[socalgal2]

You might be right. Maybe it's solely cultural inertia and the fact that there are tons of izakaya that can take a group from 2 to 24 and up, whereas there aren't many places to play boardgames. You can offer someone's house but that's usually less convenient geographically in my experience.

Someone's house might not be clean, they have to plan ahead. Someone's house might not have snacks. They either have to get some or else do potluck but potluck requires everyone to plan ahead. Someone's house likely doesn't have as much variety so people have to settle for what's available. Someone's house doesn't have a waiter and cooking staff so people can be stuck in the kitchen. I guess you can order doordash/pizza to solve some of that. Though if you want something else it's not going to arrive in 3-5 mins like an izakaya. It will be 20-40mins. Someone's house might not seat as many people (regularly had 25-30 people show up). Someone's house you might need to keep quiet (like an apartment). Someone's house might have pets (so people with pet allergies can't come).

Yea, I know you didn't say "someone's house" but I don't know where else I could break out a deck of cards. Most restaurants/bars won't allow it AFAIK so that's what made me think of people's homes.

[Symbiote]

The cards was an aside.

What you describe sounds very similar to going to a pub in Britain, a tapas bar in Spain or a beer hall in Germany. (Presumably some traditional American equivalent, but I don't know the name.)

"And sometimes going to 2nd, 3rd, or 4th outings" is called a pub crawl or bar crawl in English.

[socalgal2]

I think pub in Britain, tapas bar in Spain, beer hall in Germany are all similar to izakaya in Japan. In the USA though, the USA arguably doesn't have an analog to those. The USA has sports bars. Sports bars have 12 to 50 TVs up to watch sports. It's not the same vibe at all. Sports bars have very bad food, unlike izayaka (and maybe tapas bars).

In the USA you also generally have to drive which limits the drinking. I don't know about Germany/Spain/Britain in general but certainly places like Berlin/Barcelona/London it's easy to go out drinking without having to drive.