Bowl of Nouns — The same twenty-four words, three times, and worse every time.

The party game with no box: everyone writes four nouns into one bowl, then three rounds over the same bowl — describe it, one word, act it out. 4 to 8 people, about 20 minutes.

This is the loudest thing on the shelf and the one that most reliably makes a team laugh at itself, because the bowl is theirs. The nouns that come out of it are the project everybody is sick of, the thing in the fridge, and somebody's dog — none of which any deck we could write would contain.

It wants people rather than cleverness, so it is a good fit for a group that has stopped needing an icebreaker and now just wants twenty minutes. Six or eight is right: enough voices that the third round is chaos, few enough that everybody takes a turn at the front.

A round

Fill the bowlDescribe itOne wordAct it out

On the sheet

+1Everyone on the describing side — per noun out of the bowl

the sameAll three rounds — describe it, one word, act it out

Also on

Games for a team of six Games for eight people at once Word games for a team Games for two teams

How to play Bowl of Nouns