Check out these rock climbing games to help you improve your endurance, enhance your technique, and have fun on the wall in a different way than you already do!
These games are great for training specific aspects of your climbing or just messing around with your friends when you need something lighthearted to do at the climbing gym.
The best time to initiate one of these games is toward the end of the climbing session. It’s a perfect way to squeeze that last bit of energy out before you’re done climbing for the day. Plus, some of them take up quite a bit of space, so only play them when you know you won’t disturb other climbers on the wall.
Game 1: Add-On
Number of Players: 2+
Description:
This rock climbing game has a few names (such as “plus one”), but I’ve always known it as Add-On. The idea of this game is to make funky/complex/technical moves on the climbing wall to eliminate your opponents.
By playing Add-On, you’ll think of new ways to make climbing moves to beat your friends and try to emulate the moves they make while trying to eliminate you.
How To Play:
Add-On can be played with as little as two players. But you can play with as many players as you want! Start by determining the order in which you’ll be climbing. You can do this by age, height, or even ape-index!
The first person starts on the wall by grabbing two handholds. (Feet don’t matter in this game, they can go anywhere). The next player uses these two handholds and then makes two moves (one with each hand), adding to the sequence.
The hand that you must move first depends on the first player. If they grab onto the wall with their right hand first, all subsequent players must make a right-hand move at the start of their additional sequence.
(You can also play another version of this game by only adding a single handhold each time, which is better to play when you have a lot of players!)
The game is on! Each player must recreate the sequence before them, then add one (or two) moves for the next opponent to try. If you cannot make the move required, you are eliminated! (You can give your friends a few tries if you want to be nice).
The game ends when only one climber can recreate the sequence and add on two more hands.
Helps You Train:
Add-On helps you train technical movements you usually wouldn’t use in a typical climbing session. These movements can improve your confidence when trying challenging boulders that you may not think are possible.
Game 2: Ninja
Number of Players: 1+
Description:
This is best played on an inclined slab or vertical wall as it involves careful movements and holding positions for longer. Ninja is a game of stealth and balance.
How to Play:
The rules from Add-On apply: three lives and add a move each turn, but you must make foot placements with no discernible sound.
Each time a player steps on, somebody will stand a metre away, and If their foot bangs the wall or they scrape their shoes against the wall, they lose a life! Silence is the key.
Want to improve climbing stamina, footwork, and make your climbing moves more solid and refined? This is your game.
Cork Game Variation:
A variation of Ninja game is using corks. Again, this is another incredibly simple exercise and a good excuse to go drinking (You’ve got to get the corks from somewhere, right!).
Place a number of corks on footholds along a vertical or slabby traverse wall. Now, try traversing the wall using all the footholds with corks on them without knocking them over.
Helps You Train:
Ninja helps you train your footwork and your endurance and improves your confidence when standing on smaller footholds.
Game 3: Twister/Simon Says
Number of Players: 2+
Description:
Twister is a climbing game of endurance and quick thinking! This game helps you make efficient decisions while climbing to improve your confidence on the wall.
The idea of this game is to put your friend in difficult positions by telling them where to put each hand and foot.
How To Play:
This is a game played by two people at a time. The climber and the Game Master.
You can play Twister with the spinner that comes with the traditional game, but you may only have all the colours needed nearby if you’re climbing on a spray wall.
The easiest way to play is to look for an area of the climbing gym with many coloured boulder problems near each other. Then, have your friend walk up to the wall and begin shouting where they should place each extremity.
For example, a typical Twister climbing game looks like this:
- Climber 1, “Right hand yellow.”
- Climber 2 moves their right hand to a yellow hold.
- Climber 1, “Left hand green.”
- Climber 2 moves the left hand to a green hold.
- Climber 1, “Left foot pink.”
- Climber 2 moves their left foot to a pink hold.
And so on and so forth! The idea is to put your opponent in difficult but attainable positions to challenge their movement on the wall. Sometimes, their feet will be above their head, and other times, their arms will be crossed under their legs. We all know and love Twister growing up, but now it’s played on the climbing wall!
Alternatively, add Simon Says if you want to spice it up a little more. You can have multiple people on the wall for this version. When playing, try to eliminate your friends by tricking them into moving their bodies or making them complete weird movements. The idea is to make them focus on your voice while also focusing on their body!
Helps You Train:
This game helps you train your focus and quick-thinking while on the wall to be the most energy-efficient while climbing.
Game 4: No Hands Climbing
Number of Players: 1+
Description:
No Hands climbing sounds precisely what it is: climbing without using your hands!
Challenge your friends to see who can traverse or send the bouldering wall without using their hands. Alternatively, you can do this yourself to practise your footwork!
How to Play:
Find a slab section of the bouldering wall with many problems nearby. You can either traverse or climb up. The goal of the game is to reach the end (or the top) without using your hands!
You can try playing this on a vertical section of the wall, but beware that it’s much harder to lean forward when the holds are in your face!
Game 5: The Floor is Lava
Number of Players: 1+
Description:
Have you played The Floor is Lava? Now imagine it while climbing!
This bouldering game is essentially just practising traversing across the gym but adding in friends to push your limits further.
Packed with endurance training, this game will likely have your forearms screaming by the end.
How To Play:
This climbing game should only be played when the bouldering area is practically empty. You want to avoid climbing in other people’s way, so put off playing in a packed gym.
The idea of this game is simple. Start on one end of a bouldering wall and traverse to the other, around all the lava!
You can play with as many players as you like, but make sure you stagger your start times to avoid waiting on each other while hanging on terrible crimps.
You can even make this climbing game more challenging by eliminating specific colours!
The game is over when all players fail to traverse the climbing wall.
Helps You Train:
This game helps you train your endurance and decision-making by focusing on the most efficient way to traverse the bouldering wall.
Game 6: Eliminator
Number of Players: 1+
Description:
Eliminator is a climbing game much like Add-On, but instead of adding moves, you’re eliminating them! (Another name for this game is known as “minus-one”).
This game teaches you how strong you are by requiring you to make climbing moves you usually wouldn’t. You will find more ways to effectively move your body that can encourage you to try more challenging climbs!
How To Play:
Choose a boulder problem that is relatively easy for you and your friends to climb. After you decide on the order, the first person climbs the problem with all the intended handholds except one. They must eliminate one hold on the problem for the next climber to complete.
Then, the next climber must repeat the problem, using the same handholds as the previous climber, except they will also eliminate one hold.
(You can challenge yourself and play this game alone, too!)
As this bouldering game progresses, you’ll climb much more dynamically and resourcefully to complete the problem. You can play with as many players as you wish, but I’ll warn you, the more players eliminating holds between your turns, the harder this game will be!
The winner is decided by the last person to successfully climb the boulder problem after all the members have fallen off.
Helps You Train:
This climbing game helps you train your technical skills by forcing you to do movements you wouldn’t normally try.
Game 7: Stick-On
Number of Players: 2+
Description:
This is one of those timeless games that can be as friendly or as cruel as you want it to be.
You’ll need a stick, a bouldering wall, a dash of sadism.
How to Play:
One climber takes the wall at a time, beginning at any jug on a bouldering wall. Those on the ground use the stick to point out the climber’s next hold. The climber must find a way to make the move.
Continue until the climber either can’t make the move or pumps out and falls. Then, the next person takes the wall, and the first climber gets to take their revenge.
Several variations are possible here. The most general version points out hand moves, but if you want to get really creative, point out feet, too. Or outlaw matching on any hold. Go wild — the possibilities are endless!
Helps You Train:
This game is a good way to build dynamic strength and work on deadpoints. It’s one of the best ways to push each other to try hard since climbers on the ground will imagine moves you never would while on the wall.
Game 8: Tag
Number of Players: 3+
Description:
Yes, tag! This bouldering game should be intuitive as it takes you back to childhood and running around with your friends. The game is simple and can be played with as many players as possible.
How To Play
Decide who ‘it’ is, get on the wall, and go tag your friends! To make it more interesting, whoever the “it” player is gets to rest after they tag another player until that person tags the next.
This game will have you scrambling around the bouldering area, shrieking like a child while trying to escape your friend climbing toward you. It’s a great way to break up a serious climbing session and cool down after you’ve been working on your project.
Make sure to play Tag only when the bouldering space is relatively empty. Never climb too close to somebody to be as safe as possible!
Helps You Train:
Tag helps you train your endurance and technique by trying to conserve as much energy as possible to climb toward your friends with the most efficiency.
Game 9: Single-Foot Climbing
Number of Players: 1+
Description:
Single-foot climbing is deciding which foot you want to use, then only using it for your chosen climb. You can do this on the bouldering wall or a rope/auto belay. You can play this alone or with your friends!
How to Play:
Choose a climb and choose a foot! Hop on the wall and only use that foot during the climb. Focus on moving your hands up the wall, then hop your foot to the next hold. Continue this until you reach the top or tire yourself. Then, try to do it again with the other foot!
You can play this yourself or with your friends to see who has the better footwork! Normally, we use our feet to propel ourselves up the wall. This game relies on your arm strength and precise foot movement!
Helps You Train:
This game helps you train your footwork and arm strength.
Game 10: Dyno
Number of Players: 1+
Description:
Dynos are more common than they’ve ever been in climbing. From competition climbing to general gym climbing, you’re sure to encounter a dyno at any gym you enter, why not practise them?
How to Play:
Choose three holds to play this game (plus two footholds). Two start holds for your hands, and one hold far enough away that you must move dynamically to reach it.
If you’re new to dynos, start with shorter moves with big holds. This will get you comfortable throwing your body into the air. As you progress, move to harder dynos!
Take turns challenging your friends with harder and harder dynos!
Helps You Train:
Dyno helps you train your dynamic movement. You may not start seeking out boulders that require dynos, but it will improve your confidence when making dynamic movements overall.
Have Fun!
Climbing games are exactly what they sound like. They’re games! The difference is that each bouldering game you play benefits your climbing.
From contorting your body to fit into less-than-ideal positions just in hopes of eliminating your friend to climbing a boulder problem using only three holds, you improve your climbing by making moves you may not have thought were possible!
As lighthearted as these climbing games are, they help you improve your technique, strength, focus, and confidence. Try them out and see which is your favourite!
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