activision published it on PS3 as well as PS2, Xbox 360, DS and Wii. Matches are played on gate cards, and there are four ways to win one, including a double stand, where you land two Bakugan on the same card. Upgrade a Bakugan enough and you can fill a bar for a special shot based on its attribute.

In the story you work through tournaments, and beating Dan in the Master Cup makes you one of the Battle Brawlers. Players who grew up with the cartoon still list it among their favourite PS3 games. It is a toy tie-in that turned out better than it had to.

Poker Night 2 is a poker game from Telltale Games and the sequel to Poker Night at the Inventory. Like the first game, it puts characters from different series around one table. Claptrap is one of the players you face, and GLaDOS from the Portal series is the dealer, voiced by Ellen McLain. It came out in 2013, late in the PS3's life.

There is one warning. One player said it "is horribly optimized for PS3 and runs in a single digit frame rate on any system." If you can play it on another system, that is the safer choice.

Uno is the classic card game of matching colors and numbers, and Gameloft made this version. You can set your own house rules and penalties and throw down Action Cards like Skip and Reverse. Get rid of your hand before everyone else, and don't forget to shout "Uno!" when you're down to one card.

The video game had already done well on Xbox Live Arcade, where it came out in May 2006 and was well received by critics. Players name it among their favourite small PS3 downloads. It is cheap and simple, and nearly everyone already knows how to play.

Battle vs. Chess is a chess game from Targem Games, published by TopWare Interactive, and it came out in Europe on May 17, 2011. The pieces are animated fantasy figures, and every capture turns into a fight, chessman vs. chessman. Under the fantasy, the moves come from the Fritz 10 chess engine. There is no setting for a time limit, so at level 9 the computer can take up to a few hours to think.

It scored 69% on Metacritic, and Eurogamer.de gave it 90%. Many players had never heard of it. If you like chess, it is worth the hunt.

The Eye of Judgment is a trading card game from SCE Japan Studio that you play with real cards and the PlayStation Eye camera. Put a coded card on the battle mat in front of the camera and its creature comes to life to fight on screen. The mat has nine squares, and the first player to take five of them wins. Set 1 had 110 cards, and two expansion packs followed in 2008. Two players could also face each other online.

A PSP spin-off, The Eye of Judgment: Legends, came out in 2010 and played the same without physical cards. Players named it more than twice as often as any other game here. They remember it as a great idea, and it keeps turning up on lists of lesser-known PS3 exclusives. Playing it today means finding the camera and the cards as well as the disc.