Advanced Rules
This page explains obscure rules that apply under rare circumstances. See How to Play for basic rules.
player requests: Some celebrity goos are requested by players, who may provide merely a name or fill in the goo with a clue, source image, and/or gooed image. Players are not allowed to guess at their own requests, which can affect their regular season score. Scott will hold a request until the bonus goos after the season ends if a player asks. Normally, no more than one goo per player is published per season, but Scott is open to suggestions for entire themes featuring five goos.
fictional characters: Goos are never fictional characters. If you recognize a movie or television character in the image, the correct answer is usually the actor shown. Although the goo is always a real person, the source image might be a dramatization of that person, such as a historical figure represented by a model in costume today. Use the category and clue as context to decipher the correct answer. Some goos may be real people whose lives have become largely fictionalized through folklore, such as Robin Hood and King Arthur. (Note: Some early goos were fictional characters, such as Mickey Mouse. Scott decided in 2009 not to create any more goos of fictional characters.)
non-humans: Goos are never non-humans, such as objects or machines or concepts. Occasionally, famous animals may be turned into goos.
multiple people: A single goo is never multiple people unless the theme states otherwise, such as a theme of famous married couples or famous twins, in which case the page will state that both names are required.
re-occurrence: The same celebrity can re-appear as new goos an unlimited number of times, even appearing in different categories depending on shifts in their career or public perception. The same goo (clue and image) usually will not reappear, except for two cases:
• "Do Over" goos are inspired by incorrect guesses made for previous goos. Sometimes the same clue or image is used again to highlight the connection between the two goos.
• Goos from the live game at GooCon occasionally appear in the online game, sometimes intact and sometimes altered. Players who attended GooCon and saw the answer are allowed to guess freely.
What Happens When...
This chart spells out whether a player's guess is counted as correct or incorrect under specific circumstances.
Occasionally, a guess might be disallowed, which means it is erased from the record and the player may enter another guess during whatever time remains, if any, before the goo expires. If this happens during a tournament goo, the clock will continue running from the time of the original activation.
| CIRCUMSTANCE | OUTCOME OF GUESS |
| A player guesses the correct name, but misspelled. | Correct, as long as Scott can tell what the player intended, and the guess is not so misspelled as to become another name entirely. |
| A player guesses the correct person, but under a different name, such as guessing "Samuel Clemens" for a goo of Mark Twain. | Correct. If Scott doesn't recognize the alternate name and counts the guess as incorrect, the player is invited to notify him so that he can change the decision. |
| A player guesses only the last name. | Correct. In rare cases where a celebrity is known by a single name like Madonna or Prince, their real last name will count as correct. |
| A player guesses only the first name, or otherwise omits the last name. | Disallowed, except in cases where the celebrity is known by a single name like Madonna or Prince. |
| A player guesses the correct last name, but gets another part of the name incorrect. | Correct in most cases, such as "Tom Goodman" for John Goodman. The exception is when the guess is the name of another celebrity entirely, such as a guess of "Roger Bacon" for Francis Bacon. |
| A player guesses the incorrect last name, but otherwise has the name correct. | Incorrect. A guess of "Kanye White" for Kanye West would not count. Guesses that are clearly misspellings usually do count (see above). Scott is the final judge of what misspellings are "close enough," and he does his best to rule fairly. |
| A player guesses a descriptive phrase rather than a name, such as "the Pope" or "the woman who stars in those insurance commercials." | Disallowed. Clarification is needed. |
| A player guesses the fictional character seen in the source image, instead of the actor playing the character. | Incorrect. See the "fictional characters" rule at the top of this page. |
| The answer, or a strong enough hint to make the goo solvable, is revealed online. | Disallowed: All players who guessed incorrectly will have an opportunity to re-guess with whatever time remains. If any of these three circumstances happens during a tournament goo, the goo will be removed from the tournament and be treated as a bonus goo instead. If a player seems to have revealed the answer on purpose, Scott may impose penalties on the player in the interest of fairness. |
| There is a factual error in the clue that causes a player to guess a different person. (Some clues contain sarcasm, wordplay, lateral thinking, or other turns of phrase that do not count as factual errors.) | |
| The source image that was used to create the goo is of the wrong person. | |
| A player finds the source image online under the wrong name and guesses that name. | Incorrect, unless the source image really is the wrong person (see previous line). |
| More than one person is visible in the image, and the player guesses the wrong one. | Incorrect, as long as the category, clue, and/or theme make clear which person in the image is the answer. If the correct person truly cannot be distinguished, guesses for the wrong people will be disallowed. |
| A player guesses a surrender phrase like "I don't know" or "I give up" or "your mom." | Incorrect. Scott may disallow the guess if he can't tell whether it's a descriptive phrase that's intended as a real guess or a surrender phrase. Players can guess the word "surrender" to have their guess marked incorrect automatically. |
Did Scott judge your guess inconsistently with the rules above? Please contact him to have it corrected.
