Lan Rahne, Author at Coupling, the Game

Recipes: Stage two, Minigame Four

By Lan Rahne / March 22, 2021 March 22, 2021

The fourth minigame is called Recipes, and it’s all about food! If you’re looking for a short run-down of the second stage of the game and its other three minigames, click here, here and here.

To start, you take the card and roll a D6 die to see which word(s) you’ll get. If you roll a 6, you can choose which word(s) you want (out of the ones available). Then, you must describe the food-word to your co-players by describing the recipe required to make it. But, you mustn’t use the root of the word to describe it!

It’s important to note that Recipes isn’t just another word-describing game. You’re challenged to try to accurately describe the process to make the food that you get. And it’s not much of an issue if you don’t know the recipe for the food, just make it up, or try to guess how it would be made! It makes for an incredibly fun challenge that can provide a ton of laughs exactly when someone gets a recipe they don’t know and they try their best to somehow describe their word.

The rest works exactly like the other stage two minigames. Whoever figures your word (or sentence) out the fastest (or at all), moves a step ahead with you! If no-one figures out the word, it’s the next player’s turn.

How To Start Your Night Right!

By Lan Rahne / March 19, 2021 March 22, 2021

Lorenzo starting his night right with his friends

So, a group of friends comes over to your place. You’re getting ready to celebrate something or just to hang out after a while. You bought some drinks, set the place up, and now you’re thinking of a fun way to start your night right.

How about Coupling?

It’s very easy to do that with Coupling! Just grab the game, get the drinks ready, and you’re all set. It works similarly to how social interactions usually work.

First, you all get to know a fun fact or story about each other. Based on whose answers or stories you liked or connected with the most, you pair up with two co-players and get to do all sorts of fun challenges with them. At this stage, you also get to know a bit about how your co-players think!

This prepares you for the last part of the game. There you’ll see if you actually understand your final co-player enough for you two to get to the finish line first!

But it’s not really about winning…

It’s about communicating and connecting with each other! If already at the first stage of the game, a great conversation is sparked, then Coupling’s job is done. Establishing a true connection in times like these, with senseless conflict all around us, is exactly what we all could wish for.

So, brace yourselves for the game that make sure you start your night right! Coming soon!

Charades with Sounds: Stage Two, Minigame Three

By Lan Rahne / March 15, 2021 March 19, 2021

For a short run-down of the second stage of the game and its previous two minigames, click here and here. Today, I’ll tell you all about the third minigame: Charades with Sounds!

You start in the same way as the previous two minigames. You take the card and roll a D6 die to see which word (or sentence) you’ll get. If you roll a 6, you can choose which word (or sentence) you want. This time, when you have your word (or sentence), you have to perform it as you would with normal charades, but you can also emit sounds! Of course, that doesn’t mean you can talk. But, you can make sound effects that accompany your Charades moves.

That means that, for example, if you get the word bird, you can not only flap your hands like you have wings, but also chirp. Or, you know, emit whatever other sounds a bird would make. Yes, this is an incredibly simple example – don’t worry, the ones in the game are harder!

The addition of sounds adds a fun dimension to the usual game of Charades. It also opened up lots of new possibilities for us to use some fun words that couldn’t be used in just Charades. With that, it’s even funnier to see your friends not just trying to act out their words, but also struggling to add sounds to the mix!

The rest is exactly like with the other stage two minigames. Whoever figures your word (or sentence) out the fastest (or at all), moves a step ahead with you! If no-one figures out the word, it’s the next player’s turn.

Cards Against Humanity? How About Cards For Humanity?

By Lan Rahne / March 12, 2021 March 22, 2021

We still have a laugh every time we play Cards Against Humanity (CAH). The way this game manages to pull hilariously offensive ideas out of players is still completely unmatched. It seems like it really is a party game for horrible people (it even says so on the box!).

Which got us thinking when we started making Coupling. We were deciding about the main direction of the game and were looking at other party games and their main goals. It turns out that our goal is not so different to CAH’s, though it might also be the complete opposite. Cards Against Humanity unites people by bringing out the worst in them. We want to do the same by bringing out the best in everyone playing!

But, how do you go about achieving that?

First, we made sure that the game gets personal enough. This is so that when you play you get a chance to express yourself and connect with your co-players. But, we had to not overdo it. If it’s too personal, it can quickly become a serious deep-talk game instead of a fun party game. So, we added the contest minigames to balance things out, and kept a degree of fun in the personal questions, too!

And that’s where the three stages of the game really start to shine.

The first stage involves questions for sharing fun, personal stories with your co-players. This is so that you get to know something new about the people you’re playing with (even if you know them already!). In the second stage, the party game aspect comes to the front. It’s a fun team-building competition, involving many fun minigames. Then, in the third stage, you get a chance to put yourself into your final partner’s shoes and try to think as they would!

But, how does it feel to play it?

It’s a dynamic system that feels very natural. That’s because Coupling uses social mechanisms that we use in our everyday lives. With that, it gives you an incredibly fun, natural experience of a party game that will make you want to play it again and again and again!

The Shape Drawing Game: Stage Two, Minigame Two

By Lan Rahne / March 8, 2021 March 22, 2021

As we‘ve already mentioned, the Contest (stage two) cards consist of multiple challenges: Mumbling, Shape Drawing, Charades with Sounds and Recipes. The cards are shuffled, so which challenge you get is entirely up to chance (like the order in which we’re posting these minigames). Let’s check out the Shape drawing game.

It’s time to get visual with this minigame! When you pull the card, you have to roll a D6 die to see which word you’ll get. If you roll a 6, you can choose which word you want. When you have your word, you then try to describe it to your two co-players, who have to draw it. But, there’s a catch! You can only give your instructions in terms of geometrical shapes!

For example: You get the word radio and you try to describe it by instructing your co-players to draw a rectangle with two circles on either sides of its interior, a small rectangle lying on top of the larger one, and a short line sticking out of the top-right side of the large rectangle. Aaaand while you might think you’re perfectly describing the object, your co-players might not have the same idea in their head (cue example):

Whoever figures it out the fastest (or at all), moves a step ahead with you! If no-one figures out the word, it’s the next player’s turn.

How To Start A Conversation

By Lan Rahne / March 5, 2021 May 9, 2021

So, I’ve been thinking: Coupling is a game of connecting with people, whether you’re already friends with them or not. And what’s the first step of making a connection with somebody? Starting a conversation, of course! And as we all know, that usually isn’t the easiest thing to do. So, we decided to share some of our insights with you.

Firstly, try to become genuinely interested in the person you’re communicating with. Often, we’re biased towards the people we’re talking to. Maybe we just decide in advance that they don’t interest us, or we think we’re just too different to connect with them at all. You won’t believe how often this prejudice turns out to be false. Every single person can teach you something new or enrich your worldview in a certain way.

But, to find that out, you need to suspend your judgement. At least for starters. Even if you fundamentally do not agree with the other person, you can still find a common ground. And in the meantime, learn why they think so differently to you. Did they experience a different upbringing to yours? A life-changing event? Whatever it is, when starting a conversation, try to perceive the other person as an innocent being, living and understanding life as well as they best know how. In the end, that’s exactly what all of us really are.

All of this might seem quite tough for starters. Luckily, Coupling (the Game) can be a bit of help to you here! Our fun party game was made to spark genuinely interesting and exciting conversations, while leaving prejudice behind! Made by good people (us) for good people (you!).

The Mumbling Game: Stage Two, Minigame One

By Lan Rahne / March 1, 2021 March 22, 2021

In the stage two of the game, you’re now coupled with two of your co-players, making every player part of two couples. The person that first finished stage one takes one of the Contest (stage two) cards and reads it to his two partners. They have to compete who will first find out the answer.

The Contest cards consist of multiple challenges: Mumbling, Shape Drawing, Charades with Sounds and Recipes. Today, we’re focusing on the Mumbling game. The concept of this game is simple. You take the card and read the topic of the card out loud. Then you roll a D6 die to see which word you’ll get. When you have your word, you then try to tell it to your two co-players without opening your mouth. Whoever figures it out the fastest, moves a step ahead with you! If no-one figures out the word, it’s the next player’s turn.

The mumbling game consists of different topics because it’s pretty hard to figure out what the other person is saying when they can’t open their mouth. These topics make the figuring out process a bit easier and much more fun. And to keep things interesting, we included a wide range of themes – from household items to social settings!

About Lina, Our Creative Sieve And Devoted Project Overseer

By Lan Rahne / February 20, 2021 March 9, 2021

Lina is a god-damn jazz singer and singing teacher. She has been singing since she was a little kid, and finished THREE high schools (two at the same time). A general one, a musical one in playing the classical violin, and then one in jazz singing.

After that, she enrolled in the art university of Graz and continued her jazz singing studies. While studying there, she recorded her own album Love Lines and performed all over the place. Actually, she graduated twice: first in jazz singing, and a few years later the pedagogical field of jazz singing, too. She has sung and acted in operas and in musicals (had a lead role in Mamma Mia). Not just that, you might have seen her on the stage with the world-famous group Laibach (yep, the ones that had a concert in North Korea), and with many more musicians.

She opened her first business three years ago, not only so she could teach singing and perform herself, but she also started many other art projects, involving video production and photography. Lina is a perfectionist, very rational and very critical, she is an infallible asset for the team. Whatever we do with the game always goes through her and we only continue with it when she gives her blessing.

All About Myint, Our Amazing Illustrator

By Lan Rahne / February 13, 2021 March 9, 2021

Our dear Myint started his career as an architect. But, as it turns out, planning, designing and constructing buildings just wasn’t the path destined for him. He soon jumped way past the real world and landed in the world of illustration. When an international jury in South Korea awarded him with an illustration award, he knew what his calling was.

After that, he’s been purely drawing. Not just for publishing companies, magazines, marketing campaigns, but a whole lot for himself, too. And this path has taken him all over Europe, from Portugal to Poland, from cartoons to children’s picture books. He has presented his works at Slovenian, Serbian and Polish biennials of illustration in the last two years.

Seeing him as a person, it is immediately obvious that his art matches his personality to the fullest. Although he joined the Coupling team fairly recently, he fits in just as if he was with us from the start – because of him, we are finally nearing the final look of Coupling! Loving, caring and always up for a good time, Myint and his illustrations bring joy everywhere they end up. He loves to draw singular moments in time and then let the rest of the story up to the imagination of the viewer.

Oh, and you can check out his work on his Facebook, his Instagram, or his Behance page.

Stage One: Find Out Whose Answers You Like The Most!

By Lan Rahne / February 9, 2021 March 9, 2021

In the stage one of the game, everyone starts out as single. Your first objective is to couple up with two co-players through interesting questions. For example: What have I always wanted, but never got… on a date? You ask the question, everyone else answers it, and then you choose your favorite answer.

The Coupling™℠® process (meaning the process of you finding two other partners) is random. You don’t find out the authors of the answers until you choose the one that you like the most. We decided this was the best way to play because we often encountered some annoying issues when playing party games. For instance, almost every single time we ended up with the same partners. But it was important to us that we achieve fun randomization which doesn’t include just throwing dice.

So we came up with the Singles stage – it’s a fun, new and original mini-game that works great as a standalone game, but is also perfect as the introductory stage for Coupling, the Game. And not just that, it also offers you a chance to find out some pretty bizarre and random things about your co-players!

Lan Rahne