Pictionary, refereed
One word, both teams drawing it at once. I hold the word, run the clock, and keep the tally.
A round goes: the picking team chooses a theme, then one of three words worth 1, 2 or 3 points. Both teams draw that same word at the same time. First team to guess it takes the points. The picking team alternates each round.
Games save themselves after every round. Resuming restores the scores, the round number and the list of words already used, so a game continued next week still won't repeat a prompt.
These names appear on the two scoring buttons and the tally board. Rename either team mid-game from the scoreboard, so nicknames that emerge over the night are easy to adopt.
One phone means both drawers huddle around it and the picking team chooses the theme and card. A phone per team gives each drawer their own screen: rounds then deal themselves from a shared seed so every phone shows the same word with no network between them. Guests join by scanning a code.
One round is one word. At 90 seconds, ten rounds runs about 25 minutes with the chat between. When the last round finishes, whoever leads wins. You can also wrap up early at any point.
Sets which tier the three cards come from. Easy stays with plain objects. Medium spans objects to short phrases. Hard reaches into idioms and absurd mashups like "rusty werewolf mowing the lawn". Mixed varies it round to round.
How long both teams get on each word. The clock ticks once a second from 20 seconds left, twice a second from 10, and four times a second for the last 5. Pick 60 for a fast, loud game.
A knockout score. If a team reaches it, the game ends there even with rounds left. Choose "No target" to always play the full set of rounds.
Buttons give a short vibration and the clock ticks aloud. Vibration works on Android browsers; iOS Safari exposes no vibration API, so iPhones get sound only. Both can be toggled mid-game from the scoreboard.
One drawer from each team looks at the screen together. Everyone else: eyes off.
🐘 Animals · Worth 2
Pick a theme. Everyone gets told which one you chose - just not the word.
First team to shout it wins the points
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Fastest: point the built-in camera app at the code: it opens the game already joined. Otherwise open this same page on the other phone, tap "Join a game on this phone" and type the eight characters.
Type the eight characters from the host's phone, or scan the code.
Check the sync code matches the host's. If it doesn't, step this phone's round to line up.
🎨 Objects · Worth 2
The word was
Champion
Red takes it, 10 to 6.
Screen hidden
Tap anywhere when it's just the drawers looking.
Scores stand as they are and we go to the final tally.