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Have you ever heard of this: Retrospective fatigue? In hundreds of interviews we conducted with Scrum Masters, Agile Coaches and other practitioners, Retro Fatigue was a very frequently mentioned challenge.
What can be done about it? There are, of course, some measures, as I explain in this article explain: 7 tips against retro fatigue. To anticipate – variety in the retro and playful elements are definitely an important building block!
This is where our list of the best retro games comes into play: Free Retrospective Play for Remote Teams. Alternatively, by the way, this article is also recommended: 54 Retro ideas for beginners and professionals.
We are presenting you online retrospective games that have three goals:
- The best retrospective games online to get to know each other as a team
- The best retrospective games online to reflect on the last sprint/weeks
- The best retrospective check-in games online to set the stage for the rest of retro (or just to do the retrospective warm up online)
This is a quick overview over the best retrospective games online:
- The retrospective maze
- Tangram Style 🔺
- The retrospective riddle 🧐
- The Reset
- A pet for our team
- Failing forward 🤦🏾♀️
- Eat that! 🥂
- Tell us your story... 🏴☠️
- #Fun fact
Let's jump straight into the best online retrospective games! We will start with the best games to get to know each other.
Getting to know the team | Scrum Retrospective Games Online
It doesn't matter whether it's a young, new, large or small team: one of the goals of retrospectives is to get to know the team in a new way and to leave everyday work behind.
This is one of the reasons why there are retrospective games. They can have different foci that might help to do a retrospective warm up online or maybe even a check-out towards the end of a retro - let's have a look!
Retrospective Games for New Teams | 1
Born to lie 👼
1. Retro game on online whiteboard
Duration: 10-20 minutes | Aim: Getting to know each other, analyzing team communication, retrospective games for new teams
Idea: Everyone in the team marks two places on a map - and explains why they were born there. In one of them, they were really born. The other place is a lie.
- Every team member on their own marks the place where they have been born and one additional place (possible on a digital whiteboard).
- Timebox 5 minutes: Next, they have to come up with an explanation for both places why they have been born there.
For example, this is what Julia Rodriguez would say:
A) As you all know, I have been born right around the corner in New York, I mean, this is why I work here and why I am visiting my family every weekend.
B) As you all know, my family name is Rodriguez. I am actually from Mexico City, where I was born 39 years ago. My family moved to the US shortly after my birthday, because my Dad started working here.
Both make sense – what's correct? - Timebox 1 minute per person: The explanation for both places is shared one by one. After one person shared their truth and a lie, everyone in the team guesses which place is the true place of birth.
- In the end, you can delete the “lies” from the map - and you should have a nice map of where the team is from that you might even want to add to your mutual team page.
Agile Retrospective Game | 2
A pet for our team 🙉
2. Agile Retro game on online whiteboard
Duration: 10-15 minutes | Goal: Getting to know each other, team spirit
Idea: If your team would have a pet, which one would it be? Which name would you give it?
- The team can view a few different pets on a digital whiteboard. An image and a few facts about the animal is given.
- Timebox 5-10 minutes: Based on that information, the team is now supposed to choose one of these animals as their pet. Which one fits best to our team spirit, our ways of working etc.? Is it more important to us that it is an intelligent animal, or that it is fun to play with?
- What you might add: The team can choose how they approach this decision. Do you want a democratic vote? Does everyone first collect clear arguments on their own why they would go for a specific pet? Should only the two people decide with the relevant skill set: the ones that already have pets?
- [Optional step] timebox 5 minutes: Of course, you can also let the team give the pet a nice name that perfectly fits its wonderful character.
- Depending on the enthusiasm of the discussions, you might actually want to post an image of the pet with its name on your mutual team page. You have a mascot!
Fun fact 😅
3. Online Whiteboard Game (Sprint Retrospective Games Online)
Duration: 5-15 minutes | Goal: getting to know each other, check-in
Idea: Everyone tells a fun fact about themselves based on a few areas of inspiration (e.g., “When I was in school…”, “My favorite animal is not a dog, a cat or the other boring obvious choices but…”, hobby, family).
- You open the linked board above or make a screenshot and import it into your retrospective tool.
- Timebox 2 minutes: Everyone writes a hidden note with a fun fact about themselves that nobody from the team knew before.
- One by one, team members share the fun fact about themselves.
- The team can react via the reactions in the top right corner (at least when using the Echometer tool).
- Optional: You vote who shared the most creative fun fact or you shared it in the most entertaining way. To vote, you can use the voting functionality or simply create circles that can be dragged and dropped by the team.
The reset 💽
4. Retro game on whiteboard (Remote Retrospective Games)
Duration: 15-60 minutes | Goal: Reflecting on teamwork
Idea: Imagine you would have a fresh start as a team. Everything could be designed differently, including your own personal skill set. What would the new “us” look like?
- Firstly, you share the instructions with the team: Someone pressed the “reset” button. You don’t have any meetings anymore. Colleagues don’t know each other. Everything has to be set up. What is the core thing that you would do differently?
Timebox 5 -15 minutes: Next, you give the following set of questions. It is your choice if the team members should pick one of these questions and answer it - or answer all of them (which would fill the whole retrospective).- When starting over, who in our team would you like to get to know better?
- Which kind of projects, technologies or other things should the team prevent in your opinion?
- You personally could learn a new skill and develop into a new role. What skill or what role would it be?
- What would you change in how the team is organized? Which meetings would not happen that often, or not at all?
- Timebox 10 - 30 minutes: Everyone shares their replies to the questions. Which things came to mind in this thought experiment?
- You should double check if you want to include the results of the questions into the voting towards the end of the retrospective. Do we want to put down an action item based on the discussions?
Agile Games for Retrospective | 5
Sorting it out 🛀🏻
5. Retro game on whiteboard (Remote Retrospective Games)
Duration: 5-15 minutes | Aim: getting to know each other, warming up
Idea: The team has to find out some numeric facts about themselves as fast as possible (e.g., age, distance to facilitator) - and then order themselves by that number. Pro-level: doing this without talking.
- You as the facilitator choose if you want to go for one or more things that they have to find out as fast as possible. These are some potential categories: age, height, distance to facilitator, distance to headquarters, years of experience, first letter of their first/last name (in that case, you order by ABC).
- These are some possible categories: age, height, distance to facilitator, distance to your headquarters, years of experience, first letter of first/last name (in this case you sort by ABC).
- You decide whether they have to order themselves by that number/letter verbally or non-verbally (e.g., only through writing, or maybe even via the video camera).
- The instructions are given to the team:
Your task is to order yourselves by your {age, etc.} as fast as possible. You have to do so by writing a whiteboard sticky note on a whiteboard with your name on it and then order it: Lowest number on the left, highest number on the right. - At the end, you say how much time they needed and maybe share in which area they were the fasts. Interesting, how did you know your height so quickly?
Retrospective Game Online | Bonus
Chicken Shoot with balloons 🎈
Bonus retro game in Echometer
Duration: 1-5 minutes | Goal: Fun at the end of the retro
Idea: We have built a small bonus game into our Echometer Retro Tool: Do you know the game "Chicken Shoot"? Our game works on the same principle, only with hot air balloons. It simply is about fun at the end of the retro: Which of our team members shoots the most balloons?
The screenshot above gives an overview of how the game works.
At the very end of the retrospective of Echometer there is a closing screen, the check-out (see at the top of the screenshot above). On that screen, you are asked how well the time was invested in the retro (aka ROTI score, see screenshot). Additionally, on that screen there is also a small balloon flying along the horizon in the background. What you need to know: As soon as any team member who is online in the Remote Retro clicks or shoots the balloon, this game is activated.
- Once that happened, each team member will see balloons flying back and forth at different speeds in the background of the retro check-out screen. The goal is to hit as many of them as possible.
- We recommend that you as the facilitator set a timer of 1 to 2 minutes as soon as the team starts playing.
- The winner can be identified via the counter in the upper left corner. The three team members with the most hits will be visible there. People with less points are not visible.
The goal of the game is simply to look forward to this little game at the end of the retro, on the one hand. On the other hand, you can leave the retro with a laugh through this game.
By the way: You don't have to actively promote the game. You can also just wait until one of the team members randomly clicks on the balloon and the game starts. It usually is a nice surprise 😄
Reflecting on the last sprint | Scrum Retrospective Games Online
Next round! By the time you're through with these games, you should have gotten to know each other quite well as a team.
The following online retrospective games focus more on reflecting on the last sprint or the last few weeks (depending on whether you are organized in Scrum or other agile frameworks).
I would like to add one thing at this point: Regular 1-to-1 meetings or coaching sessions with your colleagues (especially combined with retrospectives) can have a decisive effect on your team performance. And they can even be data-driven! If you are interested in the topic in more detail, take a look here: Here you will find 129 one-to-one meeting (or performance review) questions and here are the 3 best one-on-one meeting tools compared.
Failing forward 🐛
6. Online Whiteboard Game (Retrospective games ideas)
Duration: 45-90 minutes | Goal: Reflecting on the teamwork in general and the last sprint
Idea: There are so many sources out there giving the typical fails, typical mistakes of agile teams. Why not go through these mistakes and reflect which ones apply to us? Where are we making the same mistakes that other teams have done before? Let’s fail forward!
- A list of common mistakes or failures of agile teams is presented (see screenshot above). E.g…. You are giving the instructions.
- 4 minute timebox: Every team member reads through the typical mistakes of Scrum teams.
- 4 minute timebox: In case team members are reminded of their own team, they write a short anonymous sticky note at that position, explaining why they think so.
From now on, you proceed with the typical 5 phases of an agile retrospective. - Explaining feedback: After everyone is done with this part, everyone shares their thoughts (and notes) to get a shared understanding. At this point, there is no discussion.
- Prioritization: Every team member has 3 digital dots to vote. Put your dots where you think you have room for improvement.
- Discussion: Discuss the areas that have the most votes. Do you want to put down an action item?
- Action items: Name a specific person who is responsible for that action item. Don´t put down more than 3 action items - focus on quality instead of quantity (more on this in our post 7 tips for great action items).
- No culture of failure
- Zombie Scrum: Following agile without knowing why
- The fallacy of “We know what we need to build.”
- Not enough space for informal communication
- Using the wrong framework
- Wrong understanding of (Scrum) roles
- Lack of autonomy
- Lack of trust
- Inadequate testing
- Lack of good estimation
- Ignoring customer feedback
- Lack of proper planning
- Too many young developers
- Ignoring agile values
- Lack of product owner's involvement
- No retrospectives
- Incoherent team structure
- Other departments fail to involve product
- Fear of failure
- The organization is not optimized for a fast build-test-learn culture
- Lack of (product) vision
- Poor involvement of team members
- No sprint demo
- Team not cross-functional (silos)
- Lack of communication
- Lack of discipline regarding agile processes
- The team takes no responsibility for their own performance
- Wrong tech stack
- Team is not adequately staffed
- No proper documentation
- Loss of control at management level leads to micromanagement
The retrospective riddle 🕵🏻♂️
7. Online Whiteboard Game (Retrospective games ideas)
Duration: 45-90 minutes | Goal: Reflecting on the teamwork in general and the last sprint
Idea: A wise wizard has 3 secret, magic questions. Answering them would help the team a lot to improve. But to get to know these questions, the team has to solve 3 riddles first.
- You give an overview over the agenda of today's retrospective.
- 3 minute timebox: The first riddle is presented (see whiteboard above). The team has to solve it as fast as possible. If they are faster than 3 minutes, the remaining time will be added on the time to solve the next riddle.
- 5 minute timebox: The first magic question (a creative retrospective question) from our wizard is presented. E.g.: When thinking about my team, what don't I hear that should be heard?
- 20 minute timebox: Repeat step 2 and 3 with the second and then third riddle, maybe adding the remaining time from the last round.
- Choose from your typical repertoire of retrospective questions to suggest questions. These are some suggestions of magic questions that the wizard could ask:
- When I think about my team, what am I not hearing that should be heard?
- What are you thankful for when you think about the past few weeks?
- What would James Bond do if he had the challenges we face?
- Imagine if we hadn't achieved our team goal. What would have been the reason we didn't achieve it?
- From now on you proceed with the typical 5 phases of an agile retrospective.
- Explaining feedback: After everyone has finished answering the final magic question, everyone's thoughts (and notes) are shared. At this point there is no discussion.
- Prioritization: Each team member has 3 digital points to vote on. Now put the points where you think there is still room for improvement.
- Discussion: Discuss the areas that have the most votes. Do you want to put down an action item?
- Action items: Name a specific person who is responsible for that action item. Don´t put down more than 3 action items - focus on quality instead of quantity (more on this in our post 7 tips for great action items).
- You want to boil a two-minute egg. If you only have a three-minute timer (hourglass), a four-minute timer, and a five-minute timer, how can you boil the egg for only two minutes?
- Answer: Once the water is boiling, turn the three-minute timer and five-minute timer over. When the three-minute timer runs out, put the egg in the boiling water. When the five-minute timer runs out, two minutes have elapsed and it is time to take the egg out of the water. You don't need the four-minute timer for this riddle.
- Two fathers and two sons went fishing one day. They were there the whole day and only caught 3 fish. One father said, that is enough for all of us, we will have one each. How can this be possible?
- Answer: There was the father, his son, and his son's son. This equals 2 fathers and 2 sons for a total of 3!
- Forward I am heavy, but backward I am not. What am I?
- The word Ton.
- Which of the following words don't belong in the group and why? CORSET, COSTER, SECTOR, ESCORT, COURTS
- Courts. All of the others are anagrams of each other.
- A woman shoots her husband. Then she holds him underwater for over 5 minutes. Finally, she hangs him. But 5 minutes later they both go out together and enjoy a wonderful dinner together. How can this be?
- Answer: The woman was a photographer. She shot a picture of her husband, developed it, and hung it up to dry.
- Attention, only works in English and by reading aloud: There are 30 cows in a field, and 28 chickens. How many didn't?
- Listen closely: 30 cows, and twenty-eight chickens. Say EIGHT and ATE. They sound the same. Therefore, it means 20 ATE chickens. 30-20=10, so 10 cows didn't eat any chickens.
- Sometimes I am born in silence, Other times, no. I am unseen, But I make my presence known. In time, I fade without a trace. I harm no one, but I am unpopular with all. What am I?
- Answer: A fart.
- I am six letters. When you take one away I am twelve. What am I?
- The word "Dozens".
- What type of music do rabbits listen to?
- Fun answer: Hip-hop.
Your version of the story 🧑🏾🏫
8. Online Whiteboard Game (Project Retrospective Games)
Duration: 45-90 minutes | Goal: Reflecting on the last sprint or the last few weeks, Project Retrospective Games
Idea: The typical sprint has its ups and downs. Similar to a good dramatic story from Shakesbeare. Let’s write a dramatic story out of our last sprint - who was the hero, when was the turning point etc.?
- You give an overview over the agenda of today's retrospective.
- The retrospective board with the curve of a typical drama is shared. It also includes the beginning of typical sentences that you would encounter at that stage of a story.
- 10 minute timebox: Now every team member can get creative by finishing the sentences or inventing their own sentences: “Once upon a time, a long time ago…”.
- In the best case, everyone gave their feedback on every part of the dramatic curve. One by one, every team member shares their version of the story by sharing their sentences.
From now on you proceed with the typical 5 phases of an agile retrospective. - Explaining feedback: After everyone is done with this part, everyone shares their thoughts (and notes) to get a shared understanding. At this point, there is no discussion.
- Prioritization: Every team member has 3 digital dots to vote. Put your dots where you think you have room for improvement.
- Discussion: Discuss the areas that have the most votes. Do you want to put down an action item?
- Action items: Name a specific person who is responsible for that action item. Don´t put down more than 3 action items - focus on quality instead of quantity (more on this in our post 7 tips for great action items).
The retrospective maze 🗺
9. Scrum Retrospective game on online whiteboard
Duration: 45-120 minutes | Objective: Reflecting on teamwork and decision-making
Idea: Sometimes you have to “disagree and commit” as a team to move forward. Similar to a labyrinth. In this retrospective game, the team is forced to go left or go right (agree or disagree) regarding specific sentences (behaviors). Attention: It cannot always go right, then it would be moving in a circle.
- Instructions: We are in a maze. To get out of this labyrinth, it is not really about going the (theoretically) right way. But to go the way that is right for us as a team.
- "In the following you will be confronted with a set of behaviors that describe teamwork. Your job as a team is to decide if you agree or disagree with them - in other words, if you want to go right or left." These are the behaviors - pick 3-6 of them:
- We get things done really fast. No waiting, no delays.
- I regularly receive useful feedback on how well I'm performing and how I can improve.
- All of our meetings are totally worth it.
- We limit our work in progress to stay focused at all times.
- We have to do things at work that should be done differently.
- We are so busy with our daily tasks that the long-term perspective in the team is often neglected.
- I know exactly where the strengths of my colleagues lie.
- We celebrate mutual successes in our team.
- My team is good at making decisions.
- We ensure that all relevant stakeholders can participate regularly enough in our Sprint Reviews.
- Everyone on my team knows who is working on what.
- Next, the first behavior is given. And it is time for the team to decide: Do you agree (go right) or disagree (go right) in our maze? This is supposed to be an open discussion of the team. You as the facilitator can observe communication and how the team is coming to a decision. In case they do not know what to discuss, you might give the hint and say: “You can start by collecting and sharing specific situations in which we observed these behaviors in our team.”
- Write down if the team went left or right. And then let the team know that they cannot always go in the same direction (e.g., always go right). They have to go left at least one time.
- Present the next behaviors, one by one, and repeat this process until you presented the 3-6 behaviors you chose.
- After presenting all the behaviors, you should have an overview over the directions (i.e., decisions) that the team took. I hope they did not always go in one direction? Then they have to change their decision for one of the behaviors.
- Once they are finished, you can share this instruction:
"You found the gardener of the labyrinth. Turns out he knows the way out. He will tell it to you if you make him a present: tell him how you were inspired by his labyrinth. In other words… tell him an action item." - Given these instructions, the team is now supposed to align on an action item. Again, they can choose how they create it (prioritization through votes or other ways). Important is that they are aligned on this single action item.
- Once you have the action item, the gardener lets you know the way out - you did it! The retrospective is finished.
The idea behind the game: in teams you cannot always align on one “right” decision. You cannot know the right decision. It rather is about aligning at all and moving forward! Also known as “disagree and commit”. Experience (aka empirical research), experimentation brings you forward, not discussion. Align on one direction, try one thing (via an action item) and then iterate on it.
Fun Retrospective Games for remote teams | 10
Could I please finish… 🔚
10. Scrum Retrospective game on online whiteboard
Duration: 45-90 minutes | Goal: Reflecting on the last sprint or the last few weeks, Project Retrospective Games
Idea: Sometimes it is easier to say something out loud after someone else created the right atmosphere to do so. This is the idea behind this retrospective game: Finish some weird, funny, creative sentences of others that make it easy to reflect on the last weeks in a fun way.
- 10 minute timebox, the instructions are given:
“You can find the beginning of many sentences on this whiteboard. Some of them might sound weird or crazy. But just take them as they are and try to finish some (or all) of the sentences by thinking about the last weeks/sprint.”
From now on you proceed with the typical 5 phases of an agile retrospective. - Explaining feedback: After everyone is done with this part, everyone shares their thoughts (and notes) to get a shared understanding. At this point, there is no discussion.
- Prioritization: Every team member has 3 digital dots to vote. Put your dots where you think you have room for improvement.
- Discussion: Discuss the areas that have the most votes. Do you want to put down an action item?
- Action items: Name a specific person who is responsible for that action item. Don´t put down more than 3 action items - focus on quality instead of quantity (more on this in our post 7 tips for great action items).
"Thumbs Down" 👎
11. Scrum Retrospective game on online whiteboard
Duration: 45-90 minutes | Goal: Reflecting on teamwork
Idea: Should we improve this or that? Thumbs up or thumbs down? There are a few areas in teamwork that typically have room for improvement. Let’s interactively review them by collecting “thumbs downs” to see in which area we are performing worst.
- In the following the team is presented with a few rough areas that are very important for successful teamwork (you don’t have to take all of them and can add other things, of course):
- Work environment, Meetings, Trust, Productivity, Commitment, Courage, Focus, Autonomy, Purpose, Respect, Work-Life balance, Communication, Decisions, Roles
- Instruction:
“Many of these area´s are pretty broad - on purpose. Simply interpret them as you like. You are now asked to give feedback on them by reacting through a “thumbs down” in the Echometer tool. Simply click on the Emoji in the upper right corner.”
Let the team click a few times to get the procedure. - Instruction:
“You might notice that the more often you click, the more the faces on the right side of the screen change and get more negative. This is the Thumbs Down-ometer. It will help us to evaluate these area’s”. - One by one, you reveal the different areas to the team on the digital Echometer whiteboard. For every area, the team is allowed to click between zero and 2 (if you have more than 6 team members) or 3 times. Write down the number that the Thumbs Down-ometer indicates after the voting (right beside the area itself).
- After every quick voting, the team members can explain why they clicked X number of times. They are always asked to share specific situations or examples to explain their choice.
- You are getting zero “thumbs downs”? That is great! Write this down and let team members explain why they are happy with this.
From now on you proceed with the typical 5 phases of an agile retrospective. - Prioritization: Every team member has 3 digital dots to vote. Put your dots where you think you have room for improvement.
- Discussion: Discuss the areas that have the most votes. Do you want to put down an action item?
- Action items: Name a specific person who is responsible for that action item. Don´t put down more than 3 action items - focus on quality instead of quantity (more on this in our post 7 tips for great action items).
A Team Health Check 🩺
12. Retro game on whiteboard (Scrum Retro Game ideas)
Duration: 45-90 minutes | Goal: Reflecting on teamwork and agile processes
Idea: Why not do a health check in your team retrospective? It can be fun, depending on the things you ask. Everyone indicates how they view a certain topic on a scale from 1 to 7!
- You choose a number of sentences, of behaviors that you think the team could improve on in the Echometer tool. E.g., these are the things that are asked in the Spotify health check.
- Of course, you can change these questions, making some of them more fun or creative.
- Everyone indicates how much they agree to these statements on the Echometer scale from 1 to 7.
- The results are shown in the graph. Now, everyone is invited to explain the results:
“From your personal perspective, wow do you explain the highest voting? And the lowest voting?” - Once you went through all the health check items and discussed them, you proceed with the typical 5 phases of an agile retrospective.
- Explaining feedback: After everyone is done with this part, everyone shares their thoughts (and notes) to get a shared understanding. At this point, there is no discussion.
- Prioritization: Every team member has 3 digital dots to vote. Put your dots where you think you have room for improvement.
- Discussion: Discuss the areas that have the most votes. Do you want to put down an action item?
- Action items: Name a specific person who is responsible for that action item. Don´t put down more than 3 action items - focus on quality instead of quantity (more on this in our post 7 tips for great action items).
- We deliver great results! We are proud of it and our stakeholders are very satisfied.
- Our way of working suits us perfectly.
- We get things done really fast. No waiting, no delays.
- The planning of our sprints is always based on achieving the greatest possible customer benefit in the given time.
We also share unfinished work with stakeholders early on to get feedback as soon as possible.
- Each member of the development team contributes appropriately to the sprint planning.
- We are open to constructive feedback and can grow from it.
- Courage: We value people showing courage.
- Respect: We value each other’s ideas, even when disagreeing.
- Commitment: Every team member is committed to follow through on what they have promised.
- Focus: We don’t allow ourselves to be distracted from reaching the sprint goal.
- Openness: We are open to constructive feedback and grow from it.
- We have a constructive exchange of knowledge between newer and more experienced colleagues.
Check-Ins, Icebreakers & Warm-Ups | Scrum Retrospective Games Online
Let's continue with check-in games, which are particularly suitable for the beginning of retrospectives. This is the phase of the retrospective where most games are played.
The following exercises are rather short. Of course, you can also change them flexibly and adapt them to your context, making them even shorter or longer. I even recommend that!
Time for emojis 🤩
13. Retro game on whiteboard (Scrum Retro Game ideas)
Duration: 5-15 minutes | Goal: Setting the stage
Idea: Everyone chooses an emoji that describes their mood regarding the last sprint. Additionally, you indicate the subjective level of “autonomy” and “accomplishment” in a matrix.
- You open the whiteboard and give the simple instructions.
- 20 second timebox per person: After everyone chose an Emoji and added their name to it, they explain why they went specifically for that one.
- The next (optional) step is to duplicate their sticky note and scroll a little down further: In a matrix with the variables “autonomy” and “accomplishment”, where would you place yourself? How autonomous did you feel, how often did you have a feeling of accomplishment? This hopefully adds some more flavor to why they chose this Emoji.
- Of course, you could think about changing the names of these two variables.
- 30 second timebox per person: Everyone quickly explains their choice.
Free online Retrospective Games | 14
Retrospective games for distributed teams: Sprint animals 🐷
14. Retro game on whiteboard (Easy Retrospective Games)
Duration: 5-15 minutes | Goal: Setting the stage
Idea: If our last sprint would be a face, which one would it be? Let them choose from the given images and explain their choice.
- You give the instructions.
- Everyone creates a sticky note with their name on it (you can also prepare this or generate them automatically in the Echometer tool). Now they position themselves on one of the images.
- The person who was the first to make a decision begins to explain their choice and hands over to the next person until everyone gave feedback.
Retrospective games for distributed teams: Eat that! 🍪
15. Retro game on whiteboard (Easy Retrospective Games)
Duration: 5-15 minutes | Goal: Setting the stage
Idea: If our last sprint would be a meal, which one would it be? Let them choose from the given images and explain their choice.
One of the many fun icebreaker games for a retrospective:
- You give the instructions.
- Everyone creates a sticky note with their name on it (you can also prepare this or generate them automatically in the Echometer tool). Now they position themselves on one of the images.
- The person who was the first to make a decision begins to explain their choice and hands over to the next person until everyone gave feedback.
Agile Retrospective Games for distributed teams | 16
Scrum sprint retrospective games: Our sprint symphony 🎹
16. Remote retrospective game on online whiteboard
Duration: 5-15 minutes | Goal: Setting the stage
Idea: If our last sprint would be a song, what would be the title? Let them choose from given songs or invent their own titles.
One of the rather quick retrospective games:
- You give the instructions.
- 1-2 minute timebox: Everyone chooses a song title from the given list of songs (see screenshot of the whiteboard) or takes a different one.
Everyone is free to change the title of a song. For example, someone might change the title “Eye of the tiger” from Survivor to “Eye of the customer” (e.g., because they met the actual customer for the very first time). - The person who was the first to make a decision begins to explain their choice and hands over to the next person until everyone gave feedback.
- "Something Just Like This" by The Chainsmokers and Coldplay
- I Took a Pill in Ibiza by Mike Posner
- "Rolling in the Deep" by Adele
- "The Twist" by Chubby Checker
- "Yes Sir, I Can Boogie" by Baccarat
- "Party Rock Anthem" by LMFAO
- „Bad Romance“ by Lady Gaga
- „Shape of You“ by Ed Sheeran
- "Rock Around the Clock" by Bill Haley & His Comets
- "Wind of Change" by Scorpions
- "Silent Night" by Bing Crosby
- "I Gotta Feeling" by Black Eyed Peas
- "Uptown Funk" by Mark Ronson (featuring Bruno Mars)
- „Call Me Maybe“ by Carly Rae Jepsen
- "Time to Say Goodbye" by Andrea Bocelli and Sarah Brightman
- "I Don't Care" by Ed Sheeran and Justin Bieber
- Your favorite songs...
Retrospective games in agile: Tangram style 🔺
17. Remote retrospective game on online whiteboard
Duration: 5-15 minutes | Goal: Setting the stage
Idea: To activate the creative juices in the team, you solve a tangram (a small puzzle).
One of the many fun retrospective meeting games:
- Share the instructions:
"This is a digital tangram, a chinese puzzle. It has to form a quadrant. Your task is to form that quadrant as a team - and you have 4 minutes to do so." - You as the facilitator should observe the team: Do you see patterns in communication that you sometimes see during the daily work? Write them down to bring them up later.
- 5 minutes timebox: Ask the team if they observed any specific team behaviors that are interesting to reflect. Who talked the most? Who talked the least and why?
- Optional: Share your own observations. If there are relevant observations, patterns you see for the actual sprint communication, include these in the second part of the retrospective: Prioritizing feedbacks and creating action items.
Fun retro games agile: Movie time 🍿
18. Remote retrospective game on online whiteboard
Duration: 5-15 minutes | Goal: Setting the stage
Idea: If our last sprint was a movie, what would the title be? Let the team choose from predefined films or invent their own titles.
One of the simple, good retrospective games:
- You give the instructions.
- 1-2 minute timebox: Everyone chooses a movie title from the given list of songs (see screenshot of the whiteboard or toggle below) or takes a different one.
Everyone is free to change the title of a movie. For example, someone might change the title “Lord of the rings” to “Lord of the bugs”. That’s a funny one. - The person who was the first to make a decision begins to explain their choice and hands over to the next person until everyone gave feedback.
- Gold fingers
- Titanic
- Lord of the Rings
- Back to the future
- Rain man
- Avatar
- The Birth of a Nation
- Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
- Paranormal Activity
- 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
- Furious 7
- Gone with the wind
- Doctor Zhivago
- Spider-Man: No Way Home
- ET the Extra-Terrestrial
- ...
Aiaiai, that was quite a few games. But we plan to publish even more new retrospective ideas in the future! So feel free to register for our Newsletter or to save this website to your favorites.
Even more Scrum Retro Games?
Seriously, you want even more cool retrospective games? Okay, more inspiration is probably not such a bad idea.
In that case, you should probably have a look at our 32 kickass retrospective ideas for beginners and professionals. You'll find some retrospective formats based on games, and other creative retrospective questions that you probably haven't tried yet in there. There are even some fun agile retrospective games for the different team development phases.
Other than that, I recommend to have a look at tastycupcakes retrospective games, geekbot retrospective games or retrospective games miro on Google - this should give you some more material, independent of your team development phase.
In case you are looking for kanban retrospective games, you should check out our Kanban retrospective format - it might be a good fit.
Here are a few more specific recommendations:
Retrospective Games Online: Conclusion
If I may give you (as the person responsible for your team) one more piece of advice: take your time to put down good action items . Good action items is a better antidote to retro-fatigue than retros just looking for fun.
Finally, if you are interested in other creative retrospective ideas that are not quite as playful but are still a lot of fun: Check out our post on 32 kickass retrospective ideas. You will enjoy that, too. Have fun!
Most Agile Coaches and Scrum Masters run in circles...
...fixing superficial symptoms. Time to use psychology to foster sustainable mindset change.
