Games you only need your hands and other players to play.
We all know rock paper scissors, thumbwars and chopsticks but I’m looking for niche.
There’s many obscure or local ones that get passed down through generations or shared around the playground and I’d love to learn something new.
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How about eye games? Because Laser Eyes!
Stand in a circle with a group and have one person call out the actions EYES DOWN and then EYES UP. When your eyes are down, choose a person to look at when you raise your eyes. If they also choose to look at you, you both scream in fake pain and die a dramatic death on the ground. You’re out, but you got to be silly for a moment there, so that was kinda fun
Play continues until one or two people remain. I forget if there’s an in-game way to break ties. Maybe you both win? Sure! Kids love it, though the screams can be ear-splitting
Kind of a fast action rock paper scissors we call shoot-load-shield. Maybe people called it 007
Two players face each other, tap twice in their lap or on a table with both hands, then have to choose an action:
Load - point thumbs over your shoulder. This loads your weapon
Shoot - make double pistol hands toward your opponent. This fires your weapon
Shield - crossed arms in front of your chest. This blocks your opponents shot.
You have to load before you can shoot, and if you shoot you have to reload. Most people load first round since you are both unloaded to begin with.
To incentivize not just shielding every turn, you can play with the rule that if you load six rounds without shooting, you get a shield penetrating bullet. But we rarely did that because people would shoot just for fun anyway.
Here’s a video of kids learning to play. Skip to about a minute to see it in full action. We play much faster: https://youtu.be/rNugwEOZ3JE?si=oqoDETuUVdQvG4vh
Side note: looking for a video, a kid had made a tutorial that added “reflector” that bounces your opponent’s shot back. I like that idea if you have to reload the reflector, too
whats the one called, maybe hot hands? one person puts out both hands palm up and the other person puts both hands on top of them palm down. the bottom person tries to quickly slap a hand of the top person, while the top person tries to avoid the hand slap. once a slap connects, they switch sides. pro-tip: remove hand jewelry first.
another one that might not count is paper football, as it needs a table and a triangular folded piece of paper. one player tries to slide the paper so that it stops partially off the table without falling off. if it does then they take a field goal flick in the air shot while the opponent makes goal posts with their hands together.
another one that might not count needs a table and 3 coins is table soccer. flick slide one coin between the other two until in scoring range, then the opponent makes a goalpost and goalie hand formation with 2 pinkies and an index finger. a successful shot on goal can hurt the knucles.
I’ve only played a version of the first where the bottomperson has to tickle the palms of the top person. That way you can like play around with faking slap attenpts by stopping for an instant but not slap, or varying the tickle speed. Adds another dimension to it.
There’s one called Double Tap. Not sure it qualifies, as it requires a table and chairs.
Everyone places their hands in front of the person sitting to each side. That is, you’ll have your right neighbor’s left hand to the left of your right hand, and vice versa.
The starting direction is clockwise. The goal is for each hand at the table to tap sequentially. Someone taps a hand, and the hand to the left of it (ie. clockwise) has to tap and so on. It’s a bit confusing, because everyone has arms crossed with each other and the hands in front of you aren’t yours.
Instead of tapping once, you can choose to double tap, which changes the direction (clockwise to counter-clockwise, or vice versa).
If someone messes up, that hand is removed from the table (all others remain where they are). Last person (or two or three) remaining wins.
That’s pretty cool for big groups.
We had a verbal game that was similarly confusing called “I went to the market”
Would you mind sharing the game?
Sure. It’s better with 4 or more players.
At first every player is assigned a number. Then one person starts.
They say “I went to the market with (another player’s number)”. That player has to quickly respond “Why with (their number)?”. The first player says “Then with what?”, they say “With (any other player’s number)”.
For example: 1 says “I went to the market with 2”. 2 has to say “Why with 2?”. 1 has to say “Then with what?”, 2 says “With 4”. 4 has to respond “Why with 4?” and so on so it’s a call and response game.
Repeat until someone gets confused, makes any mistakes or takes too long to respond. When they do, the person that flustered them gets to assign them a new name. This replaces their number, they have to answer to it and everyone has to use it now. Generally these are insults as this is a rowdy game between friends but of course they can choose whatever they want.
If someone makes more mistakes after being assigned a nickname you add adjectives to it. Eventually you’ll get things like:
“I went to the market with fat smelly pig”
“Why with fat smelly pig?”
“Then with what?”
“With arrogant ass”
And so on.
After 3 adjectives you’re eliminated and everyone continues until 1 person is left.
It’s confusing because you gotta keep track of everyone’s names and your own and answer quickly.
Has anyone said Mercy yet?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercy_(game)
It’s not really a fun game though IMO lol
What about the old clapping rhyme games? They’re more cooperative than competitive, trying to keep going faster and faster without messing up. Traditionally for girls but for no real reason. Plenty of sources online for rhymes and the hand motions that go with them
Oh, and I almost forgot about Bloody Knuckles.
The version of bloody knuckles that we had at school was you put your fist on the table vertically, knuckles towards your opponent. Then you take turns flicking a coin at each other’s knuckles.
Hmm, I remember that one too but I just remember it being called “quarters,” since they were largest, heaviest coin with an abrasive edge, so that’s what was used.
Same though we would spin a quarter and then take turns flicking it while still spinning to maintain the spin; whoever knocked it over took the penalty flick against their knuckles.
I’d not encountered Bloody Knuckles before, but we did have the card variant when I was at school - the trick being to get a new pack, flex it a little and push the card so that all the edges are available to strike the knuckles in rapid succession. I was extremely good at it, as i recall, both in inflicting and (particularly) withstanding the pain.
We knew this game as Scabby Queen. Evidently there is an actual card game called that, it seems, with the knuckle skinning merely the end result. We did not bother with the game part (or even know about it) - just the knuckle skinning.
We had 2 games we used to play that I haven’t been able to find online. One I think is common but I just can’t find it, the other is nonsensical and probably super local.
A Chinese one I grew up calling 15 20. Very stressful game for me lol
Reminds me of a game we learned from some south Asian students at my school called odd even.
It’s a 2 player game. First the players choose odd or even. They bump fists with one hsnd, and show a number at the same time. 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5. Their numbers are added up and the result is checked if it’s odd or even. Whoever called it right wins. But wait that’s not the actual game it’s just the deciding round. Like the coin toss before the soccer game
Whoever won the deciding round picks “bowling” or 'breaking". Whichever one they pick the other player is the other.
Both players bump fists and show a number(1-6 with only thumb being raised meaning 6) at the same time. The bowling player’s goal is to show the same number as the breaking player. If the numbers are different the value of the breaking player’s hand is added to their score(starts at 0) and players bump fist again and again until the bowling player calls it right. When they do the breaking player’s score is saved and players swap positions. They play one more game the same way with the new breaking player’s goal being to exceed the score of the original breaking player. If they do they win. If they’re stopped before that they lose.
Professional Wrestling is fun to watch
Thumb wars. Not only is it a fun game, it is also a very funny Star Wars parody film using thumb puppets made by Steve Oedekerk (same guy who did Kung Pow).
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