The Hat (2010)

The Hat is a game for a good big company that plays it all together. Players one after another try to explain, show by pantomime or draw any word and all the others do their best to understand it. A performing player and those who coped with guessing words get winning points. Sometimes it happens that you need to describe several words but the time is always limited. Moreover player can cut down his time or make his task harder by any other way to earn more points. Players take the word samples from the hat or something modeling it. They decide how to fill the hat choosing words themes, their difficulty or language. It’s easily possible to come across with unknown words or you can compose the tasks by your own self.

This parlor game has got its name after the game popular in many companies where you have to explain words written down at the sheets of paper that are put into a hat. The game mechanics is based on the popular russian games such as “Associations”, “Crocodile”, “Stooping dog”. Mostly well-known western board games of this genre are Activity and Alias.
The Hat cards are the basis of the game – they describe the way of representing the word: to explain by words, to show or to draw it.

Players draw cards with face up from The Hat pile by turn and define the way of the word explanation. Finally played words bring winning points marked at the card. Also cards recount the time for the performance. It’s possible to reduce explanation time to increase points. In this case the time is fixed by a dice roll.
There are also 3 other card types with extra explanation terms. You get more points if you succeed using these cards. For example, you can take a complication card “draw a word with your left hand” as an addition to a simple drawing task.

The main trait of The Hat game is in the unlimited ways of using words. Only you decide what word should appear in the hat and what will be guessed by your company. Varieties are numerous because Russian dictionary contains 140 000 different words, and it’s possible to play using any foreign language as well.

The game box contains of several word sets that differ by difficulty. They are sealed so nobody will see them before the game begins. You need to cut the word sets into the hat without opening it.

It also happens that players get tired of the word game after guessing the same words for several times. This will never happen with The Hat. Words from the basic sets suit only for the first play. New words can be downloaded from our web site or bought in the special boosters.