Codenames

Are you ready to go undercover and infiltrate the enemy? Codenames is a simple, yet really fun, fast-paced party game that entertains all participants, whether you're playing with family, friends, or someone you've just met.

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Codenames is a card game from 2015 for 4-8 players designed by Vlaada Chvátil and published by Czech Games Edition. In 2016, Codenames won the Spiel des Jahres award for being the best board game of the year – the most prestigious game award in the world. Codenames has won several other game awards and ranks high on BoardGameGeek's ranking list. The game has been published in 38 countries and is therefore well-known in large parts of the world.

An excellent party game

The rules of Codenames are super simple, and it takes no more than a maximum of five minutes to set up. The game itself can be played in 15-30 minutes, so it is ideal to have a little fun by organizing a small tournament. Codenames can end in two ways: you win when all agents on the team are identified, and you lose when a team has identified the assassin.

A bit about the rules

In Codenames, two teams compete against each other. Both teams have a 'spymaster' who can give codewords as hints to their teammates, who must associate them with one or more cards with random words on the table. The codeword can be anything the spymaster comes up with, but it obviously must not contain or be integrated into the words on the cards on the table. The players on the spymaster's team must then try to guess their team's specific word cards while avoiding choosing the opponents' word cards. In another variant of the game with only 2-3 players, one spymaster gives codewords to the other player (or players).

Alternative variants

Since the original game, a number of alternative variants of Codenames have been created. You can read more about them here:

• Codenames: Disney Family Edition
  Exactly the same game as the original Codenames, but it instead features characters and locations from Disney and Pixar movies.

• Codenames: Marvel Edition
  Exactly the same game as the original Codenames, but it features characters from the Marvel universe, such as Spider-Man and Dr. Strange.

• Codenames: Pictures
  Instead of cards with words, this edition has pictures on the cards. Otherwise, the rules are the same as in the original game.

• Codenames: The Simpsons Family Edition
  Based on the same concept as the Pictures edition and features characters and references from the TV series about the crazy Simpson family.

• Codenames: Duet
  Duet is a 2-player version of Codenames, where players must work together against the game.

• Codenames: Harry Potter
  The Harry Potter edition is like Codenames Duet a cooperative game, where players together must guess all the right cards before time runs out, or they accidentally summon Lord Voldemort or another evil wizard.

• Codenames: Deep Undercover
  This edition of Codenames is for adults only and contains sexual references and words with ambiguous meanings – where one meaning is often on the naughtier side.