The best Dungeon Crawler games 2026

Dungeon crawler board games are derived from dungeon crawl scenarios in role-playing games.

A dungeon crawl is a type of scenario in fantasy role-playing games where heroes navigate a maze environment (a "dungeon"), fight various monsters, avoid traps, solve puzzles, and loot all the treasure they can find.

Dungeon crawlers are tactical, cooperative, explorative.

So dungeon crawlers are tactical-combat, cooperative game with player(s) against environment (player vs. environment) or overlord game with exploration and a story-based goal (e.g. escape, kill a monster).

Common elements of dungeon crawler games:

  • Character progress/Leveling.
  • Equipment/loot
  • Solving puzzles
  • Random events
  • Traps

List of the best dungeon crawler games 2026

This list was last updated on June 2, 2026. There's also a print version for this list .
  1. Clank!: Catacombs

    The catacombs of the skeleton dragon Umbrok Vessna are mysterious and dangerous. Portals lead you through the depths of the dungeon, while shrines offer great riches to fearless explorers. Each trip into the catacombs is unique as you tile the dungeon layout, and you can play with the new dungeon deck or incorporate cards from previous games.

    Nominated for 2 awards.

    More details for Clank!: Catacombs
    • 👥 2 - 4 Players
    • ⏱️ 45 - 90 Minutes
    • 🧒 13+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  2. Cthulhu: Death May Die

    Cthulhu: Death May Die is an intense, cooperative board game set in the 1920s, drawing inspiration from H.P. Lovecraft's universe. Players take on the roles of daring investigators, embarking on a perilous mission to confront and eliminate Elder Gods.

    Nominated for 6 awards and won 1.

    More details for Cthulhu: Death May Die
    • 👥 1 - 5 Players
    • ⏱️ 90 - 120 Minutes
    • 🧒 14+ years old
    • 🧩 Medium difficulty
  3. Karak

    Beneath the crumbling walls of Karak Castle lies a labyrinth filled with treasures and monsters. Six brave adventurers enter, each with a unique trick to claim fortune, but they must outsmart their opponents, defeat monsters, and seize the dragon's gemstone. Players uncover the labyrinth tile by tile, engage in battles, and gather treasures, with the most successful adventurer being crowned the true master of Karak!

    Nominated for 2 awards and won 2.

    More details for Karak
    • 👥 2 - 5 Players
    • ⏱️ 45 Minutes
    • 🧒 7+ years old
    • 🧩 Immediately playable
  4. Looking for a really good game from game designer Jean-Baptiste Lullien 👨? Then we have just the thing: the list with the best Jean-Baptiste Lullien games 2026.

    The best games from Jean-Baptiste Lullien 🇫🇷👨 →
  5. Escape: The Curse of the Temple

    Escape: The Curse of the Temple is a cooperative, real-time board game that offers an exhilarating and unique gaming experience. The game's theme centers around players working together to escape a cursed temple before it collapses.

    Nominated for 11 awards and won 1.

    More details for Escape: The Curse of the Temple
    • 👥 1 - 5 Players
    • ⏱️ 10 Minutes
    • 🧒 8+ years old
    • 🧩 Immediately playable

    Video reviews for Escape: The Curse of the Temple

    • YouTube Review for the game "Escape: The Curse of the Temple" by Shut Up & Sit Down
      Video
  6. Mansions of Madness: Second Edition

    Mansions of Madness: Second Edition is a cooperative, app-enhanced board game that combines elements of horror and mystery. It's set in the same universe as Eldritch Horror and Elder Sign, offering an immersive narrative experience.

    Nominated for 9 awards.

    More details for Mansions of Madness: Second Edition
    • 👥 1 - 5 Players
    • ⏱️ 120 - 180 Minutes
    • 🧒 14+ years old
    • 🧩 Medium difficulty
  7. Zombicide (2nd Edition)

    Zombicide: 2nd Edition revitalizes the beloved cooperative board game franchise, offering both new and seasoned players an enhanced zombie-slaying experience. Since its original release in 2012, Zombicide has captivated gamers worldwide with its thrilling cooperative gameplay, where players band together as survivors in a zombie-infested apocalypse. This new edition breathes fresh life into the game with refined rules, updated mechanics, and new components designed to streamline play and enhance immersion.

    Nominated for 1 award.

    More details for Zombicide (2nd Edition)
    • 👥 1 - 6 Players
    • ⏱️ 60 Minutes
    • 🧒 14+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  8. Kinfire Delve: Scorn's Stockade

    • 👥 1 - 2 Players
    • ⏱️ 60 Minutes
    • 🧒 14+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  9. HeroQuest: First Light

    An introductory version of the HeroQuest system, this game offers new quests and compatibility with all expansions. Players embark on a journey as four heroes through dungeon quests, uncovering treasures, exploring impressive environments, and battling evil forces controlled by Zargon, the game master, on a dynamic double-sided game board. With stunning graphics and over 100 components, including a detailed dragon miniature and the ability to create custom quests, this game promises endless replay value and is perfect for fans of cooperative fantasy games.

    More details for HeroQuest: First Light
    • 👥 2 - 5 Players
    • 🧒 14+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  10. The Lord of the Rings: Journeys in Middle-Earth

    The Lord of the Rings: Journeys in Middle-Earth invites players to immerse themselves in the rich and legendary world created by J.R.R. Tolkien. This fully cooperative, app-supported board game is designed for one to five players, offering a unique blend of adventure, strategy, and storytelling set in the iconic landscapes of Middle-Earth.

    Nominated for 4 awards.

    More details for The Lord of the Rings: Journeys in Middle-Earth
    • 👥 1 - 5 Players
    • ⏱️ 60 - 120 Minutes
    • 🧒 14+ years old
    • 🧩 Medium difficulty
  11. Dungeon Fighter in the Castle of Frightening Frosts (Expansion)

    • 👥 1 - 4 Players
    • ⏱️ 45 - 60 Minutes
    • 🧒 8+ years old
    • 🧩 Immediately playable
  12. Monsters bring thrilling excitement to board games. These games feature fantastical creatures in various creative and scary ways.

    The Best Board Games with Monsters →
  13. Kinfire Delve: Callous' Lab

    • 👥 1 - 2 Players
    • ⏱️ 60 Minutes
    • 🧒 14+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  14. Dungeon Fighter (2nd Edition)

    Dungeon Fighter returns with a brand new second edition, building on its cooperative gameplay and crazy dice rolls. Explore the dungeon, face terrifying monsters, and battle your way to the final boss, utilizing optimized rules, new boards, heroes, weapons, and more.

    Nominated for 1 award.

    More details for Dungeon Fighter (2nd Edition)
    • 👥 1 - 6 Players
    • ⏱️ 45 - 60 Minutes
    • 🧒 8+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  15. Zombicide: Black Plague

    Zombicide: Black Plague is an exciting board game that takes the popular zombie apocalypse theme and transports it into a medieval fantasy world. This game is a fresh twist on the classic Zombicide series, offering players the chance to battle the undead hordes in an age of swords and sorcery.

    Nominated for 2 awards.

    More details for Zombicide: Black Plague
    • 👥 1 - 6 Players
    • ⏱️ 60 - 180 Minutes
    • 🧒 14+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  16. Arcadia Quest

    Arcadia Quest is an engaging, campaign-based board game where players lead guilds of heroes on a quest to overthrow a vampire lord and take back the city of Arcadia. It's a competitive yet cooperative game, filled with strategic battles against both other players and game-controlled monsters.

    Nominated for 1 award.

    More details for Arcadia Quest
    • 👥 2 - 4 Players
    • ⏱️ 60 Minutes
    • 🧒 13+ years old
    • 🧩 Medium difficulty
  17. Mini Rogue

    Mini Rogue is a minimalist dungeon crawler where one or two players venture into a deep dungeon to obtain a mysterious ruby called Og's Blood. Players must strategically manage their resources to survive increasingly difficult monsters and challenges. Randomly generated levels and encounters ensure that each playthrough is a unique experience.

    Nominated for 1 award.

    More details for Mini Rogue
    • 👥 1 - 2 Players
    • ⏱️ 30 - 45 Minutes
    • 🧒 12+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  18. Dungeon Fighter in the Catacombs of Gloomy Ghosts (Expansion)

    • 👥 1 - 4 Players
    • ⏱️ 45 - 60 Minutes
    • 🧒 8+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  19. Zombicide: Invader

    Humans journeyed to the stars in search of high-performance fuel and discovered it on the remote planet PK-L7, uncovering Xenium deep beneath its surface. However, they also faced a brutal onslaught from the Xenos, an unyielding swarm of infected creatures controlled by the game itself. Players take on the role of survivors in a sci-fi scenario, aiming to complete missions, defeat as many Xenos as possible, and, most importantly, survive.

    More details for Zombicide: Invader
    • 👥 1 - 6 Players
    • ⏱️ 60 Minutes
    • 🧒 14+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  20. Massive Darkness 2: Hellscape

    Ten years have passed since the Lightbringers pushed back the hordes of darkness and sealed the portal they came through. Though they believed their task was complete, dangerous new portals have suddenly opened across the land, allowing the darkness to return stronger than ever. Players must journey through these portals into the unknown to eliminate the darkness once and for all, determining whether light will prevail or darkness will consume every being in the world.

    More details for Massive Darkness 2: Hellscape
    • 👥 1 - 6 Players
    • ⏱️ 60 Minutes
    • 🧒 14+ years old
    • 🧩 Medium difficulty
  21. Dungeon Exit

    • 👥 1 - 2 Players
    • 🧒 8+ years old
    • 🧩 Immediately playable
  22. Descent: Legends of the Dark

    In Descent: Legends of the Dark, players dive deep into the troubled realm of Terrinoth, facing off against demonic barbarians, undead servants, and other dark forces threatening the land. This co-operative dungeon-crawling board game, enriched by an integrated free companion app, invites players to embark on the "Blood and Flame" campaign, spanning sixteen quests that weave a rich narrative full of danger and discovery. With its innovative use of 3D terrain and a host of hero and monster miniatures, the game promises an immersive adventure as players build their legends through strategic combat, exploration, and skillful management of their characters' abilities.

    Nominated for 5 awards and won 1.

    More details for Descent: Legends of the Dark
    • 👥 1 - 4 Players
    • ⏱️ 120 - 180 Minutes
    • 🧒 14+ years old
    • 🧩 Medium difficulty
  23. Shy Monsters

    Shy Monsters is an asymmetrical bluffing game for two players. One player builds a dungeon while the other attempts to escape from it. The Dungeon Master leads a group of shy monsters that must be respected in their favorite spots, or they won’t attack the hero. The hero must decode the structure of the dungeon and cleverly use its unique actions to escape alive.

    More details for Shy Monsters
    • 👥 2 Players
    • ⏱️ 10 - 15 Minutes
    • 🧒 10+ years old
    • 🧩 Immediately playable

    Video reviews for Shy Monsters

    • YouTube Review for the game "Shy Monsters" by BoardGameGeek
      Video
    • YouTube Review for the game "Shy Monsters" by BoardGameGeek
      Video
  24. Four Against Darkness

    Players select four character types from classic classes such as warrior, wizard, and rogue. They embark on solo dungeon-crawling adventures using only a book, a pencil, dice, and grid paper, generating room contents through random tables as they encounter monsters, manage resources, and complete quests. The game emphasizes strategy and progression without the need for miniatures or traditional role-playing elements.

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    More details for Four Against Darkness
    • 👥 1 Players
    • ⏱️ 45 - 75 Minutes
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  25. Nemesis

    Nemesis is a semi-cooperative, survival horror board game set in a sci-fi universe, offering an intense and immersive experience as players navigate a spacecraft infested with hostile alien organisms.

    Nominated for 8 awards and won 3.

    More details for Nemesis
    • 👥 1 - 5 Players
    • ⏱️ 90 - 180 Minutes
    • 🧒 12+ years old
    • 🧩 Medium difficulty
  26. Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion

    Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion is a standalone adventure game that serves as a prequel to the highly acclaimed Gloomhaven. It's designed to be more accessible to a broader audience, with streamlined rules and an integrated tutorial.

    Nominated for 13 awards and won 5.

    More details for Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion
    • 👥 1 - 4 Players
    • ⏱️ 30 - 120 Minutes
    • 🧒 14+ years old
    • 🧩 Hard to learn
  27. Wonder Book

    Oniria is the world of an ancient dragon civilization, described as an idyllic paradise filled with wonders created by dragons and surrounded by a vibrant wilderness. The only portal to this world is the Wonder Book, an ancient tome that lies dormant in a forgotten tower, waiting for you.

    Nominated for 1 award and won 1.

    More details for Wonder Book
    • 👥 1 - 4 Players
    • ⏱️ 60 - 90 Minutes
    • 🧒 10+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  28. Claustrophobia

    Claustrophobia is a thrilling, asymmetric miniatures-based game set in the dark, foreboding universe of Hell Dorado. The game pits a team of determined human heroes against a seemingly endless horde of demonic creatures, offering a richly thematic and intense gaming experience.

    Nominated for 5 awards.

    More details for Claustrophobia
    • 👥 2 Players
    • ⏱️ 45 Minutes
    • 🧒 14+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  29. Dungeons, Dice & Danger

    Gather your courage, grab your sword, and roll the dice as you travel through the realm in search of treasure and glory. Explore deep, dark dungeons filled with treasures and monsters. Will you become a legendary hero?

    More details for Dungeons, Dice & Danger
    • 👥 1 - 4 Players
    • ⏱️ 45 - 60 Minutes
    • 🧒 12+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  30. Zombicide: Undead or Alive

    The harsh landscapes of the West test a person's courage with threats from cattle rustlers, bandits, and deadly creatures. Now, the recently deceased rise from their graves to attack the living, turning the town into chaos. This version introduces new survivor types like the gunslinger and the townfolk, each with unique rules, alongside fresh mechanics like balconies and trains to challenge players in exciting ways.

    More details for Zombicide: Undead or Alive
    • 👥 1 - 6 Players
    • ⏱️ 60 Minutes
    • 🧒 14+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  31. Stuffed Fables

    Stuffed Fables offers a unique and imaginative adventure where players embody heroic stuffed animals ("stuffies") on a mission to protect the child they cherish from an ominous villain. This game stands out as the first "AdventureBook Game" from Plaid Hat Games, blending storytelling, strategy, and a dynamic game board all within a single, vividly illustrated book.

    Nominated for 4 awards.

    More details for Stuffed Fables
    • 👥 2 - 4 Players
    • ⏱️ 60 - 90 Minutes
    • 🧒 7+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn

    Video reviews for Stuffed Fables

    • YouTube Review for the game "Stuffed Fables" by BoardGameGeek
      Video
  32. Catacombs

    Catacombs is a unique blend of action and strategy, set in a dark and treacherous catacomb full of monsters and a formidable Catacomb Lord. This dexterity-based board game pits one player, the Overseer, who controls the dungeon's monsters, against the other players who control four heroes with distinct abilities.

    Nominated for 4 awards and won 1.

    More details for Catacombs
    • 👥 2 - 5 Players
    • ⏱️ 30 - 60 Minutes
    • 🧒 12+ years old
    • 🧩 Easy to learn
  33. Looking for a really good game from game designer Lorenzo Silva 👨? Then we have just the thing: the list with the best Lorenzo Silva games 2026.

    The best games from Lorenzo Silva 🇮🇹👨 →

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