How to Play

Codenames: Pictures

2-8 players 15-15 min 7.2 Board Game Geek Rating

Two spymasters guide their teams using cryptic clues to identify friendly agents among pictures containing multiple visual elements. Players must decode their spymaster's hints to find their team's operatives while avoiding enemy agents and a deadly assassin. The first team to successfully contact all their agents wins this tense deduction race.

Published 2016

Get Ready

Setup the game with these step-by-step instructions before diving into your turn.

Split into teams

Organize players into 2 teams of roughly the same size, with at least two players on each team

Choose spymasters and operatives

Each team chooses 1 player to be their spymaster; the rest are operatives

Lay out picture cards

Mix up the picture cards, choose 20 at random, and lay them out in a 5×4 grid

Draw a random key card

Spymasters choose the key randomly and slide it into the stand between them, oriented the same as the 5×4 grid of pictures

Distribute agent tiles

Put the 7 orange tiles in front of the orange spymaster and the 7 purple tiles in front of the purple spymaster

Give double agent to starting team

The triangles on the key card show which team starts; flip the double agent tile to their color and add it to their tiles

On Your Turn

What you can do during your turn.

Spymaster gives one clue

The spymaster says 1 word and 1 number relating to pictures in their team's color

Operatives discuss the clue

Take a moment to discuss (or think, if you are the only operative) before guessing

Make a guess

One operative must touch one of the picture cards to make a guess official

Reveal the identity

The spymaster covers the guessed picture with a tile matching the color shown on the key

Continue guessing on correct answers

If you guess a picture in your own color, you may guess again

End turn on wrong guess

Three things end your turn immediately:

Choose to end your turn voluntarily

You can stop guessing before using all guesses if further guessing seems too risky

Apply the plus one rule

Operatives are allowed to guess one more card than the number specified by the clue

Use unlimited clue (expert)

Say your clue is unlimited to allow operatives to make as many guesses as they want while guessing correctly

Use zero clue (expert)

A clue like "reptiles: 0" means don't guess pictures related to that word, allowing unlimited guesses on other pictures

Winning

How to claim victory.

Identify all your agents

When your team has no pictures left to guess, your team wins

Opponent contacts assassin

You win if the other team guesses the assassin

Lose by contacting assassin

If your team guesses the assassin, you immediately lose the game

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