Cocktail Games' 2012 Release Calendar: Acting, Silliness, Riddles, Consonants & Murder

At the start of the game, each player receives a card that features three challenges, e.g., "Speak three sentences in a foreign language" or "Suck your thumb for 30 seconds". Players agree on an ending time for the game, perhaps 1-2 hours, then each player must perform or act out his three challenges during that time in a subtle manner, but with witnesses. If no one says anything for 30 seconds after a player has completed a challenge, he can whip out his card and show everyone the challenge he's just performed. This nets him a number of points specified on the card for that challenge.

If, however, another player says, for example, "I bet you had to suck your thumb" and the guesser is right, then the guesser earns two points; if she's wrong, she loses one point.

Whoever has the most points at the end of the game wins.

The Tweegles are monsters from another galaxy, come to invade the Earth. Unfortunately for them, once they hit the ground, nothing is on their scale. They are frightening and huge monsters on their own planet, but are only as big as mice on earth. They land in an everyday house, full of traps for them: electrical sockets, children with scissors and stamps, insects and cleaning products...

Twenty-five action cards – each showing a tweegle that has been hit by one of the "traps" – are laid face-up on the table at the start of Tweegles, while the twenty-five tweegle cards are shuffled and set aside. Everyone plays at the same time. One tweegle card is revealed from the deck, with the card showing one of five tweegle types and one of five possible actions, symbolized by scissors, a mosquito, an electrical socket, a stamp and spray bottle.

Everyone searches for the action card that "completes the story" begun with the first card. If a tweegle card shows scissors, for example, you need to find the cut-up tweegle among the face-up action cards. To claim the card, however, you need to perform the appropriate gesture: slapping the card if a mosquito is involved, hammering it with your fist if the tweegle was stamped, and so on. The first player to do this claims the tweegle card, while the action card remains on the table.

Whoever claims the most cards wins!

In Le Mot le plus Court ("The Shortest Word"), you don't actually want to find the shortest word – but given the interference of opponents, that's what you might have to settle for.

Each round, one player rolls the three consonant dice included in the game, then everyone tries to think of a word that includes all three consonants (in any order, with repeats allowed). As soon as a player thinks of a word, she announces the number of letters in it, then starts counting down from that number, e.g., "Eight letters! 8, 7, 6..." If someone else thinks of a shorter word that includes all three consonants, he interrupts the countdown to announce his letter count and start a new countdown. If no one interrupts a countdown, the counter announces the word and scores as many points as the number of letters in the word; if she goofed, giving a non-word or a word that doesn't contain the consonants, everyone else scores that many points.

If a player thinks that no word can be created with the letters rolled, she announces, "Impossible!", then counts down from ten, scoring three points if no one interrupts with a shorter word count.

The first player to score 36 points wins.

A six-sided vowel die is included that allows younger players to compete with older ones. The young players use any two consonants and the vowel, while older players use the original game rules.