LogFAQs > #963720246

48. CrossTalk

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/215371/crosstalk

Category: Team vs team
Key mechanics: Clue-giving, word game
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 2
Game length: 10-20 minutes
First played: 2021
Experience: 4-6 plays in 1 session with 6 players

CrossTalk is a clue-giving team game, where each team has a spymaster alternates giving a word clue for a secret word, which is the same between the two teams. Whichever team first guesses the word will win the round. Before the game starts, the spymaster can also write down a special clue word that only their team knows.

So I guess the way CrossTalk is supposed to work is, your hidden word gives you extra context for what the real word is, and the above-the-table clues are outwardly kind of hard to decode (as you don't want them intercepted by the other team.) It's got a Decrypto-like element to it. Cool stuff, right?

Well... I mean the problem is that the lack of restriction on the hidden word is so strong that it alone kind of wound up solving the whole game a lot of the time. It's certainly pretty enjoyable to run through, but I just didn't feel that strongly connected to the game when - as a pure example - your spymaster secretly passes your team the word "Russian." All it then takes is "falling" and "blocks" (or whatever) to hit Tetris.

Now giving clues is still really fun if the other team messes up, but at least in my games, it felt like the game would rarely go beyond a rally of 2-3 clues before one team would have it. Those 2-3 clues were really fun, though!