Round up four to eight friends and place the Score Card in the middle. Give each player a clip, a board (attach these together) and a pen. Admire the new drawing in front of you. Grab a blank Scrawl Card, clip it over the illustration and write down a description of what you are looking at. Again, everyone pass their clipboard to the left. Move over charades, take a hike twister, and pass the parcel can… you get the idea. Because this party game is the latest and craziest thing to hit gatherings, and is sure to leave you in stitches. Meet Scrawl. The game comes complete with enough bits and pieces for 4- 8 players to play at any one time. These include eight player board Harrison (12) isn’t blessed with the skills of Da Vinci. I don’t think he would mind me saying it isn’t his forte in life. However, he gave it a go and relaxed into it. You see, it doesn’t really matter how well you can draw, as the game is more funny when the drawing is woeful! Even good drawings can lead to bad guesses. That is the joy of Scrawl!

The game starts by all players taking a card with scenario card, with a phrase that the player must illustrate. Once drawn, the doodle is then passed to the player on their left who then proceeds to try and guess what has been drawn and writing it on a new board, that being placed over the drawing, which is then passed on to the player to your left. This continues (drawing and writing) until you end up with your original board that should, hopefully, have more doodles and phrases placed above it! Each player will then see what journey their picture has taken and everyone votes on their favourite doodle for each player! That proud artist will then receive a point! Overall, as a family we had a lot of laughs sitting around the table passing ludicrous things to each other. The cards aren’t easy to depict. For example how would you draw ‘Pooing on a pigeon’ or ‘Tasering a Sloth’? I know what you’re thinking, this is the family version? Yes, yes it is! Scrawl Adult Yellow Box Edition If you have ever fancied yourself as the next Monet or Van Gough, then Scrawl is a game that should suit you perfectly well. This adult party game comes from the creative minds of Big Potato Games, famous for games such as Obama Llama. Scrawl, as described by the creators as “chinese-whispers meets Pictionary” is a game of frantic doodling and some “innocent” misunderstanding that sees players trying to guess what the awful doodle in front of them is trying to depict, while also letting their inner Picasso out and attempting to draw the phrase they have been given.

Scrawl seems to be one of those games that gets to the table more often when playing with people that aren’t heavily into modern board gaming. That’s not to say that this won’t be played by those that adore heavy-Euros, but in my experience it isn’t played all that much at game nights, rather social gatherings.

You may be forgiven for taking a passing glance at Scrawl, and being immediately overcome with terror as you recollect the many incidents and feuds that came out of playing Pictionary with the family – Nobody wants to repeat the great family squabble of December 1993… Big Potato Games, a UK based company specialising in party games, decided enough is enough – something had to be done – People need to draw and have fun! Aimed at ages 17+ things get a little saucier with the adult version. Swear words and sexual references are frequent. Choosing slightly less racy cards as examples for the purpose of this family-friendly review, you might be asked to draw a ‘Touchy-feely geography teacher’ or ‘Pulling a Hat out of a rabbit’. Now the cards do get more ‘adult’ than that. As a result, you find your mind wandering to that way of thinking. All of a sudden ‘Dreaming of Bacon’ is misinterpreted and transformed into something it shouldn’t be… EVER! Players then doodle their best interpretation of the card. The only rule – no words allowed. Once everyone has completed their masterpiece, they attach another blank Scrawl sheet to their board and pass it to their left. This player has to become art connoisseur and write down a description of what they believe has been drawn. Again, a blank Scrawl sheet is added to the pad and play is passed on with the next player having to draw what is now written on the card. In the very unlikely event that your original Scenario Card matches the final Scrawl Card in your clipboard, feel free to break into applause. You (the owner of the clipboard) win an automatic three points! When guessing, I often find myself trying to make a common phrase from the picture before me. It rarely is a well-known saying, but my brain is preprogramed to still work like that.The rules in Scrawl are simple. Each player will nominate a colour, and then take a Phrase/Scenario Card, and begin attempting to draw their best interpretation of it onto their player board (the colour nominated determines which phrase/scenario the player has to draw). Once they are done, they pass their board face down to the player on their left. Other players around the table will be doing the same thing simultaneously. The game comes complete with enough bits and pieces for 4- 8 players to play at any one time. These include eight player boards and bulldog clips, enough Scrawl dry-wipe cards for people to write/draw on as the game progresses, 240 multi-choice phrase/scenario cards, and eight dry-erase pens and cloths. Wipe down all the Scrawl Cards, grab a new Scenario Card and start again. The game ends once a player collects two more points than the number of people playing (or if there's a fire).