BrainRush How to play

What is BrainRush?

BrainRush is a trivia game for a group around one shared screen. Players or teams pick questions from a board of categories and point values. Harder questions are worth more points.

One person is the host. The host runs the game on the computer, reads each question out, listens to the answers and marks them right or wrong. Players answer out loud: nobody types an answer.

Quick start

1. Who is playing? Choose Players or Teams and enter the names.
2. Pick categories and click Start Game.
3. Pick a cell on the board: a category and a point value.
4. Answer before the timer runs out. Stuck? Use one of your 3 helpers. The host clicks Show Answer and marks each answer Correct or Wrong.
5. Go Back to Board and keep playing. Click End Game to see who won.

Setting up a game

Players or teams

• Choose Players (up to 6) or Teams (up to 4).
• Each player or team needs a name of their own, up to 30 characters.
• Everyone gets a color. Click a color circle to switch to the next free color.

Categories

• Tick the categories you want to play. The setup screen shows how many you can pick.
• The board columns follow the order you tick them in. The small number on each tick shows its place.
• Surprise me! lets the game choose for you:
  • Tick it on its own and you get 3 random categories.
  • Tick it together with your own picks and it adds 1 random category.
  • A random category shows ? on the board until one of its questions is opened.

Timer

Set how many seconds players get for each question (5 to 600). The change applies to this game only.

Played questions

The bar shows how much of the question bank has already been played on this device. New games pick questions you haven't seen yet first. Forget played questions starts the count again, so every question can come up again.

The board

• Each column is a category and each row is a point value, from the lowest at the top to the highest at the bottom. More points means a harder question.
• Click a cell to open its question. Your group decides who picks next, for example taking turns.
• After a question, its cell closes. It takes the color and name of whoever answered correctly, or turns grey if nobody did. A closed cell can't be opened again. The double score cell also shows a small ×2 in its corner once it has been played.
• The scoreboard below the board shows every score. The host can use − and + to fix a score if a mark was wrong.

Answering a question

• The question appears in large text. Some questions show a picture, such as a flag or a famous place. Photos show their credit underneath.
• A countdown starts straight away. It turns red in the last third. When it reaches 0 it shows Time's up!, and the host decides what happens next: nothing is scored automatically.
• The host can Pause, Resume or Reset the timer.
• Many questions are in Arabic and English. Arabic is shown first; the language button switches between the two. The answer follows the same language.
• The host clicks Show Answer to reveal the answer. Text in brackets such as (accept Makkah) lists other answers that also count as correct.

Scoring

• ✓ Correct adds the question's points to the score.
• ✗ Wrong takes the same number of points away. Scores can go below zero, so think before you guess!
• Only one player or team can be correct on each question, but anyone may try, unless someone has used a helper on it.
• Each player or team can be marked only once per question, and a mark can't be undone. To fix a mistake, use − / + on the scoreboard.
• Back to Board closes the question for good, whether or not anyone answered.
• One hidden question on every board is worth double for a correct answer.

Example

Sara, Omar and Lina open a 300 question.

The cell then takes Sara's color and name.

Helpers

Every player or team starts the game with 3 helpers, and each one can be used once per game. The host clicks the small helper buttons next to that player's name on the question screen, then confirms. The scoreboard shows which helpers each player has left.

• A helper can be used only before anyone has been marked on the question and before the answer is shown.
• Once you use a helper, the question is yours alone: nobody else can answer it. You can still add another of your helpers, for example Swap and then 3 choices.
• Some questions don't have 3 choices yet. On those, the ABC button is greyed out.
• A helper can't be taken back, and the scoreboard's − / + buttons don't give it back.

Example

Omar opens a 400 question and has no idea. He uses Skip and loses 200 instead of risking 400. Later, Lina uses 3 choices on a 300 question, picks B and gets it right: +300.

×2 Double score

Every game hides one double score question somewhere on the board. It is picked at random when the game starts, and nothing on the board shows which one it is.

• When someone opens it, a ×2 Double score! popup appears and shows what the question is worth. The timer waits until the host clicks Let's play.
• The question's heading shows a gold ×2 Double score badge, and the Correct buttons turn gold and show the doubled points.
• ✓ Correct earns twice the question's points.
• ✗ Wrong costs only the normal points: there is no double penalty, so it's worth having a go!
• Swap keeps the double: the new question is worth twice its own points. Skip costs half the normal points, as usual.
• Once it has been played, its cell on the board shows a small ×2 in the corner.

Example

Sara opens a 300 question and the Double score popup appears.

Ending the game

• Click End Game at any time. If questions are still left on the board, the game asks you to confirm first.
• When every cell has been played, the board shows End Game and show results.
• The results list everyone from the highest score to the lowest, and the winner is highlighted. If several share the top score, it's a tie and all of them are highlighted.
• New Game takes you back to setup for the next round.

💀 Sudden Death Streak (solo)

Playing alone? Try to answer as many questions in a row as you can.

• Choose Players with just one player. Click 💀 Sudden Death Streak (solo) next to Players / Teams, enter your Challenger name, then click Start Streak Challenge.
• Questions come from every category, one after another, and ones you haven't seen come first. The category picker isn't used.
• Each question shows 3 answers. Tap the right one before the timer runs out to add 1 to your streak, then click Next question (or press Enter).
• One wrong answer or time's up ends the run, and the right answer is shown. You can also click End run to stop and keep your streak.
• There is no Pause or Reset, and refreshing the page keeps the time that's left. Helpers aren't used in a streak.
• A streak of 1 or more is saved to the shared leaderboard. It shows the top 10, one row per person (their best run) with the name, the streak and the date of the run. Streak leaderboard on the setup screen shows it any time.

Tips and questions

What if someone refreshes the page by mistake?

Nothing is lost. The board, scores and played cells come back. An open question comes back too, but its timer starts again from the beginning.

Will we get the same questions next time?

Not on the same device until you've played through the questions you haven't seen yet. Each device keeps its own list.

What works best?

Play on a big screen or a TV that everyone can see, with one person as the host at the keyboard.