game
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: enpr: gām
ipa: /ɡeɪm/
rhymes: -eɪm
Forms: form: games
Etymology: From Middle English game, gamen, gammen, from Old English gamen (“sport, joy, mirth, pastime, game, amusement, pleasure”), from Proto-West Germanic *gaman, from Proto-Germanic *gamaną (“amusement, pleasure, game", literally "participation, communion, people together”), from *ga- (collective prefix) + *mann- (“man”); or alternatively from *ga- + a root from Proto-Indo-European *men- (“to think, have in mind”).
Cognate with Yola gaame, gaaume, gaume (“game”), Old Frisian game, gome (“joy, amusement, entertainment”), Dutch gemelijk (“cantankerous, crabbed”), Middle High German gamen (“joy, amusement, fun, pleasure”), Danish gammen (“merriment”), Icelandic, Norwegian Nynorsk gaman (“joy, fun”), Swedish gamman (“mirth, rejoicing, merriment”). Related to gammon, gamble.
Senses: examples: text: Being a child is all fun and games.
glosses: A playful or competitive activity.
A playful activity that may be unstructured; an amusement or pastime.
synonyms: amusement
diversion
entertainment
festivity
frolic
fun
gaiety
gambol
lark
merriment
merrymaking
pastime
play
prank
recreation
sport
spree
antonyms: drudgery
work
toil
examples: text: Games in the classroom can make learning fun.
text: Joshua: Shall we play a game?
David: ... Love to. How about Global Thermonuclear War?
Joshua: Wouldn't you prefer a good game of chess?
David: Later. Let's play Global Thermonuclear War.
Joshua: Fine.
ref: 1983, Lawrence Lasker et al., WarGames:
glosses: A playful or competitive activity.
An activity described by a set of rules, especially for the purpose of entertainment, often competitive or having an explicit goal.
examples: text: From time to time tracksuited boys ran past them, with all the deadly purpose and humourless concentration of those who enjoyed Games.
ref: 1991 September, Stephen Fry, chapter 1, in The Liar, London: Heinemann, →ISBN, section III, page 26:
glosses: A playful or competitive activity.
A school subject during which sports are practised.
examples: text: Sally won the game.
text: They can turn the game around in the second half.
text: “I'm through with all pawn-games,” I laughed. “Come, let us have a game of lansquenet. Either I will take a farewell fall out of you or you will have your sevenfold revenge”.
ref: 1908, W[illiam] B[lair] M[orton] Ferguson, chapter I, in Zollenstein, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:
glosses: A playful or competitive activity.
A particular instance of playing a game.
synonyms: match
glosses: A playful or competitive activity.
That which is gained, such as the stake in a game.
examples: text: In short whist, five points are game.
text: See also: for the win
glosses: A playful or competitive activity.
The number of points necessary to win a game.
topics: card-games
games
glosses: A playful or competitive activity.
In some games, a point awarded to the player whose cards add up to the largest sum.
examples: text: Some of the games in the closet we have on the computer as well.
glosses: A playful or competitive activity.
The equipment that enables such activity, particularly as packaged under a title.
examples: text: Study can help your game of chess.
text: Hit the gym if you want to toughen up your game.
text: I played golf with her that same afternoon. She lost eight balls, I remember. Eight. I had a terrible time getting her to at least open her eyes when she took a swing at the ball. I improved her game immensely, though.
ref: 1951 July 16, J[erome] D[avid] Salinger, chapter 11, in The Catcher in the Rye, Boston, Mass.: Little, Brown and Company, →OCLC:
glosses: A playful or competitive activity.
One's manner, style, or performance in playing a game.
examples: text: There’s a sense here, as well as in games such as Limbo, that we’re making ourselves experience our children’s reality, trapped in the chaos that the adults have created.
ref: 2019 May 8, Jon Bailes, “Save yourself! The video games casting us as helpless children”, in The Guardian:
glosses: A playful or competitive activity.
Ellipsis of video game.
examples: text: When it comes to making sales, John is the best in the game.
text: He's in the securities game somehow.
synonyms: line
qualifier: nearly always singular
glosses: A field of gainful activity, as an industry or profession.
examples: text: In the game of life, you may find yourself playing the waiting game far too often.
text: I ſee you ſtand like Grey-hounds in the ſlips, / Straying vpon the Start. The Game’s afoot:
ref: 1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life of Henry the Fift”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene i], page 77, column 2:
text: “I'm through with all pawn-games,” I laughed. “Come, let us have a game of lansquenet. Either I will take a farewell fall out of you or you will have your sevenfold revenge”.
ref: 1908, W[illiam] B[lair] M[orton] Ferguson, chapter I, in Zollenstein, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:
text: Hidden behind thickets of acronyms and gorse bushes of detail, a new great game is under way across the globe. Some call it geoeconomics, but it's geopolitics too.
ref: 2013 July 19, Timothy Garton Ash, “Where Dr Pangloss meets Machiavelli”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 6, page 18:
glosses: Something that resembles a game with rules, despite not being designed.
topics: government
military
politics
war
synonyms: wargame
glosses: An exercise simulating warfare, whether computerized or involving human participants.
examples: text: You want to borrow my credit card for a week? What's your game?
text: Your murderous game is nearly up.
ref: 1845, Blackwood Magazine:
text: It was obviously Lord Macaulay's game to blacken the greatest literary champion of the cause he had set himself to attack.
ref: 1902, George Saintsbury, Dryden, page 182:
synonyms: scheme
racket
glosses: A questionable or unethical practice in pursuit of a goal.
examples: text: The forest has plenty of game.
text: I had known the President several years before he became famous, and we had had some correspondence on subjects of natural history. His interest in such themes is always very fresh and keen, and the main motive of his visit to the Park at this time was to see and study in its semi-domesticated condition the great game which he had so often hunted during his ranch days; and he was kind enough to think it would be an additional pleasure to see it with a nature-lover like myself.
ref: 1907, John Burroughs, Camping & Tramping with Roosevelt, Houghton Mifflin Company, →OCLC, pages 5–6:
glosses: Wild animals hunted for food.
examples: text: He didn't get anywhere with her because he had no game.
text: She's strange, so strange, but I didn't complain / She said yes to me when I ran my game
ref: 1998, “She's Strange”, performed by Nate Dogg:
glosses: The ability to seduce or woo someone, usually by strategy.
raw_tags: used mostly for men
glosses: Lovemaking, flirtation.
examples: text: ſet them downe, / For ſlottiſh ſpoyles of opportunitie; / And daughters of the game.
ref: c. 1602, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Troylus and Cressida”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene v], lines 61–63:
text: [H]e put spurs to his horse, and just in the twilight reached the gate, where, at that time, there happened to be two ladies of the game [translating mugeres moças], who being on their journey to Seville, with the carriers, had chanced to take up their night's lodging in this place.
ref: 1755, Miguel de Cervantes, translated by Tobias Smollett, Don Quixote, Volume 1, I.2:
glosses: Prostitution. (Now chiefly in on the game.)
examples: text: What is game? Who got game? / Where's the game in life, behind the game behind the game / I got game, she's got game / We got game, they got game, he got game
ref: 1998, “He Got Game”, performed by Public Enemy:
text: In the contemporary arts of the academic contact zone, I say African American students got game!
ref: 2005, Kermit Ernest Campbell, Gettin' Our Groove on: Rhetoric, Language, and Literacy for the Hip Hop Generation, →ISBN, page 123:
text: My dad had game at that kind of thing, and I spent long periods as a child watching him.
ref: 2009, Michael Marshall, Bad Things, →ISBN, page 24:
glosses: Mastery; the ability to excel at something.
examples: text: To ſet the minde on the racke of long meditation (you ſay) is a torment: to follow the ſwift foote of your hound alday long, hath no wearineſſe: what would you ſay of him that finds better game in his ſtudie, then you in the fielde, and would account your diſport his puniſhment? ſuch there are, though you doubt and wonder.
ref: 1611, Joseph Hall, “Epistle VIII. To E.B. Dedicated to Sir George Goring.”, in Epistles […], volume III, London: […] [William Stansby and William Jaggard] for Samuell Macham, […], →OCLC, 5th decade, pages 95–96:
glosses: Diversion, entertainment.
Synonyms: word: game
Hypernyms: word: activity
Hyponyms: word: board game
word: card game
word: computer game
word: cue sport
word: dice game
word: electronic game
word: game of chance
word: game of skill
word: game of strategy
word: guessing game
word: numbers game
word: party game
word: parlour game
word: role-playing game
word: sport
word: team sport
word: video game
word: zero-sum
Derived terms: word: 163rd game
word: action game
word: adventure game
word: advergame
word: aftergame
word: after-game
word: A game
word: A-game
word: ahead of the game
word: ain't no shame in my game
word: all fun and games
word: alternate reality game
word: antigame
word: arcade game
word: art game
word: artillery game
word: at the top of one's game
word: away game
word: backgame
word: back in the game
word: back-seat game
word: badger game
word: Balbo's game
word: ball game
word: banking game
word: beat someone at their own game
word: beer and pretzels game
word: Big Game
word: big game
word: black game
word: blackgame
word: blame game
word: blow this for a game of soldiers
word: board game
word: bowl game
word: bullet-screen game
word: cannon game
word: card game
word: cash game
word: casual game
word: catch someone at their own game
word: cat's game
word: centipede game
word: change the game
word: children's game
word: choking game
word: circle game
word: city-building game
word: clapping game
word: clicker game
word: cocktail game
word: complete game
word: computer game
word: confidence game
word: con game
word: console game
word: cooperative game
word: Cornish game hen
word: counting-out game
word: crane game
word: crapgame
word: crunch game
word: crying game
word: cue game
word: cybergame
word: dance game
word: day game
word: death game
word: dice game
word: doorgame
word: door game
word: doujin game
word: dress-up game
word: drinking game
word: end game
word: endgame
word: end-game
word: end of the ball game
word: ballgame
word: Eurogame
word: exergame
word: exhibition game
word: expectations game
word: extensive form game
word: fair game
word: fangame
word: field game
word: fighting game
word: folkgame
word: foregame
word: for the love of the game
word: fuck this for a game of soldiers
word: fun and games
word: gameable
word: gamebag
word: game bag
word: game ball
word: game bird
word: game board
word: gameboard
word: gamebook
word: gamebot
word: gamebreaking
word: game camera
word: gamecard
word: gamecatcher
word: game chair
word: gamechanger
word: game changer
word: game-changer
word: game-changing
word: game clock
word: game club
word: gamecock
word: game console
word: game controller
word: gamecraft
word: game day
word: gameday
word: gamedev
word: game drive
word: game-end
word: game engine
word: game face
word: gamefic
word: game-filled
word: gamefish
word: game fish
word: game for a laugh
word: gamefowl
word: game fowl
word: game-goer
word: gamegoer
word: game-head
word: gamejack
word: gamejacker
word: game jam
word: game jammer
word: gamekeeper
word: game keeper
word: game-keeper
word: gamekeeping
word: gameland
word: game laws
word: gameless
word: gamelike
word: gamely
word: game-making
word: game manager
word: game master
word: game mastering
word: game mode
word: game of chance
word: game of chicken
word: game of gotcha
word: game of luck
word: game of skill
word: game of strategy
word: game of the goose
word: game of Troy
word: game of two halves
word: gameography
word: game on
word: game out
word: game over
word: game-over
word: game pad
word: gamepad
word: game park
word: game piece
word: game plan
word: gameplayer
word: gameplay
word: game-play
word: gameplaying
word: game point
word: gameport
word: game port
word: game preserve
word: gamer
word: game rage
word: game reserve
word: game room
word: games room
word: game save
word: gamescape
word: game score
word: game sense
word: game set
word: game, set, match
word: game sheet
word: game show
word: gamesman
word: gamesmanship
word: gamesome
word: gamespace
word: gamesplayer
word: gamester
word: game studies
word: gamesy
word: game theory
word: game-theoretical
word: game theorist
word: game time → game-time decision
word: gametype
word: gameverse
word: game viewer
word: game warden
word: gameware
word: game-winner
word: gamewise
word: game with a purpose
word: gameworld
word: gamey
word: gamy
word: gamification
word: gamify
word: German game
word: give the game away
word: god game
word: good game
word: goomer
word: grab game
word: grand strategy game
word: ground game
word: guessing game
word: gutter game
word: hand game
word: handgame
word: have fun and games
word: head game
word: head-game
word: home game
word: hypergame
word: idle game
word: imitation game
word: incremental game
word: ingame
word: in-game → in-game currency
word: in the game
word: iron game
word: killer game
word: knife game
word: language game
word: late in
word: to the game
word: launch game
word: lift one's game
word: long game
word: lookers-on see most of the game
word: love game
word: makegame
word: make game of
word: map game
word: massively multiplayer online game
word: m.m.o. role-playing g.
word: master of game
word: match-three game
word: match-four game
word: mathematical game
word: May game
word: Mazur game
word: mechanical game
word: medal game
word: Mediterranean Games
word: megagame
word: metagame
word: metagaming
word: microgame
word: middlegame
word: middle game
word: midgame
word: mind game
word: mini-game
word: minigame
word: mobile game
word: mug's game
word: multigame
word: Murphy game
english: video
translation: video
word: music game
word: name of the game
word: netgame
word: neurogame
word: new game +
word: new game plus
word: newsgame
word: new to the game
word: night game
word: nomination game
word: nongame
word: normal form game
word: Northcott's game
word: no shame in my game
word: number game
word: numbers game
word: off one's game
word: old army game
word: online reality game
word: only game in town
word: on one's game
word: on the game
word: on top of one's game
word: open game
word: otome game
word: outgame
word: panel game
word: parity game
word: parlor game
word: parlor-game
word: parlour game
word: parlour-game
word: party game
word: passing game
word: pebble game
word: penis game
word: Penney's game
word: perfect game
word: pervasive game
word: philosopher's game
word: pick-up game
word: pinch of the game
word: pitch game
word: platform game
word: play a double game
word: playgame
word: play games
word: play someone at their own game
word: play stupid games, win stupid prizes
word: play the game
word: play the pronoun game
word: Ponzi game
word: post game
word: postgame
word: pre-game
word: pregame
word: pseudogame
word: put someone on game
word: puzzle game
word: race game
word: rage game
word: raise one's game
word: redemption game
word: reindeer games
word: retrogame
word: return game
word: rhythm game
word: ring game
word: road game
word: roaring game
alt: role-playing/role playing/rôle-playing
word: roleplaying game
word: role-playing video game
word: round game
word: rules of the game
word: run game
word: run game on
word: running game
word: sandbox game
word: saved game
word: savegame
word: screw this for a game of soldiers
word: semi-closed game
word: semi-open game
word: service game
word: shell game
word: shitgame
word: Sir Philip Sidney game
word: skin in the game
word: small game
english: /that
translation: /that
word: sod this for a game of soldiers
word: sports game
word: stage of the game
word: stealth game
word: step up one's game
word: strap game
word: strategy game
word: strongman game
word: subgame
word: survival game
word: table game
word: tabletop game
word: tactical role-playing game
word: take-that game
word: take the game to
english: /big
translation: /big
word: talk a good game
word: team game
word: telephone game
word: the beautiful game
word: the game is not worth the candle
word: the game is up
word: there's no shame in my game
word: tile-matching game
word: town-building game
word: Troy game
word: TV game
word: twitch game
english: this/ at this/ at that
translation: this/ at this/ at that
word: two can play that game
word: two-handed game
word: tycoon game
word: ultimatum game
word: up one's game
word: up the game
word: vantage game
word: video arcade game
word: video-game
word:  video game console
word: video game
word: viddy game
word: waiting game
word: wall game
word: war game
word: webgame
word: what's your game
word: whole new ball game
word: wide game
word: word game
word: zero-sum game
Related terms: word: board game piece
word: chess piece
word: chess move
word: card suit
word: playing card
word: entertainment
word: goal
word: player
word: rule
word: :Category:Games