Unplug Play

Each player must come up with a group of “couples.” What is a couple? For this game, a couple is any two people or things that are somehow connected. You can use actual couples like Napoleon and Josephine, Charles and Diana, or Bill and Hillary. Or you can go with Patrick Swayze and Demi Moore from the movie Ghost, Robert Redford and Paul Newman from any number of movies they did together, or Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippin, who played together for the Chicago Bulls. In addition to pairing up well-known people who have some kind of connection, you can go in an entirely different direction and choose pairings like cheddar and swiss, bowl and spoon, chicken noodle and minestrone, spaghetti and linguini, or strawberries and cream.

NOTE: When creating couples, anything goes, as long as you can draw a definite connection. The more creative you are in this game, the more challenging and fun it will be for the players involved.

On index cards or small, evenly shaped pieces of paper, players create the game cards for each round of the game. Each player needs one notecard for every player in the game. (If there are an odd number of players, round down.) The couples will be split between two cards, so divide the total number of players in the game by two to see how many couples each player needs to create.

Each card will contain one part of one couple and will be a game piece for a different player in the game.

Write one part of a couple on one card and the other part of the couple on another card until there is one half of a couple written on each card. Don’t let anyone see what you write on any of the cards! In addition, write your name at the bottom of each card on the same side as the item so the player who gets the card knows who the item is from. Once you have created your game cards, mix them up and hand one card out to every player.

NOTE: With an odd number of players in the game, everyone will have one of your cards except you! With an even number of total players in the game, each player will have to keep one of his or her own cards. (For example, with seven total players, every player will have a total of six game cards, one from every other player in the game. With six total players, every player will also have a total of six game cards, but one of those cards will be your own.)

IMPORTANT: Do not let anyone see any of your cards!

Play begins with Player 1 asking if anyone has a specific person or thing that he feels is a match for one of his items. For example, if one of his cards is bat and it is from Dianne, he might say, “Does anyone have Dianne’s ball?” He must say the name of the person as well as the item he thinks may be out there as a match. The reason for this is because it is possible someone else in the game may also have the same card as part of a different couple (in this case, ball) and you don’t want two people acknowledging that they have the item. In this case, if Player 2 says, “Yes, I have Dianne’s ball,” then Player 2 must hand the ball game card over to Player 1 and Player 1 must show it to Dianne to confirm the match, just in case Dianne has something else matching with bat.

NOTE: Players shouldn’t say their own item out loud! You never want to reveal what you have to the whole group until the match is confirmed. In this case, if Player 1 says out loud that he has bat and Dianne says that it WASN’T the right match, now the rest of the group knows Player 1 has bat and someone will most likely easily take the match.

Then Player 2 (seated to the left of Player 1) goes and tries to find a match for one of her cards. If Player 2 says a word and nobody answers, then Player 2 has one strike and must try again when her turn comes the next time. Play continues to rotate to the left, and each player takes a turn trying to find a match for one of his or her items. If a player gets three strikes in a row (meaning on each consecutive turn for three turns), that player must immediately pass one of his or her cards to the player to the right. The player to the right now has another game card to try to match! After a player gives a card to the player to the right, the player who gave away a card starts fresh with another three strikes before he or she has to do that again.

IMPORTANT: Keep in mind that if there are an even number of players in the game, every player will be holding one of his or her own cards at the beginning of the game. You may not ask for a match for your own card since you know what the match is. Therefore, since you are unable to score with your own card, you should be ready to give that card away as soon as you have three strikes against you.

NOTE: The card you are given after a three-strike run may actually already be a match with one of your existing cards, and you can therefore get confirmation on the match from the player who created the couple once your turn comes around again. If you have a confirmed match, place both cards in your match pile, and your turn is over.

Eventually, all of the matches will be paired. The number of match cards you end up with is your total points for the round. The player with the most points wins!

TIP: It is recommended that you do not make your couples too difficult or too easy. Something in between always makes this game more interesting! You can also make them tricky by providing items in your group of couples that may match with more than one of your items. For example, with the word bat, the true match could have been glove and the actual match for ball may have been basket.

Let’s say one of Player 1’s items is bat, and he asks, “Does anyone have Dianne’s ball?” If ball was the actual match for bat (confirmed by Dianne, who submitted both), then Player 2, who had ball, must give her card to Player 1, who now has one match! Player 1 just earned two points for the match, and the other player has one less item to match for points. If ball wasn’t correct, that means ball and bat are obviously matches for other items in the game, and now everyone knows the word ball is out there and exactly who has it! Nobody is certain what Player 1 has on his card other than Player 1 and Dianne since it wasn’t revealed. You can only take an educated guess, and that may give someone an important clue about a potential match.