This super easy fall party game is great for pretty much any age and fall celebration! All you need is a pumpkin, some tape, and some prizes for a fall game that everyone will love!
Pumpkin Party Game
When you think of a pumpkin roll, you probably think of the delicious pumpkin cake rolled up with cream cheese filling (and if you like that, you should try these pumpkin cream cheese muffins).
This pumpkin roll game is not that. It’s literally rolling a pumpkin to win prizes, and it’s so much fun! We played tons of fall party games with my family and this was easily one of their favorites!
This one’s great because you could play it with pretty much any age so it works for fall festivals, fall parties, classroom parties, and more! All you have to do is switch out the prizes and difficulty level to make it work for different ages!
Supplies
This game is super simple but does require a few things to play. I’ve included what we used below but you can always change it up too!
- Small pumpkin – make sure it’s a real pumpkin, not a fake one. The fake ones will just fly when you roll them because they’re so light! Plus, the real ones wobble and roll in a much different way!
- Tape – I used colored painter’s tape to make my lines but you can really use any tape that you’re comfortable with taping onto the ground. Just make sure it’s something bold and visible so it’s easy to see the lines!
- Prizes – I’ve included an entire section full of prize ideas that will work for different ages at the bottom of this post so I’m not going to into details here, but you will need prizes!
How to setup the game
This pumpkin roll game is super simple to setup – that’s one of the reasons it’s one of my favorite new games!
1 – Create Your Board
Use tape to create lines on the ground (or you could do a table and use a mini pumpkin if you’d prefer – but the ground is more fun), creating sections that are wide enough for a pumpkin to land in.
Make sure that your lines go pretty far across the floor to create a large board to play on. They don’t need to go all the way across the floor (and I recommend they don’t), but there should be a good sized playing area. You can see how big ours was in the picture below.
Tip!
Choose how wide your sections are based on the ages of people playing. The wider your sections, the easier it is to land a pumpkin in them – great for kids. If you make the sections narrower, it’s harder to land a pumpkin in the middle of a section – perfect for teens and adults!
2 – Add Your Prizes
Once you have your sections, place a prize of some sort at the very end of tape line. I like to do less exciting prizes toward the beginning of the roll (easier to win) and harder prizes toward the end (harder to get it to stop there accurately).
Put the best prize of all next to the last line on your grid – that’s always going to be the hardest one to win! I didn’t make my grid go all the way to the wall so it was possible to overshoot the grid completely (and not win anything – this works best for teens and adults).
My big prize at the end for example was a $50 Chipotle gift card and the prizes at the very beginning were like $2-$3.
Tip for little kids!
If you’re doing this with kids (elementary aged and younger), I highly recommend putting buckets of small prizes at the end of the lines instead of just one prize. In the adult version of the game, the prize is gone once someone wins it, but you’ll want younger kids to always win a prize so go with buckets full!
How to Play this pumpkin roll game
This really is one of the easiest fall party games ever, maybe even easier than the fall scavenger hunt we did last year!
1 – Choose Your Playing Order
Start by choosing the order players will roll in. This is important because once a prize is off the board, it’s off the board (unless you’re playing with little kids – see my note above).
You can do something like youngest to oldest or let people choose their own order, but I personally recommend randomizing it in some way by letting people choose a number out of a hat or a playing card or something like that (kind of like we do with our gift exchange games).
Going first is easily the best because you have all the prizes left on the board, so I recommend choosing the order randomly if you can so there aren’t any complaints!
2 – Roll the pumpkins
The first person stands behind the starting line and rolls the pumpkin (on its side) onto the grid you created earlier.
If they land the pumpkin inside the grid (not outside and not beyond the grid) AND inside one of the sections (not touching the tape line), they can do one of two things:
- Take the prize that’s at the end of the section they landed in and leave the game with their prize. This also means that prize is gone – unless you want to replace them throughout the game, that’s up to you.
- Choose to not take the prize (if they want to try for something better) and go to the end of the line to roll again. They also get a strike. This can be risky because you never know what prizes will be left when it’s your turn again but also can be a way to win a better prize!
If someone rolls and lands the pumpkin outside the grid (either to the left, right, or beyond the grid), on a line, OR in a section that no longer has a prize, they receive a strike and go back to the end of the line to try again next turn.
Three Strikes, You’re Out
If someone gets three strikes, whether they got self-inflicted strikes by choosing to try for a better prize or because they rolled off the grid, they’re out of the game and end up with no prize. This makes it so the game eventually ends and people don’t just keep getting back in line until all of the prizes have been won.
Keep playing until everyone is out of the game because they either won a prize or got three strikes. Anyone who won a prize gets to keep their prize and anyone who doesn’t, better luck next time – or you can give them sort of small consolation prize!
a fun final round of the game
If you want to make the game even more exciting, you can give anyone who won a prize the chance to play one final round, kind of like in our Let’s Make a Deal game.
Add more prizes to any empty spots on the pumpkin board (including ideally some big ones that would entice people to risk what they’ve already won). Then let anyone who wants to turn in their previously won prize for the chance to roll the pumpkin one time – if they land it inside a prize section, they win the prize. If they don’t, they’re out of luck and lose everything.
It’s risky because you never know if the pumpkin is going to cooperate but that’s what makes it fun!
Pumpkin Roll Prize Ideas
If you’re doing this with little kids, you can just do standard Halloween or fall party favors like bouncy balls, erasers, little wind-up guys, etc. If you’re doing this for teens and adults and looking for real prizes, here are some great options!
- Gift cards – you can do small ones, medium ones, and large ones. Try to make sure the gift cards are universal enough that everyone will be excited to win them (and nervous about risking them).
- Cash – everyone loves winning money! You can do small amounts up to larger ones!
- Lotto tickets – I personally prefer cash or gift cards but lotto tickets are still kind of a fun option (for adults!)
- Experiences – things like movie tickets, massages, indoor skydiving, mini golf cards, etc. are always a good big prize!
- Gourmet snacks, treats, and candies
- Small card games (a bunch of our favorite board games for game night would be great)
More Fall Party Ideas
If you want more fall party ideas to go with these ones, check out these next!
- Fall scavenger hunt – three different fall scavenger hunt ideas including ones for kids and adults!
- Fall bucket list – tons of great fall activities and a printable bucket list to fill out!
- Pumpkin worksheets – these are great to put on a table for kids to work on during parties!
- Fall art projects – tons of fall craft ideas for kids like this fun apple craft, this pumpkin patch craft, and more!
- Fall snack mix – one of my favorite fall party secrets is this delicious snack mix!
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