August 11, 2019 10:16 AM CDT

Playing Jackbox Games with Remote Friends

Jackbox Games are hilariously fun. The games are designed to be played with all of the players in the same room. We have great friends who live far away, so I set out to find a way to play with them remotely. If you have the games on a PC or through Steam, you can use Steam Remote Play. Otherwise, for this to work, you’ll need:

2 computers
- Computer 1 – video game and google hangouts host
  - The Jackbox Games. I bought mine through steam.
  - Google hangouts account #1 – this account will share it’s screen (the Jackbox video game)
  - Use either VB-Cable or Loopback to get the game audio into the google hangout. You’ll probably need to adjust the game audio to be way lower.
- Computer 2 – regular computer
  - Google hangouts account #2 – this second account will be where you, the host, interact with the other guests via your webcam and
  - headphones
    - We either share a earbud each, or use a headphone splitter

Your friends will need:

A computer
Headphones
- We either share a earbud each, or use a headphone splitter
Google hangouts account

Once you have everything setup, all you need to do is start a call between your two computers. Computer 1 will be sharing its screen. Computer 2 is just your webcam. Invite your friends to the call. You’ll have to jump between the two computers to interact with the game, but once the game is started, you’re good to go. We had a blast doing this, and the lag is very minimal with google hangouts. I tested other streaming options, and there was too much lag, even though the quality of the stream was better.