Description: Catch Phrase is a group party game that combines word guessing with hot potato. The rules are simple – everyone sits in a circle and every OTHER person is on the same team. Before beginning, being the control freak that I am, I always have everyone on my team raise their hands and take a look around to make sure we are clear about whose side we are on.
The game is played by passing an electronic pod around the circle as a sound timer gets faster and faster. When you have the pod, you attempt to get someone on your team to guess the word or phrase that appears on the screen. Once they guess it, you pass to the next player. It’s as simple as that! Get it out of your hands as quickly as possible so the timer goes off while the opposing team is holding it because that’s how your team gets a point. The first team to get to 7 points… WINS!
Words or phrases that appear on the screen can fall into different categories of your choosing that. I almost always set it to “Everything” so it consists of a good mix. Some examples of things that have appeared are - Dead as a Doorknob, Chicago Cubs, and Nicole Kidman.
This is possibly my favorite board game of all time. It makes for a fantastic ice-breaker and is perfect to bring out when a party starts falling into a lull. Everyone that has ever played ends up LOVING it. It keeps players on their toes and suddenly each person is shouting out, high fiving and laughing. My friends and family are always asking me to bring it to get-togethers.
PROs:
- No game board or pieces to worry about (the pod is the entire game)
- Portable
- No set-up or clean-up
- Easy to understand and explain to others
- Simple score keeping
- Doesn’t require too much interaction unless you WANT it to
- Includes plenty of phrases (10,000 words according to wikipedia)
– I have yet to experience any repeats
CONs:
- Sometimes the guessing team gets very excited and loud as the timer keeps ticking away after it is passed, so the next team is at a disadvantage because they can’t hear the person explaining over the noise
- Eventually the phrases will run out and there is no way to update it to get new ones
- If you accidentally bump a TEAM button, they are given a point and there is no way to take this back
- Cannot be played with an odd number of people
*** One little trick that I learned from a very competitive friend is that even if you don’t know or understand the word presented to you or your team gets stuck – you can break it down by syllables or smaller words. For example, if you didn’t know what “Gryffindor” was… besides making me very disappointed about your knowledge of Harry Potter… you could say the first syllable is a mythical hawk-like creature (griffon) and the second syllable is something you open to walk in and out of a room (door).
FINAL RATING:
