Word.ws English Dictionary

game

/ɡeɪm/[ɡeɪ̯m]

game noun: a playful activity that may be unstructured; an amusement or pastime. Also the ellipsis of video game.

Noun

game (countable and uncountable, plural games)

  1. A playful activity that may be unstructured; an amusement or pastime.
    • Being a child is all fun and games.
    Antonyms:
    drudgery, work, toil
  2. (countable) An activity described by a set of rules, especially for the purpose of entertainment, often competitive or having an explicit goal.
    • Games in the classroom can make learning fun.
    • 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.1983, Lawrence Lasker et al., WarGames
  3. (UK, in plural) A school subject during which sports are practised.
    • From time to time tracksuited boys ran past them, with all the deadly purpose and humourless concentration of those who enjoyed Games.1991 September, Stephen Fry, chapter 1, in The Liar, London: Heinemann, →ISBN, section III, page 26
  4. (countable) A particular instance of playing a game.
    • Sally won the game.
    • They can turn the game around in the second half.
    Synonyms:
    match
  5. Part of a set during which one player continuously serves (at least four rallies must be won to win a game, at least six games must be won to win the set).
    • Game, set and match!
  6. That which is gained, such as the stake in a game.
  7. The number of points necessary to win a game.
    • In short whist, five points are game, while in in table tennis game is 21 points.
    • See also: for the win
  8. In some games, a point awarded to the player whose cards add up to the largest sum.
  9. (countable) The equipment that enables such activity, particularly as packaged under a title.
    • Some of the games in the closet we have on the computer as well.
  10. One's manner, style, or performance in playing a game.
    • Study can help your game of chess.
    • Hit the gym if you want to toughen up your game.
  11. (countable, informal, singular, usually) A field of gainful activity, as an industry or profession.
    • When it comes to making sales, John is the best in the game.
    • He's in the securities game somehow.
    Synonyms:
    line
    1. (informal, singular, usually) The music industry.
      • The rapper bragged about how he ran the game.
  12. (countable, figuratively) Something that resembles a game with rules, despite not being designed.
    • In the game of life, you may find yourself playing the waiting game far too often.
    • I ſee you ſtand like Grey-hounds in the ſlips, / Straying vpon the Start. The Game’s afoot: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...
Show 9 more meaningsShow fewer meanings
  1. (countable) An exercise simulating warfare, whether computerized or involving human participants.
    Synonyms:
    wargame
  2. (countable) A questionable or unethical practice in pursuit of a goal.
    • You want to borrow my credit card for a week? What's your game?
    • Your murderous game is nearly up.1845, Blackwood Magazine
    Synonyms:
    scheme, racket
  3. (uncountable) Wild animals hunted for food.
    • The forest has plenty of game.
    • 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...1907, John Burroughs, Camping & Tramping with Roosevelt, Houghton Mifflin Company, →OCLC, pages 5–6
  4. A flock of swans, especially as kept for hunting purposes (or, originally, a group of any animals kept for such purpose).
    • A game of swans flew there and the water and the shore beneath were fouled with their greenwhite slime.1916, James Joyce, chapter V, in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, New York, N.Y.: B[enjamin] W. Huebsch, →OCLC
  5. (informal, uncountable) The ability to seduce or woo someone, usually by strategy.
    • He didn't get anywhere with her because he had no game.
    • She's strange, so strange, but I didn't complain / She said yes to me when I ran my game1998, “She's Strange”, performed by Nate Dogg
    Synonyms:
    rizz
  6. (archaic) Lovemaking, flirtation.
  7. (slang) Prostitution. (Now chiefly in on the game.)
    • ſet them downe, / For ſlottiſh ſpoyles of opportunitie; / And daughters of the game.c. 1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Troylus and Cressida”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and...
    • [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.1755, Miguel de Cervantes, translated by Tobias Smollett, Don Quixote, Volume 1, I.2
  8. (slang, uncountable) Mastery; the ability to excel at something.
    • 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 game1998, “He Got Game”, performed by Public Enemy
    • In the contemporary arts of the academic contact zone, I say African American students got game!2005, Kermit Ernest Campbell, Gettin' Our Groove on: Rhetoric, Language, and Literacy for the Hip Hop Generation, →ISBN, page 123
  9. (archaic, uncountable) Diversion, entertainment.
    • 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...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...

Adjective (1)

game (comparative gamer, superlative gamest)

  1. (colloquial) Willing and able to participate.
    • "[…] But what’s this long face about, Mr. Starbuck; wilt thou not chase the white whale? art not game for Moby Dick?”1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 36, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC, page 180
    • One Friday when I jumped into my barber’s chair to get a trim, she suggested I try a jheri curl. I was game, despite the fact that most of the women I knew hated jheri curls on men and called men who wore them “bamas,” a term short for Alabamas, which meant real country.2003 August, E. Lynn Harris, chapter 9, in What Becomes of the Brokenhearted: A Memoir, New York, N.Y.: Doubleday, →ISBN, pages 126–127
  2. That shows a tendency to continue to fight against another animal, despite being wounded, often severely.
  3. Persistent, especially in senses similar to the above.

Verb

game (third-person singular simple present games, present participle gaming, simple past and past participle gamed)

  1. (intransitive) To gamble.
    • an impressive protest against gaming, swearing, and all immoral practices which might forfeit divine aid in the great struggle for National Independence1898, “George Washington: Statesman, Christian Gentleman”, in Suggestive programs for special day exercises
  2. (intransitive) To play card games, board games, or video games.
    • “The first few days after getting here are weird. It’s a version of cold turkey because you’ve been gaming around the clock and suddenly, nothing. […]”2017 June 16, Joanna Walters, “Inside the rehab saving young men from their internet addiction”, in The Guardian
  3. (transitive) To exploit loopholes in a system or bureaucracy in a way which defeats or nullifies the spirit of the rules in effect, usually to obtain a result which otherwise would be unobtainable.
    • We'll bury them in paperwork, and game the system.
    • A large batch of online trolls have gamed a web contest that promises a Taylor Swift performance at any school in the US. The target? Horace Mann School for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing.2012 August 31, Amanda Holpuch, “Trolls game Taylor Swift competition in favor of school for the hearing impaired”, in The Guardian
  4. (slang, transitive) To perform premeditated seduction strategy.
    • Returning briefly to his journalistic persona to interview Britney Spears, he finds himself gaming her, and she gives him her phone number.2005 October 6, “Picking up the pieces”, in The Economist
    • A business associate of mine at the time, George Wu, sat across the way, gaming a stripper the way I taught him.2010, Mystery, The Pickup Artist: The New and Improved Art of Seduction, Villard Books, →ISBN, page 100

Adjective (2)

game (comparative more game, superlative most game)

  1. Injured, lame.
    • You come with me and we'll have a cozy dinner and a pleasant talk together, and by that time your game ankle will carry you home very nicely, I am sure."1906 April, O. Henry [pseudonym; William Sydney Porter], “Lost on Dress Parade”, in The Four Million, New York, N.Y.: McClure, Phillips & Co, →OCLC
    • He was done for, all right. I took out my six-shooter and aimed right between his eyes. He kicked once, sort of leaped—or tried to, and then lay still. I stood there a minute, to see if he had to have another. He was so game that, some way, I didn’t want to give him more than he needed.1930, Edna Ferber, Cimarron, page 29

Also used as

game is also the ellipsis of video game.

game meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

game in Hindi

playful activity that may be unstructured, amusement, pastime
खेल khel

game in Tamil

particular instance of playing a game; match
விளையாட்டு viḷaiyāṭṭu

game in Marathi

playful activity that may be unstructured, amusement, pastime
खेळ kheḷ
activity described by a set of rules, especially for the purpose of entertainment
खेळ kheḷ
video game — see also video game
गेम gem

game in Urdu

playful activity that may be unstructured, amusement, pastime
کھیل khel
More languagesFewer languages
game in Bengali
খেলা khela
game in Telugu
ఆట āṭa
game in Malayalam
കളി kaḷi, കളിക്കുക kaḷikkuka
game in Kannada
ಆಟ
game in Punjabi
ਖੇਡ
game in Gujarati
રમત
game in Odia
ଖେଳ
game in Sanskrit
क्रीडा krīḍā
game in Assamese
খেল khel
game in Nepali
खेल
game in Pashto
لوبه loba, بازي bāzí
game in Tagalog
laro
game in Arabic
لَعْب laʕb, لَعْبَة laʕba, لُعْبَة luʕba, لعبة liʕba
game in Malay
permainan
game in Indonesian
permainan
game in Persian
بَازِی bāzī, بازی bâzi
game in Thai
กีฬา gii-laa, เกม geem, การเล่น gaan-lên
game in Vietnamese
trò chơi, thi đấu
game in Myanmar
အားကစား a:ka.ca:

Examples of game in a sentence

  • “I'm through with all pawn-games,” I laughed.1908, W[illiam] B[lair] M[orton] Ferguson, chapter I, in Zollenstein, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:
  • “Come, let us have a game of lansquenet.1908, W[illiam] B[lair] M[orton] Ferguson, chapter I, in Zollenstein, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:
  • Hidden behind thickets of acronyms and gorse bushes of detail, a new great game is under way across the globe.2013 July 19, Timothy Garton Ash, “Where Dr Pangloss meets Machiavelli”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 6, page 18:
  • It was obviously Lord Macaulay's game to blacken the greatest literary champion of the cause he had set himself to attack.1902, George Saintsbury, Dryden, page 182:

All 40 example sentences with game

Synonyms of game

21 more synonymsFewer synonyms

Antonyms

All synonyms and antonyms of game

Forms of game

Noun
pluralgames
Adjective
comparativegamer
superlativegamest
comparativemore game
superlativemost game
Verb
third-person singular presentgames
present participlegaming
past participlegamed
pastgamed

Plural of game: games

Origin of game

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.

Words formed from game

Phrases with game

166 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with game

37 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about game

What does game mean?
Game means a playful activity that may be unstructured; an amusement or pastime.
What is game in Hindi?
Game in Hindi is खेल (khel). See Game meaning in Hindi.
How do you use game in a sentence?
“I'm through with all pawn-games,” I laughed.
What part of speech is game?
Game can be a noun, an adjective or a verb.
How do you pronounce game?
Game is pronounced /ɡeɪm/.
What is the plural of game?
The plural of game is games.

Words near game in the dictionary

  1. gambusia
  2. gambusias
  3. gamcha
  4. gamchcha
  5. gamchha
  6. game
  7. game as Ned Kelly
  8. game bag
  9. game bags
  10. game ball
  11. game balls

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: game (page history and authors); game (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); game (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); game (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); game (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); game (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-game.ogg.

Cite this entry: “game.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/game. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.