Casual Conversation

whats the one called, maybe hot hands? one person puts out both hands palm up and the other person puts both hands on top of them palm down. the bottom person tries to quickly slap a hand of the top person, while the top person tries to avoid the hand slap. once a slap connects, they switch sides. pro-tip: remove hand jewelry first.

another one that might not count is paper football, as it needs a table and a triangular folded piece of paper. one player tries to slide the paper so that it stops partially off the table without falling off. if it does then they take a field goal flick in the air shot while the opponent makes goal posts with their hands together.

another one that might not count needs a table and 3 coins is table soccer. flick slide one coin between the other two until in scoring range, then the opponent makes a goalpost and goalie hand formation with 2 pinkies and an index finger. a successful shot on goal can hurt the knucles.

There's one called Double Tap. Not sure it qualifies, as it requires a table and chairs.

Everyone places their hands in front of the person sitting to each side. That is, you'll have your right neighbor's left hand to the left of your right hand, and vice versa.

The starting direction is clockwise. The goal is for each hand at the table to tap sequentially. Someone taps a hand, and the hand to the left of it (ie. clockwise) has to tap and so on. It's a bit confusing, because everyone has arms crossed with each other and the hands in front of you aren't yours.

Instead of tapping once, you can choose to double tap, which changes the direction (clockwise to counter-clockwise, or vice versa).

If someone messes up, that hand is removed from the table (all others remain where they are). Last person (or two or three) remaining wins.

Red Hands is a classic.

Oh, and I almost forgot about Bloody Knuckles.

Kind of a fast action rock paper scissors we call shoot-load-shield. Maybe people called it 007

Two players face each other, tap twice in their lap or on a table with both hands, then have to choose an action:

Load - point thumbs over your shoulder. This loads your weapon

Shoot - make double pistol hands toward your opponent. This fires your weapon

Shield - crossed arms in front of your chest. This blocks your opponents shot.

You have to load before you can shoot, and if you shoot you have to reload. Most people load first round since you are both unloaded to begin with.

To incentivize not just shielding every turn, you can play with the rule that if you load six rounds without shooting, you get a shield penetrating bullet. But we rarely did that because people would shoot just for fun anyway.

Here's a video of kids learning to play. Skip to about a minute to see it in full action. We play much faster: https://youtu.be/rNugwEOZ3JE?si=oqoDETuUVdQvG4vh

Side note: looking for a video, a kid had made a tutorial that added "reflector" that bounces your opponent's shot back. I like that idea if you have to reload the reflector, too

How about eye games? Because Laser Eyes!

Stand in a circle with a group and have one person call out the actions EYES DOWN and then EYES UP. When your eyes are down, choose a person to look at when you raise your eyes. If they also choose to look at you, you both scream in fake pain and die a dramatic death on the ground. You're out, but you got to be silly for a moment there, so that was kinda fun

Play continues until one or two people remain. I forget if there's an in-game way to break ties. Maybe you both win? Sure! Kids love it, though the screams can be ear-splitting

We had 2 games we used to play that I haven't been able to find online. One I think is common but I just can't find it, the other is nonsensical and probably super local.

😏

Professional Wrestling is fun to watch

Has anyone said Mercy yet?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercy_(game)

It’s not really a fun game though IMO lol

A Chinese one I grew up calling 15 20. Very stressful game for me lol

What about the old clapping rhyme games? They're more cooperative than competitive, trying to keep going faster and faster without messing up. Traditionally for girls but for no real reason. Plenty of sources online for rhymes and the hand motions that go with them

Thumb wars. Not only is it a fun game, it is also a very funny Star Wars parody film using thumb puppets made by Steve Oedekerk (same guy who did Kung Pow).