FIGURE EIGHT
(Trivia/Strategy)
The group of players divides into two teams. In each round the moderator describes a category that has exactly eight members. One team comes up with a list of up to eight guesses for the category members. The opposing team may challenge any of the first team’s guesses and also may offer guesses not given my the first team. The correct answers are revealed and the first team scores for all of its guesses not eliminated by valid challenges; even wrong guesses that are not challenged score points! The opposing team scores for valid challenges and correct answer additions but are penalized for invalid challenges and incorrect additions. The roles of the two teams—first guessers and challengers—alternate in subsequent rounds.
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Figure Eight was first presented at a game party in Colorado and later retooled for the Crowd-Pleasing Puzzles book. The basic categorical trivia game with a risk-benefit twist worked well in practice. The dynamic scoring system proved to be a bit of an administrative nuisance but the scoring for simplified for the book version.
life as a puzzle 