Partner Tag
Number of players: 4+
Ages: 4+
Space: outdoors
Anyone familiar with professional wrestling has heard the expression “tag team”, but what about team tag? This variation of tag adds a whole new meaning to the word “teamwork.” It adds a whole new dimension to the simple game of tag.
To begin play, all of the players except two hook arms in couples. For the two who aren’t “coupled” one is “It” or the chaser, and the other one is the runner. The runner’s job is to avoid being tagged by the person who is it. So… how is this different from normal tag?
Here’s one the game’s many twists. The runner can make him or herself “safe” from being tagged by locking arms with one of the couples in the game. If the runner is able to do that, the player not linked up to the runner has to break away and become the new runner. The new runner now has to find another couple to link up to while avoiding the person who is “it.” If the runner is tagged at any time, he or she becomes “it.”
This game is fun to play, and fun to watch for a couple reasons. First, in order for the couples to avoid being linked up with the runner, they have to do some pretty clever maneuvering. This requires a lot of coordination on the part of the couple, who has to communicate as quietly as possible about which direction they’re going to get away from the runner. While all of this is going on, the person who is “it” is waiting to pounce on whichever player is the runner.
This game is great if there’s a lot of space to run, and if there are an exceptionally large number of players, there should be more than one runner and chaser.