Time's Up: Adapt it and You'll Love it.

In Time's Up, players have thirty seconds each to get their team to to guess as many words or phrases on cards as they can. Sound familiar? Sound like a bunch of other group games you've played? Maybe so, but there's a twist.

In the first round, the clue giver can say just about anything except the actual words on the card and team members can keep guessing until they get it right. In the second round, the same cards are used, but players may give one-word clues only, with one guess allowed. Third round, only actions and sounds are permitted and only one guess. An optional fourth round, has the clue giver freezing into a statue while the team closes their eyes and then opens them to guess.

Sounds like lots of fun, doesn't it? That's what we thought when we made the purchase. However, the first time we played, the 40 cards suggested by the directions was waaaay too many, especially considering the range of old and young we had. Three rounds seemed to take forever. The next time we played, we tried 30 cards and enjoyed it much more. Since then, we've adapted it various ways.

For instance, it you've got young (or old) players and want an easier game, hand out six or so cards to everyone and have them choose three to put in the pile. That way, some of the more difficult ones get weeded out and you've given everyone a head start.

Time's Up has the concept and the components for a great crowd game, just be aware that you might need to change it to suit your crowd.

# Players . . .  4 and up
Game time . . . . . . . . variable

Set up . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 minutes

Luck . . . . . . . 5 . . . . . Strategy

*Interplay . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9.5

Visual Appeal . . . . . . . . . . . . 

Component Quality . .. . . . . 7

*Replayability . . . . . . . . . . . 6

*See "How we Rate" for a definition.