Featured Image Credit: Photo by Greg Raines on Unsplash
Are you looking for a new game to play with your road trip partner? If so, we’ve got you covered.
Whether you are a couple, family, or friends, we’ve come up with a list of games to make your time in the car just as fun as the destination.
These games are sure to provide hours of entertainment and laughter between two people traveling together. And we promise once you try them out, they’ll become part of your go-to list every time you hit the road again!
So without further ado, let’s dive into 15 road trip games for two!
21 Questions
Let’s start with the all-time classic of road trip games for two people.
21 Questions is an iconic game that has lasted through the years for a reason. It’s fun, the rules are easy to pick up, and you can tailor the game to match everyone’s personality.
The game starts with one player thinking of a person, place, or thing in their mind. The other player then has 21 “yes or no” questions to guess what the first player is thinking.
Every question needs to have a yes or no answer.
If you’re trying to guess what someone else is thinking, it helps to start with broad questions that slowly narrow down to get it right.
You win the round if you can successfully guess what the other person is thinking within 21 questions. If you’re feeling a little extra competitive, you can assign points based on how many remaining questions you have before getting the correct answer.
Six Degrees of Separation
Here’s another road trip classic for two players, especially for movie buffs.
Six Degrees of Separation got a second wind when it became an iconic meme in the early days of the internet known as Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon.
The point of the game is straightforward. One player names two actors, and the other must connect them in six degrees of separation or less.
Here’s a classic example using Kevin Bacon.
“Kevin Bacon and William Shatner.”
William Shatner was in Festival in Cannes with Maximilian Schell, who starred in Telling Lies in America with Kevin Bacon.
There’s even a website called The Oracle of Bacon that can generate these degrees of separation if you two get stuck!
Fictional Road Trip Families
One of the most fun things about a road trip is all of the people that you’re going to meet on the way.
However, some of those people you “meet” are driving past you on the road at 60 miles an hour. While you don’t get enough time to meet them properly, that doesn’t mean you can’t tell a fun story about their lives.
The next time an interesting-looking car drives past you, the two of you can collaborate on a fictional story about the family inside that vehicle. Take turns adding elements of the story and see where it will lead you.
The Movie Game
Here is another one for film buffs.
This game starts with one person naming a movie and the other person naming an actor who starred in that film. The person who picks the movie then names another actor from that movie and a different movie that the actor starred in. The second player then repeats the process, and play continues until no one can name a new movie.
For a twist on this game, players can go back and forth naming actors, writers and directors, and production staff on movies until they cannot name anyone else involved with a given film.
Human Jukebox
Here’s a game for the musically inclined pair on a road trip.
Human Jukebox starts with one player singing the line from a song. Then the other player using the last word of that line to connects it to a brand new song.
Here’s an example:
Player 1 starts with a line from Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody: “So you think you can stop me and spit in my eye. So you think you can love me and leave me to die. Oh, baby, can’t do this to me, baby.”
Player 2 connects it with Britney Spears’s classic “…Baby One More Time.” When I’m not with you, I lose my mind. Give me a sign. Hit me, baby, one more time.”
And the song goes on!
Two Truths and a Lie
Two Truths and a Lie is more than a fun game. It’s a great way to get to know your travel companion.
Here’s how the game works:
Name two truths about yourself and one lie. For example, you could say, “I used to have blue hair, I once designed a video game, and my aunt is a world record holder for women’s rodeo.”
Your traveling companion will then have to guess which one of these is the lie and which one is the truth. And the fun part is that you can make your truth and lies as straightforward or as challenging to guess as you’d like.
This game is a fun way to explore your traveling companion’s personal history and find out unique and fun details about their life.
Name That Song: Radio Edition
Name That Song is a classic of road trip games for two.
The usual way of playing this has one player singing a line from a song and the other player guessing the song’s name.
However, you can play this game another way using local radio stations.
Turn on your radio and start scanning for random stations. Once you hear some music playing, the other player has to guess the name of the song and the artist before the song ends. You can take turns playing and score points based on who could get the most right answers.
This way of playing is fun because it allows you to get to know an area through its radio stations.
Fortunately Unfortunately
Fortunately Unfortunately is a game that can get weird pretty quickly. Therefore, it’s a great game if someone in the car has their crabby pants on.
It starts with one player saying something that starts with “fortunately: that’s positive and then the next player saying something negative about that same event starting with “unfortunately.”
Here’s an example:
“Fortunately, we got time off of work for this road trip.”
“Unfortunately, your boss got replaced by a zombie.”
“Fortunately, all those George Romero movies I watch have prepared me for this day.”
Continue this back and forth until you are ready to move on to the next game.
The Road Trip Memory Game
Here’s a fun game to test your memory skills.
The game starts with the first player saying, “I’m going on a road trip, and I’m bringing…”
They can name any person, place, or thing they want to bring with them on this road trip. Let’s say they said, “my guitar.”
The next player continues the game by saying, “I’m going on a road trip, and I’m bringing my guitar and…” and adding their own item.
The game continues until someone starts forgetting items on the list. Consider this game as a safe way to forget what you need to bring on your next road trip!
Radio Roulette
Radio Roulette can either be an exciting way to find new music you love or a challenging endurance test.
All you need to do is turn on the local radio stations and pick one at random. You have to keep this station on for an unbroken 10 minutes to complete a round of the game. After 10 minutes, you switch to the next radio station and keep playing.
You might find yourself in love with some local Polka you would have never thought to listen to. Or you might be battling through 10 minutes of local talk radio.
Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?
In the mood to win $1,000,000? Well, there might not be an actual stack of hundreds on the table, but you can have fun playing along.
The Who Wants To Be A Millionaire app is a great way to play a game with just two players on your next ride. One player gets to be the host of this iconic game show while the other gets to be in the hot seat with a shot at a cool million dollars.
And if you like these app-based games, there are plenty of others out there for two people looking to play road trip games together. Check out your app store for more games.
Did You Hear That?
No, this game isn’t about that strange noise coming from the engine. It’s a fun game that tests how up-to-date you and your travel companion are on current events.
This game can be about emerging events in the news, the latest updates from your favorite bands, or any other current events topic that the two of you are into.
To start this game, ask your travel companion, “Did you hear that X?” and replace the “X” with whatever current event you want to quiz them on.
Here’s the twist, the current event you just talked about doesn’t have to be real.
You’re trying to trick your travel companion into thinking that whatever you’re talking about really happened.
If you trick them, you win the round.
Cuisine Quest
As you travel throughout the country, you’re going to see sights that might seem a little strange.
And one of the most exciting things that changes as you move to the country is the local cuisine.
Next time you two stop at a gas station, each one of you has to purchase a food item that you’ve never seen before. The goal is to be the one who discovers the most unique local snacks on your road trip!
Bad Film Plots
Usually, when you play a game, you want to do everything right. However, Bad Film Plots has you intentionally doing everything wrong.
The goal of this game is to explain the plot of a movie as badly but as accurately as you possibly can. The other player then has to guess the film that you’re talking about correctly.
Let’s say you wanted to explain the plot of Terminator II: Judgement Day badly. You could say: “A down-on-her-luck working single mother makes an unlikely friendship as her son discovers a father figure.”
That might be a little tricky, but that’s the whole point of the game.
Local Trivia Night
One of the most significant advantages you have when taking road trips today is that you’ve got the whole internet by your side while you’re on the road.
Use that to your advantage and do a local trivia game while traveling.
One player gets to be the trivia master asking questions about the state you’re driving through, and the other person is in the hot seat attempting to come up with clever answers.
More Road Trip Fun
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Road Trip Questions For Couples: 149 Fun and Deep Conversation Starters
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Best Podcasts for a Long Car Ride
Best Road Trip Game Apps
