h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

When I was young, someone introduced me to a similar mentality game. We played "Imaginary Hide & Seek". The first person would look for somewhere to hide, generally in the same room but with no necessity of being able to actually be able to fit in the place. Then it was more like 20 questions. You could ask questions to narrow down the persons hiding spot, and once you found them it was your turn to hide. This could be played in the car, or in a house where there were few real hiding places, or anywhere you were bored and couldn't wander around or touch stuff. I never played it with more than two people, I suppose you would take turns asking questions.

Questions tended to be along the lines of "are you within a foot of the ceiling?", "Is your hiding place bigger than a breadbox?", and "can I see you from over here?". This could keep a kid occupied for quite a bit.

We often play "The Animals Game" with my daughter (now 7), in this game you think of an animal and provide some information about it, everyone has a guess at the name of the animal and if no one gets it right, yu provide another clue.

Depending on the detail of your clues, and the animal knowledge of the players, the game can take anything from one clue to dozens. It can also teach you stuff about animals you missed while your daughter was watching "Animal Planet".

For example the initial clue "I have a long neck" usually prompts an immediate response of "Giraffe!", but there are a few other animals which fit the bill (one of which has a bill!).

Whenever possible, I try to make my second clue eliminate the animal which has already been guessed wrong previously (e.g. Clue 1. I have a long neck. Guess 1 Giraffe! Clue 2 I have short legs.)

For reasons too complicated to go into here (one being they don't make any sense), the correct answer to the clue "Well" is "Elephant!"