Students drawn to DrawSomething

The sketch first appears to be a rotting banana, then a dirty blonde wig. Suddenly and inexplicably, a light bulb goes off in the student’s head and he types in “Lady Gaga” on his smartphone. The student squeals in delight; he just won three coins.

It’s the new iPhone and Android app that everyone seems to be playing, DrawSomething, from the online multiplayer gaming website OMGPOP.

In the game, students are given a word, out of three choices separated by difficulty, to draw. The person they are playing attempts to guess the word. The harder the word, the more coins the players can win.

Of course, the drawings aren’t always dead ringers. Players are initially restricted to only using the colors blue, red, yellow and black. They also have to draw with their fingers as opposed to drawing with more accurate styluses.

Junior Parth Shah, an avid player of the game, recalls less than ideal drawings that he has had to guess.

“One time for [the word] Holland, someone drew ‘ho’ and then drew ‘land’ and I had to combine [the two] for the word,” Shah said.

Junior Kristen Leung has also had to guess ambiguous drawings.

“One of my friends sent me a drawing that literally [just] said ‘David’,” Leung said. “I had no idea what it was because it could mean so many things, but I did guess it in the end. It was ‘Beckham.’”

Users of the app can also be tempted to cheat due to the high stress of the game.

“I’ve sometimes accidentally written parts of the word but then caught myself and erased them,” Shah said.

Despite the difficulty of the game, students have no intention of giving it up. The adrenaline rush that comes from successfully guessing the word “squid” from what looks like a black and white abstract scribble of a woman weaving a basket is just too gratifying.