Codenames: Duet is a two-player, co-operative version of the very popular Codenames. Two covert operatives are on a secret mission in a crowded city. Each knows nine secret agents that the other must contact. Communicating in coded messages, they must sneak past three enemy assassins to complete the mission before time runs out.

With a grid of codewords laid out on the 5x5 table, the players take it in turns to give a one-word clue, followed by a number which indicates the number of words on the table that are linked to the clue. The clue giver wants to link as many of the ‘correct’ words as possible whilst avoiding assassins and decoys. There is a time limit on the number of turns in the game and the number of wrong answers that can be accepted, so you need to be more ambitious than giving single clues.

With cleverly designed, double-sided clue cards, each player is given information about the codenames of the agents that the other player must guess. Together you must guess them all, but each side of the clue card has some common agents as well as one common assassin. This extra knowledge can be used to try and deduce even more about what your team-mate is trying to communicate.

Codenames: Duet adds to the spy theme with a campaign where you will travel around different cities. In each city you will have a different challenge with a different balance of timer tokens and acceptable mistakes, forcing you to swap more ambitious coded messages and generally increase your ability to think as a team.

Whilst Codenames: Duet is primarily a two-player game, it can be played in teams with four or more players. But, if you’re looking to play Codenames with a larger group, then you can always checkout the original game, 

Player Count: 2-4
Time: 15-30 Minutes
Age: 11+