What do I have in my pocket?

June 8, 2009 4:36 PM

CHATFILTER: Looking for games of the 'exquisite corpse' variety that can be played by adults and require nothing more than creativity and intelligence. Ideally, we'd even dispense with pen and paper.

We like to entertain ourselves with arguments, riddles, thought experiments, and surrealist games. I'm looking for some new forms or ideas to add to the repertoire and wow my friends.

posted by anotherpanacea to human relations (23 comments total)

These are pen and paper games, but my friends and I get great joy out of them.

(PocketMod)
posted by litterateur at 4:42 PM on June 8

There's a game I love called Farting Yoda or something like that (I think that name was made up by friends of friends who taught me).

Anyway, you need about 7 or more people. You fold up a long rectangular piece of paper like an accordion (basically just little rectangles), so you can write on the top fold and not see the next fold.

The first person writes a phrase that can be drawn. The more graphic the better. Something like "The King takes his kids to the pool". You pass that to the next person in the circle. That person sees the phrase, then draws a picture of it in the next square. They then fold the phrase over so the next person can't see it. The next person interprets the drawing and writes a new phrase below the drawing, and so on, till you get back to the original.

Everyone is doing this, btw. If you have 7 people, then you get 7 papers. Depending on the imagination of your friends, and how bad their drawing skills are, you can get some really bizarre little interpretations.

Seriously the most fun I've had in a long time. I almost wet my pants. Depends a lot on who you are playing with. Starting phrases out with poop seems to work well for LOLs.
posted by sully75 at 4:53 PM on June 8 [2 favorites has favorites]

Previously.
posted by Jaltcoh at 4:56 PM on June 8

Here's another.
posted by Jaltcoh at 4:59 PM on June 8

I think farting Yoda is called "Eat poop you cat" in my circle.
posted by JonnyRotten at 5:03 PM on June 8 [1 favorite has favorites]

I like a game called 'guess the thing.' The rules are simple: One person thinks of a thing, and then the other people each make one guess at what it is. Whoever is closest wins and gets to think of the next thing to be guessed.

The fun comes from thinking of things: Any 'thing' is allowed, and people often make up elaborate stories to explain the context for their thing. Example: The thing I am thinking of is: Imagine you are a high school senior in 1999. You go to the theater and see a film called The Matrix, and it immediately blows your mind and introduces all sorts of new and interesting thoughts that you've never even considered before. You are so intrigued by the philosophical questions brought up by the film that you major in philosophy at college: Through the next four years, you never return to The Matrix, wanting to see it for the second time only once you have your degree in hand. You labor through undergrad, learning about Foucault, Plato, Derrida, etc etc. Finally, on the day of graduation, with your diploma still in your car, you sit down in front of a DVD player and watch your favorite film. The thing I am thinking of is: your disappointment.

The criteria by which you choose who is closest is also entirely up to the person whose thing is being guessed. If my thing is snowflakes, and Jane guessed popsicles and Tom guessed Rorschach from Watchmen, I could say that Jane guessed correctly because popsicles are cold, or I could say that Tom guessed correctly because Rorschach is symmetrical. Once everyone has said what their guess it, the person who is 'it' explains what his/her thing was, and then announces the winner and why.

It's a ton of fun, and allows for goofy creativity with just enough structure to keep you going for an hour or so.
posted by shakespeherian at 5:28 PM on June 8 [3 favorites has favorites]

To put a physical aspect into the mix try Wing Chun Chi Sao exercises. Equipment needed: two people and enough room to stand in. Think of it as fencing without blades.
posted by EnsignLunchmeat at 5:48 PM on June 8

Eat Poop You Cat previously (and previously-er).
posted by chr1sb0y at 5:55 PM on June 8

I am boldly linking back to my answer to a previous similar question where I explained our (husband and I) pet game, Nut. I just like the idea of others playing it on warm front porches with ice teas and bowls of fancy cherries this summer.
posted by rumposinc at 6:29 PM on June 8

I explained the game Contact in this thread, and it's so amazing that I will copy-paste!



Basically, it's an awesome word game requiring a minimum of three players. Let's call them A, B, and C.

A starts out by choosing a word without telling anyone what it is. The longer, the better. Say his word is dinosaur; he tells B and C the first letter (D). Now B and C have to think of words that begin with D. Once B, for example, thinks of a word beginning with D, he tries to describe it to C and if C understands, he yells "CONTACT ONE TWO THREE" and then they have to say the word together.
Example situation: B has thought of the word dog. He says to C, "A common household pet". He could even say "Skip" if that's the name of his dog (as long as there are no inside jokes and stuff involved because it ruins the game. Everyone has to be able to understand the definition). C gets what he means and yells "CONTACT ONE TWO THREE" and together they both yell "DOG".
While they are doing this, A has the opportunity to sabotage things for them by yelling out B's word before C gets a chance to yell "CONTACT ONE TWO THREE" and then the word. If so, B and C keep thinking up different words beginning with the letter D. If, however, B and C have done the ritual and said the word together before A did, then A has to give them the next letter of the word, in this case i.
Now B and C have to find words that begin with 'di'. This continues until B and C manage to guess the word.
If persons D and E are also playing, they just join in to B and C's team, shouting definitions and trying to guess. And of course the players only need one other person to say their word, not the whole group.

Imaginary Scenario:

A: D!
B: Common household pet...
C: CONTACT ONE TWO-
A: dog!
C: successor of pokemon...
B: CONTACT ONE TWO THREE
B and C: DIGIMON
A: okay, DI.
B: the ___ stole my baby!

etc, etc.

It's a long explanation but it's a very uncomplicated game and loads of fun to play! My friends and I became addicted a few months back and every time we meet up at least 15 minutes are spent on Contact.



Another cool game is where someone chooses a letter and then two people have to have a conversation in which the first letter of the first word someone says each time they go to speak starts with the letter. And you can't repeat words! And what you say has to make sense in the context of the conversation.

Say the letter is D, for example:

A: Dude, I heard you ate that dog!
B: Dogs are yummy, what can I say!
A: Don't do that, man, it's unhealthy
B: Dimwits could think there was something wrong with eating a dog
A: Dang nabbit, don't you call me a dimwit!

etc.
posted by alona at 8:36 PM on June 8 [1 favorite has favorites]

The one I have is better when you have people who don't know the trick of it. It's something my godparents' kids taught me once -- they called it "going on a picnic."

One person starts by announcing that he's going on a picnic, and he names two things he's going to bring. the thing is -- there is something thematic about these items that he has in mind. Then other people name two things they each would bring, and he tells them whether or not they can go. Once everyone's made their guesses, the person who's leader starts again, naming another two things he'd bring...and eveyrone else also gets to try again, with the leader telling them whether or not they guessed the theme right by saying whether they can go on the picnic. You keep at it until everyone figures out the theme.

For instance -- the first time I played, the theme was your initials. So I could bring (using my handle name) egg salad and cucumbers. Or, elephants and carpaccio. Or estrogen and corn. You get the idea. We were just kids, so it took us all long enough to just get that one theme, but I imagine that if you had a number of quick-witted adults you could have each new leader pick their own theme and everyone takes turns guessing this way.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:54 PM on June 8

The opposite game! e.g. What is the opposite of vanilla ice cream? What is the opposite of Dave Navarro? What is the opposite of carpenter ants? What is the opposite of a walk on the beach?
posted by unknowncommand at 9:21 PM on June 8

Oh, and also the game where everyone yells a word on the count of three. And then, on the next count of three, they yell the word that the words of the last round reminded them of. Etc etc, until finally everyone says the same word. Fun.
posted by unknowncommand at 9:28 PM on June 8 [1 favorite has favorites]

Mafia, or Gangsters and Villagers, or Assassin is pretty good. Requires about 12 playing cards to assign rôles, but you can use slips of paper or coins or whatever else you have around, and after that it's all conversation. Good for finding out which of your friends are merciless and expert liars.
posted by Cantdosleepy at 3:44 AM on June 9 [1 favorite has favorites]

My friends and I are pretty much in love with the same game that sully75 described, except we call it "Telephone Pictionary".

Seriously, if you haven't played, you haven't lived!
posted by Cygnet at 5:17 AM on June 9

Check out the game called Times Up. Great game. Only a few cards. Endless possibilities.
posted by Takeyourtime at 8:30 AM on June 9

A bunch of music nerds and I played a game once where we came up with the "opposite" band name of band names and album and song titles we liked. We were pretty forgiving with the "opposite" requirement since most words don't have an exact antithesis. The fun is both coming up with them, and trying to guess what real band someone else is referring to.

Examples:

Television Butt (Radiohead)

White Butterfly Terribly Greyscale (Black Moth Super Rainbow)

Vampire-Slayer Weekday (Vampire Weekend)

Clean LCD Screens (Dirty Projectors)

Postfuse -73 (Prefuse 73)

Boy Silence (Girl Talk)

Dim White Evening Darkness (Bright Black Morning Light)
posted by Juliet Banana at 10:56 AM on June 9 [1 favorite has favorites]

sully75's game is also known as Broken Picture Telephone.

Have you ever heard of the game that's really fun called the game of questions? Did you know that it's a game that you play by holding a conversation consisting entirely of questions? Doesn't that sound fun?
posted by Night_owl at 10:59 AM on June 9

The Pronoun Game: Have a conversation without using pronouns.
posted by NikitaNikita at 1:57 PM on June 9

Telephone Pictionary, Botticelli, Celebrity (which I have heard called Password/Celebrity Password), "the Celebrity game" (player 1 names a well-known person, player 2 names another person whose first name starts with the first letter of the previous named person's last name, etc.), and 1000 Blank White Cards are all funtime hits.
posted by quatsch at 2:27 PM on June 9

If getting up and acting things out is not a deterrent, Telephone Charades is incredible for large-ish groups (preferably at least 7+), and has the same promise of deliciously ludicrous mutations as Eat Poop You Cat/Telephone Pictionary/Pictionary Down The Lane (my set's preferred moniker).

">A guide to play. It's easy, dudes.

Themes my friends have used: being a platypus, the "bring out yer dead!" scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, a day in the life of Tim R. (one of our friends famous for consuming a lot of tubular meats and incessantly building things) -- the best ones are a little meta, in my experience, but of course it depends on personal sense of humor.
An example gesture mutation:
- platypus swimming motion --> ?? --> ?? --> cupping a small item near one's ear and slowly opening and closing palms as if hinged on one side, listening intently (as to a tiny tiny bird)

Laying an egg in this scenario also had degenerated by the second interpretation to delivering an awful fart and frantically dispersing it with platypus flippers.
posted by dorothy humbird at 6:47 AM on June 11 [1 favorite has favorites]

Rats! Here's a proper link:

E-how Telephone Charade Instructions

Have at!
posted by dorothy humbird at 6:52 AM on June 11

We play a game for keeping kids amused and also helps them to learn. I call it Guess What.

I say Guess What
They say Guess What What.
I say Guess what kind of house I am (Apartment, bungalow, castle, cottage etc.)
The child who guesses correctly has the next go at saying Guess What
Guess "What What" always has to be said.
We have come up with hundreds of things what kind of boat,shoe,car, colour, nationality.country. Kids love it and its educational. Also stops them kicking lumps out of each other in the car.
posted by cheekybisom at 9:54 AM on June 11