Consequences, exquisite corpse and other names for the fold-over game

Names for Consequences

These all describe the same game: each player writes one line of a story, folds the paper over so only the last line shows, and passes it on.

• Consequences, the usual name in Britain and Ireland
• The Consequences game, or the Consequences party game
• The fold-over story game
• The folded paper game
• The paper story game
• The pass-the-paper story game

Exquisite corpse

Exquisite corpse, in French cadavre exquis, is the version played by the surrealists in Paris in the 1920s, with the same fold-and-pass idea. It is widely said to have grown out of Consequences. The name comes from the first sentence the surrealists made: “The exquisite corpse will drink the new wine”.

The words version builds a sentence one part at a time, and a drawing version builds a creature. The rules differ a little from Consequences, which tells a story in seven set lines.

Heads, bodies and legs

This is the drawing version. Each player draws one part of a figure, folds the paper over so only the ends of the lines show, and passes it on. The result is an odd creature instead of an odd story. We do not have a drawing game here, only the writing one.

Which one is this site’s?

Consequences, the word game, with the classic seven lines: who, who they met, where, what the first one said, what the other one said, the consequence and what the world said. You can play it on one device or on many, with the folding done for you.