Telestrations
Write a secret prompt, pass the book, and watch it alternate between drawings and guesses until the original idea is beyond legal identification.
The newest edition has no timer, so every pass waits for the last marker still moving.
How to play Telestrations
- Goal
- Build a private telephone chain in every sketchbook by alternating drawings and written guesses, then reveal how each opening prompt changed.
- Set up
- Give every player a sketchbook, marker, and prompt card. Everyone writes their name and a secret prompt. With an even number of players, draw your own prompt first; with an odd number, pass the book left before anyone draws, so every chain ends on a written guess.
- Play
- On drawing pages, privately sketch the prompt or guess on the previous page without letters or numbers. Hide it and pass left. On guessing pages, privately write what the previous drawing depicts, hide it, and pass again.
- Finish
- Continue until every book returns to its owner, then reveal each chain in order. Scoring is optional; if used, play three rounds and total the selected friendly or competitive points.
- Easy to miss
- The 2025 second edition removed the die and sand timer used by older editions. Everyone should pass together, and the final completed page must be a written guess rather than a sketch.
Before you start: The book
Eight of you. Everyone draws first, then passes left. 8 pages, home on a guess.
Everyone gets a book
Everyone gets a little wipe-clean sketchbook and a prompt card, picks a word off the card, and writes it on the first page where nobody can see. Then the books go round the table. Whoever has your book draws your word. The next person only sees the drawing and writes down what they think it is. The person after that draws the guess. Draw, guess, draw, guess, until your book comes back to you.
Then you open it and read it out, page by page, and find out where your word went. That reveal is the game. Everything before it is making sure there's something to reveal.
The only rules that matter
- Draw or write on your own, then hide the page before you pass. Nobody looks ahead.
- No letters or numbers in a drawing. Draw it badly if you have to, but draw it.
- Everyone passes at the same time, to the left. The new edition has no timer, so a pass takes as long as the slowest drawing in the room. That's fine. Talk.
- Even number of players: draw your own word first. Odd number: pass the book left before anyone draws. Do that and every book ends on a written guess, which is what makes the last page land.
When the books come home
One book at a time. The owner reads the word, shows the first drawing, reads the first guess, and keeps going to the end. Nobody gets to explain their drawing until the guess after it has been read out loud. The rulebook has two ways to keep score if you want them. You can also just play again.
This page follows the 2025 twelve-player edition. Older boxes came with a die, a sand timer and a different start, so a rules video from a few years ago is probably teaching a box you don't own.
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