Video Game Word Search Printable for Clubs, Parties and Class

Press New puzzle for 15 brand-free gaming words, from Joystick to Glitch, then print it for a club or party.

Name Date

Video Game Word Search

Find every word hidden in the grid. Words go across and down.

0 of 15 words found

FPHSAESCNEUHDMD

DLEVELTNXOTTOPC

YYDILOJVTBTSDIE

HAVATARYGQRSGTO

PORTALOOGPIXELN

ALWATQBDLOGIOIP

KAUFCUOYIFRBSLU

CASTLETMKDPOHEZ

WSRMDSEANETNFTZ

PVTTCTDZBEEUILL

ATARCADEHXPSOEE

ERNOBEWESFCRBDE

TTWPCTGOAITRHBL

PALHKLWKNAXCHUE

ORPYEPBOSSCOREK

This grid is wider and taller than its box. Slide it to see every letter.To drag, hold the first letter for a moment, then slide.Keyboard: Tab to the grid, arrow keys to move, Enter on the first and last letter.

LevelLEVEL
CastleCASTLE
MazeMAZE
PortalPORTAL
DodgeDODGE
ScoreSCORE
BonusBONUS
TrophyTROPHY
QuestQUEST
AvatarAVATAR
BossBOSS
RobotROBOT
ArcadeARCADE
PuzzlePUZZLE
PixelPIXEL

15 of 24 words from the Video Game list.

Start from a list

Easy: words go across and down.

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Word list

Large print Lower-case letters Name and date line on paper

The puzzle changes as you go. See the puzzle

Answer key: Video Game Word Search

FPHSAESCNEUHDMD

DLEVELTNXOTTOPC

YYDILOJVTBTSDIE

HAVATARYGQRSGTO

PORTALOOGPIXELN

ALWATQBDLOGIOIP

KAUFCUOYIFRBSLU

CASTLETMKDPOHEZ

WSRMDSEANETNFTZ

PVTTCTDZBEEUILL

ATARCADEHXPSOEE

ERNOBEWESFCRBDE

TTWPCTGOAITRHBL

PALHKLWKNAXCHUE

ORPYEPBOSSCOREK

LEVEL, CASTLE, MAZE, PORTAL, DODGE, SCORE, BONUS, TROPHY, QUEST, AVATAR, BOSS, ROBOT, ARCADE, PUZZLE, PIXEL

Next step Find more heroes in the superhero word search Print a maze to go with the game worlds

All 138 words

Controls and Gear 19

Audio Sound that is recorded or played back. The word comes from the Latin verb for to hear.
Button A small part you press to make something happen, such as a jump.
Cartridge A plastic case with a chip inside that holds a game and plugs into a machine.
Computer A machine that runs programs. The word is first found in 1613, when it meant a person who did calculations.
Console A machine built mainly for playing video games, usually on a television.
Controller The handheld device with buttons and sticks that a player uses to steer a game.
Digital Stored as numbers, the way a computer keeps everything. The word comes from digitus, Latin for a finger or toe.
Gamepad Another word for a controller held in both hands, with buttons under each thumb.
Handheld A small game machine with its own screen, made to be carried and played anywhere.
Headset Headphones with a microphone attached, for hearing the game and talking to a team.
Joystick A lever that tilts to steer. Pilots had them first: the earliest known one flew on a French airplane in 1908.

Show all 138 words (127 more)

Controls and Gear, continued

Keyboard Rows of lettered keys. QWERTY is named for the first six letters of the top letter row, a layout from the 1870s.
Monitor A screen made to be used with a computer.
Mouse A pointing device moved by hand, first shown in public in 1968. The name likely came from its cord, which looked like a tail.
Screen The flat surface where the picture of a game appears.
Thumbstick A short lever on a controller that you push around to move or look.
Trigger A curved button on the back edge of a controller, pulled with a fingertip.
Video Moving pictures on a screen. The word comes from the Latin verb for to see.
Wireless Working without a cable, by sending signals through the air.

Game Worlds 19

Arena An enclosed space where a contest or a match takes place.
Bridge A path over a gap or a river. In some games it falls away behind you.
Castle A stone fortress with walls and towers, often the last stop in a game.
Cave A hollow in rock, often dark and full of things to find.
Checkpoint A spot that saves your place, so that a mistake sends you back only that far.
Dungeon An underground maze of rooms to explore. The word comes from donjon, the Old French name for the keep of a castle.
Forest A wide stretch of trees, a classic first area of an adventure.
Island Land with water on every side, a common setting for an adventure.
Kingdom A land ruled by a king or a queen.
Level One stage of a game. Finish it and the next one opens.
Map A drawing of the game world that shows where you are and where to go.
Maze A tangle of paths with dead ends and one way through.
Portal A doorway that carries a character from one place to another in an instant.
Realm A kingdom or a land, a word fantasy games use for their worlds.
Temple An ancient building, in games often full of puzzles and traps.
Tower A tall, narrow building that a player climbs floor by floor.
Treasure Gold, gems or rare items hidden for the player to find.
Village A small group of homes where a hero can rest, trade and talk.
World The whole place where a game happens, or one themed set of levels inside it.

Moves and Actions 20

Build To put pieces together to make something, from a bridge to a whole town.
Climb To go up a ladder, a vine or a wall.
Collect To gather items such as coins, keys or stars.
Craft To make a tool or an item out of materials you have gathered.
Dash A short, sudden burst of speed.
Dodge To move quickly out of the way.
Explore To travel through a place to see what is there.
Glide To float smoothly through the air and come down slowly.
Jump To leap over a gap or onto a ledge, the main move of a platform game.
Pause To stop the game for a moment without losing your place.
Respawn To come back into the game after being knocked out. The word joins re, for again, and spawn.
Restart To begin a level or a game again from the beginning.
Save To store your progress so that you can come back to it later.
Sneak To move quietly so that nobody notices.
Solve To find the answer to a puzzle.
Sprint To run at top speed for a short time.
Steer To guide a car, a boat or a ship in the direction you want.
Teleport To vanish from one spot and appear in another.
Unlock To open something that was closed, such as a door, a level or a new character.
Upgrade To make a tool, a vehicle or a skill better than it was.

Score and Progress 20

Achievement A goal set by the game and recorded on your profile once you reach it.
Badge A small emblem earned for finishing a task.
Bonus Something extra on top of what you earned. The word is Latin for good.
Coins Round metal money, the most common thing to collect in a game.
Combo Several moves or hits linked in a row. The word is short for combination.
Countdown Numbers running backward to zero before a start or a finish.
Leaderboard A list that ranks players by their scores, best at the top.
Lives The number of tries a player has left.
Mission A task with a clear goal that a game sets for the player.
Points The units a score is counted in.
Progress How far you have come in a game.
Quest A long search for something. The word goes back to the Latin verb quaerere, to ask or seek.
Rank Your place in an ordered list of players.
Reward Something given for finishing a task or a level.
Score The number that shows how well you are doing.
Streak A run of wins, or of days in a row, without a break.
Timer A clock that counts the seconds you have used or have left.
Tournament A contest of many matches that ends with one winner.
Trophy A prize for winning. The ancient Greek word named a monument put up where an enemy had turned and fled.
Victory A win.

Heroes and Rivals 20

Alien A being from another planet.
Avatar The figure that stands for you in a game. The word comes from a Sanskrit word meaning descent.
Boss A powerful enemy at the end of a level or a game.
Champion The winner of a contest or a tournament.
Character Any person or creature in a game or a story.
Dragon A huge legendary reptile that often guards treasure.
Guardian Someone who protects a place, a person or a treasure.
Hero The main character, who sets out to put things right.
Knight A warrior in armor who serves a king or a queen.
Merchant A character who buys and sells items.
Monster A large, strange or scary imaginary creature.
Ninja A spy of old Japan, known in stories for moving without being seen.
Opponent The player or team on the other side of a match.
Pirate A sea robber, in games usually hunting for buried treasure.
Player A person taking part in a game.
Rival Someone who competes against you for the same prize.
Robot A machine that carries out tasks. The word comes from a 1920 Czech play and from robota, Czech for forced labor.
Sidekick A helper who travels with the hero.
Villain The character who works against the hero. In Late Latin a villanus was a peasant who worked the land of a villa.
Wizard A character who uses magic. The word was built from wise, and at first it meant a sage.

Kinds of Games 20

Adventure A game built around a story, a journey and places to explore.
Arcade A room of coin-operated game machines. The word first meant a row of arches, from the Latin arcus.
Cooperative Played by working together as a team, often shortened to co-op.
Educational Made to teach something, such as typing, math or geography.
Indie Short for independent: made by one person or a small team.
Online Connected to the internet, often to play with people in other places.
Party A set of short, simple games made for a group in one room.
Pinball A table game where flippers keep a steel ball in play. Many video versions exist.
Platformer A game about running and jumping between ledges.
Puzzle A game that asks you to think your way to the answer.
Racing Games about being first across the finish line.
Retro In the style of older games, often with chunky pixels and simple sounds.
Rhythm A game played in time with music.
Sandbox A game with no set path, where you build and play freely. It is named after a child's play pit.
Simulation A game that copies a real activity, such as flying a plane or running a farm.
Sports Games that copy real contests, such as soccer, tennis or skating.
Stealth A game about staying hidden rather than rushing in.
Strategy A game won by planning ahead rather than by quick fingers.
Survival A game about gathering food, tools and shelter to last as long as you can.
Trivia A quiz game about facts.

Making Games 20

Animation Pictures shown quickly one after another so that they seem to move. The word once meant the act of giving life.
Artist The person who draws the characters and the places of a game.
Beta A nearly finished version given out for testing. It is named after the second letter of the Greek alphabet.
Code The written instructions that tell a computer what to do.
Debug To find and fix the faults in a program. In the 1940s a moth stuck in a computer was taped into its log book as a bug.
Designer The person who plans the rules, the levels and how a game feels to play.
Engine The core software that draws the picture and runs the rules, shared by many games.
Glitch A sudden small fault. Astronaut John Glenn used the word in 1962 for a spike in electric current.
Graphics Everything you see on the screen.
Patch A small fix sent out after a game is released.
Pixel One tiny square of color on a screen. The name joins pix, for pictures, and el, for element, and was first printed in 1965.
Polygon A flat shape with straight sides, the building block of a 3D model. In Greek the word means many angles.
Programmer The person who writes the code.
Prototype A rough first version built to test an idea.
Soundtrack The music of a game.
Sprite A flat picture of a character that moves over the background. It shares its name with the fairy, since it seems to float.
Storyboard A row of sketches that plans a scene before anyone builds it.
Studio A company or a team that makes games.
Tester A person who plays an unfinished game to find its faults.
Update A newer version of a game, with fixes or added parts.

How this list was compiled: 138 generic video game words chosen and defined for this site: seven themed lists (controls and gear, game worlds, moves and actions, score and progress, heroes and rivals, kinds of games, making games), a 24-word starter list, 12 short words and every word of 8 letters or more. The list holds no game title, character, company, console or platform name, and the definitions name none either. The definitions are our own wording for ages 8 and up. Facts were read on 18 September 2026 at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pixel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joystick https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QWERTY https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_mouse https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_(occupation) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debugging https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robot and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sprite_(computer_graphics) and word origins at https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/avatar and the same address pattern for glitch, arcade, trophy, dungeon, quest, villain, video, audio, digital, polygon, animation, wizard, bonus, combo, indie, beta and respawn. Licence: own work

How it works

For a coding club, a party table or a computer lab, this video game word search printable holds no title, character or brand. Seven themed lists run from Controls and Gear to Making Games, and the starter list holds 24.

Read the full guide

Seven lists, seven uses

Switch between the lists under Start from a list. Game Worlds and Heroes and Rivals read like a story map, and double as a word bank for story writing. Moves and Actions is all verbs, from Dodge to Teleport. Kinds of Games starts a class survey, and Making Games belongs to a coding or game design club.

Word histories in the clues

Many clues carry a checked history. Pixel joins pix, for pictures, and el, for element, and first appeared in print in 1965. Pilots had joysticks before players did: the earliest known one flew on a French airplane in 1908. In the 1940s a moth stuck in a computer was taped into the log book as a bug, and programmers still debug.

Questions and answers

Why is my favorite game not in the list?

Titles, characters and console names belong to the companies that made them, and a class rarely agrees on one game. Shared words such as Checkpoint, Respawn and Sidekick work for every pupil. For your own table, type any name at the end of the word list under the grid.

Which list suits a coding or game design club?

Making Games. Its 20 words cover the jobs and the steps, Designer, Tester, Storyboard, Prototype and Patch among them. The clues add history: astronaut John Glenn used the word glitch in 1962 for a spike in electric current.

Which video game clues carry a word history?

Robot and Computer, among others. Robot, in Heroes and Rivals, comes from a 1920 Czech play and from robota, Czech for forced labor. Computer, in Controls and Gear, first meant a person who did calculations, in 1613.

Can pupils solve it on a screen instead?

Yes. Tap or click a word's first letter, then its last, and the word is marked as found. A mouse can drag instead, and a keyboard uses the arrow keys and Enter.

All 138 words

Controls and Gear 19

Controls and Gear, continued

Game Worlds 19

Moves and Actions 20

Score and Progress 20

Heroes and Rivals 20

Kinds of Games 20

Making Games 20

How it works

Seven lists, seven uses

Word histories in the clues

Questions and answers

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