GeodlyTimed naming quiz
Geo Guess: how to play
Play Geo Guess inside Geo Sprint. Name countries from flags or outlines in ten timed rounds, earning up to 1,000 points per fast, correct answer.
What is Geo Guess?
Geo Guess is a typing quiz with two versions. Guess the flag shows a national flag. Guess the outline shows the border of a country as a blue line on white, including its islands. In both you type the name of the country, with no list of options to choose from.
A game is ten rounds, and no country appears twice in the same game. Easy uses 55 well-known countries with 20 seconds per round. Hard uses about 140 less familiar ones and cuts the time to 12 seconds, so you need to know the answer almost on sight.
- Rounds
- 10 per game
- Time per round
- 20 seconds on Easy, 12 seconds on Hard
- Guesses per round
- 1
- Points per round
- 145 to 1,000 on Easy, 175 to 1,000 on Hard, 0 if wrong
- Maximum score
- 10,000
- Countries included
- 55 on Easy, about 140 on Hard
How to play
- 1Pick Easy or Hard with the switch on the home page, then choose Guess the flag or Guess the outline.
- 2Look at the picture and start typing straight away, because the answer box is ready as soon as the round begins.
- 3Press Guess or the Enter key to lock in your answer. You only get one attempt per round.
- 4Read the feedback, which tells you the correct country and how many points you earned.
- 5Press Next round to continue, and See results after the tenth round.
- 6Check the results list to see which countries you got right and what each one scored, then press Play again for ten new rounds, or Play on Hard or Play on Easy to change difficulty.
Scoring
A correct answer is worth 100 points plus a speed bonus of up to 900. The bonus shrinks evenly as the timer counts down, so each second costs 45 points on Easy and 75 points on Hard.
Answer before the first second has passed and you get the full 1,000. A correct answer with one second left earns 145 on Easy or 175 on Hard.
A wrong answer scores 0 and ends the round at once. Running out of time also scores 0. There is no penalty beyond that, and the ten round scores are added up for a total out of 10,000.
Tips
- Type the short form when there is one. UK, USA, UAE, DRC, Ivory Coast, Vatican and Czech Republic are all accepted, and they save seconds.
- Do not worry about capitals, accents or punctuation, which are ignored. Spelling is not, so a misspelt name counts as wrong.
- Every outline is scaled to fill the same frame, so size tells you nothing. Luxembourg looks as big as Kazakhstan. Go by the shape alone.
- Learn the flag families that are easy to mix up: the Nordic crosses, the red, white and blue horizontal stripes of the Netherlands, Russia and Serbia, and green, white and orange for Ireland against green, white and red for Italy.
- If you are stuck, type your best guess before the timer ends. A wrong answer and a timeout both score 0, so guessing costs nothing.
What you learn
Because you have to produce the name yourself, Geo Guess trains recall and spelling of country names as well as recognition. The flag version builds knowledge of colours, stripe order and emblems. The outline version builds a feel for coastlines, peninsulas and the general shape of a country.
Playing both versions on the same difficulty is a good way to connect the two, since both versions draw on essentially the same list of countries.
Questions and answers
- How do I switch between Easy and Hard?
- Use the Easy and Hard switch on the home page before you start. If you open the game from a direct link it starts on Easy. On the results screen, Play on Hard or Play on Easy starts a new game on the other difficulty.
- Which spellings are accepted?
- The usual English name of the country, plus common alternatives for some of them, such as Great Britain or England for the United Kingdom, America for the United States and East Timor for Timor-Leste.
- Is my score saved?
- No. Your total and the round-by-round list are shown at the end of the game, and a new game starts again from zero.