Leave it Out! Deej Johnson reveals ten words you should avoiding using in rules

How many positive words can you think of that start sn? There’s snug, snooze, snack, snazzy… Without adapting those, can you quickly get three more?

Chances are the answer’s no. That’s because words starting sn force you to give a tiny sneer! As a result, sn mostly starts unpleasant words: snot, snarl, snag, snitch, snake…

For that reason, words that start sn are quite rare in game rules. There are, though, dozens of much worse words that are far more common. They waste space and send the reading age rocketing. Here are just ten of them…

GAME
Of all the wasteful words in rules, game is the most inane. Objective of the Game. Setting Up the Game. Playing the Game. Winning the Game… People aren’t morons; they know what they’re playing! So why keep writing it? Why waste the whitespace?

OBJECTIVE
This kind of over-hard word subtly raises the reading age. Just say aim.

OF THE
You often see of the chewing up space as in the first sentence below. If you use an apostrophe and swap things around a little, it uses less space – and breath:

So! Now you know I don’t care for the words game, objective, or of the… Just imagine how I feel when rules start: Objective of the Game!

RULES or INSTRUCTIONS
Who wants to obey rules? Or take instructions? Neither word sounds fun! Most of the time, I suggest How to Play.

WILL
The word will always makes actions feel less lively and more distant. Where you can, drop it and add an S to the verb it affects. As soon as you do, your writing will improve… Or rather: as soon as you do, your writing improves. Here’s an example, taken from the BANANAGRAMS strapline:

THAT
Take a look at something that you’ve written. Search for the word that. Now… Does it need to be there? If you’re writing in a relaxed tone, you can often lose it. The first sentence here proves the point:

TAKE then PUT
Humour me, would you? Put your finger on this green dot and count to three.

Now, whether you did it or not, how did you find my request? Clear? If so, you’ll know why I didn’t waste Mojo’s ink or your time by saying:

Take your finger, put it on the black dot and count to three

When you see certain words in a sentence, take is rarely needed. These words include put, position, give, present and show. The same edit also gets rid of other fluff: a comma perhaps, or words like and, the and it, as here:

That’s because putting things requires you to have them… Which means there’s rarely a need to write take, then put.

So… That’s just ten of the 101 words I like to avoid in rules. No one of them sounds like much on its own… In fact, I’m often asked if these things really matter. My answer’s always the same: it depends! Do you think buyers actually WANT long, cramped rules that are harder to read? You can read more about why writing the right rules matters here.

As it happens, when you add them up, these little tweaks not only lose about a third of the overall text… They also lower the reading age and free up whitespace for advertising.

And that’s not to be sniffed, sniped or sneered at!

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