Shape It

• Designer: Thomas Dagenais-Lesperance
• Publisher: Randolph
• Players: 2-7
• Age: 8+
• Time: 20 minutes
• Amazon affiliate link: 
• Played with review copy provided by publisher

Shape It is a cooperative game in which players move shapes to try to guess a word. What word is your group trying to illustrate? That’s the game: You don’t know for sure… But it has to be on one of the 5 cards on the table. When it comes time to guess, will you all see the same word in the shapes you’ve placed? Good luck!

If your whole group sees the same Word in the shapes you’ve placed, you win the round and collect a Word card. If you don’t all see the same thing, you lose a Life.

→ If you collect 5 cards, you win!

→ If you lose your 3 Lives… you’ve lost the game.

To set up, have the group agree upon 7 of the 29 shapes in the box to play with and place them in a circle on the table along with 3 life tokens.  The 5 Action tokens are also on the table, though the distribution of sides of these tokens is determined by player count (they can be Silence or Extra Move face up).  Shuffle the three decks of word cards: green, pink and orange.

For each round, make a pool of 5 word cards from the current deck.  Now, each player can move exactly one piece per round to try to illustrate one of the words in the pool.  You cannot give any verbal hints about what you are doing nor any suspicious hand/eye gestures.  You are allowed to rotate your piece however you like as well as place pieces on top of other pieces. 

As soon as any player is sure they know which of the five words is being illustrated, they give a thumbs up sign.  They do not do anything else – including moving a shape if they have not yet moved one.  When all players have given the thumbs up, everyone shouts out the word they think is being illustrated.  If everyone says the same word, keep the word card as a victory point, the goal is to get 5.  If they are not all the same word, then flip over one of your life tokens.

If a player is unsure, he can use one of the Action tokens.  A Silence Token means that this player does not have to vote in this round, and all other players answer as usual.  An Extra Move token can be used by any player to allow them to move one additional piece in this round to try to illustrate the word better.

Move onto the next round if the game is not won or lost. The pieces stay in their current configuration.  Deal out 5 cards from the next deck and continue.  Again, play until the group has collected 5 words or has missed three times.

My thoughts on the game

Shape It is an interesting limited communication cooperative game.  Unlike many cooperative games, this one stands out a bit because the answer isn’t fixed.  The group has to figure out on the fly what everyone else is thinking the answer is.  And because each player can only move one shape piece each round – you have to really get the timing right!  

The first player might move a piece, trying to lead the group towards a certain answer.  But, then, the next person finds a better idea, and moves a different shape somewhere else.  Now, everyone has to re-evaluate things and hopefully come to a consensus.

The team does get a few extra action tokens, and at least in our group, we’ve found the abstention tokens to be much more useful than getting to move an additional shape.  For me, I either see the answer or I don’t…. Generally, one more shape movement isn’t going to somehow make it all clear after 4 or 5 movements.

Interestingly, the shapes stay in their locations from one round to the next, and there can be some times when the restriction of not being able to move a piece that is under another can be a bit of a bear.

Games are always different as you have so many different shapes to choose from, and you only use 7 of them in any particular game.  I have tried a few rounds where we used the same cards but changed out the shapes in play, and it was a really interesting (and totally hilarious) experience.

Whether my group wins or loses, it’s always a lot of laughter and enjoyment. I’m generally not a fan of limited communication games, but this one hits my sweet spot for that genre.

Ratings from the Opinionated Gamers

• I love it!
• I like it. Dale Y
• Neutral. John P
• Not for me…