How to play Picture Telephone

Picture Telephone is the old party game of telephone, played with a pencil. A word turns into a drawing, the drawing into a word, and so on around the table, and nobody knows where it started until the sheets come back. People have played it with paper and pencils for generations, sometimes under sillier names. Here you can play it three ways.

How a round goes

• Everyone has a sheet. Pick one of three words to start yours. Only you see them.
• Then everyone works at the same time, each on one sheet. If you get a word, draw it: no letters or numbers. If you get a drawing, write what it looks like.
• When everyone is done, every sheet moves one seat on. You only ever see the last thing on the sheet in front of you (if someone ran out of time before writing a word, the one drawing gets the last word written on it).
• When the sheets have gone all the way around, they come back and are shown one by one, from the first word to the last.

Points

Each time someone writes the same word a drawing was meant to be, the one who drew it and the one who wrote it score 1 point each. Capitals, "a" or "the" and plurals do not matter, but spelling does: "horse" is not "house". When the word changes, nobody scores for that drawing, and the sheet goes on with the new word. After the last round, the most points wins. A sheet that comes home as something else entirely is not a loss: it is usually the best laugh of the night.

Against the computer

Play with two to five computer players, for one to three rounds. The computer reads your drawing for real: it compares your lines with every drawing in its sketchbook and writes the one it looks most like. It can only draw what is in its sketchbook, so when you write what you see, start typing and tap the word in the list. Easy computers often take a drawing for something close to it; Sharp ones always write what it looks like most.

Game night with friends

Choose Play with friends and send the link, or read out the four-letter table code. Everyone plays on their own phone or tablet and writes whatever they like. Open the TV link on the TV's web browser: it shows who has passed their sheet on, and then all the sheets as they come back, big enough for the whole room. There is a clock for each drawing or word (one to two minutes); when it runs out, the phone passes on what it has. The computer does not play in this game, so give every person a seat.

Pass the tablet

Three to eight people around one phone or tablet. The game tells you whose turn it is: pass it to them, they tap Show me, do their drawing or word while the others look away, and pass it on. The sheets come back for everyone to see together.

Tips

• Draw the one thing that gives the word away, big and in the middle. A cat needs ears and whiskers, not a background.
• Write the simplest word for what you see. One or two words, not a sentence.
• Drawing something hard? Draw what it does or where you find it.

Questions

Can the computer really read my drawing? Yes, in its own way: it never knows what you were asked to draw. It compares your lines with its sketchbook. Clear, simple drawings it reads almost every time; a quick scribble often becomes something else, just like at a real table.

How many people can play? Three to eight around one tablet, two to eight with friends on their phones, and three to six against the computer.

Do I need an account? No. Your game is saved in this browser, so you can close the page and come back.