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Updated for October 2026: still one of the easiest Halloween party games I know, and the skulls are still available at Dollar Tree every year! If you’re in the UK, you could try Poundland, Poundstretcher, B&M or The Range.
Looking for an easy last-minute Halloween party game that kids will love? If you’ve seen Witch Pitch games on Pinterest, this is the same concept, just with skulls instead of a witch hat, making it great for Halloween parties beyond just the witchy theme.
Last year I volunteered as a room parent in my eldest’s classroom. This wasn’t something I had done before, and Halloween was the first event that I needed to help out with. I was tasked with providing a game.
Cue panic!
Of course, I turned to Pinterest and was bombarded with ideas. But, what on earth would actually entertain a group of ten year olds?!
Armed with some possibilities, and a non-existent budget, I ventured out to my local Dollar Tree. Wandering the aisles, I found these skulls and an idea took shape. A variation on the Witch Pitch games that I had seen all over Pinterest.
In my usual fashion, I thought, how hard can it be? Grabbed all the supplies and headed home.
It was a success: this game takes less than an hour to make, costs under $10 from Dollar Tree, and can be packed away and reused every Halloween. It works for classroom parties, home parties, and everything in between!
Materials
- A back-board [I used a standard black foam presentation board]
- Six skulls
- A bag of ping pong balls
- Red, purple and black sharpies
- A craft knife
- Glue gun
- Printed numbers for the ‘points’ per skull
As a side note, I originally picked up a bag of eyeballs from Dollar Tree, thinking it would save me a job BUT it turns out that these don’t bounce well, at all. Grab a bag of proper ping pong balls!
How to make your Skull Eyeball Pitch Game
1. First up you will need to cut the tops off the skulls. Using a bowl, draw a line around the top of each skull and then, carefully, cut along the line.
2. Lay your six skulls out on the black back-board. I positioned them so that if a ping pong ball hit a skull and missed, it would have a chance of dropping into a lower skull (I didn’t want the game to be too hard, and for the kids to hate it, and me!).
3. Using a glue gun, glue each skull in place. You want them to be secured well, so a glue gun is your best bet.
4. Either write, or print out, a number five, two threes, two twos and a one and stick to the front of each skull as shown. These are the points for getting a ball into the skull.
5. Draw an eyeball onto each of your ping pong balls. I used ten balls in total, enough for each kid to get a decent chance of scoring, but not so many that it took too long to play a turn.
How to play the game
- Lean your board up against a wall. I used a cardboard wedge to keep it from slipping.
- Mark a line about four feet back from the board. You want it far enough to have some challenge, without making it too difficult – you could vary the distance based on age of kids.
- Line up behind the line.
- Throw the ping pong balls and try to get them into the skulls. It works best if you bounce the ping pong ball on the floor in front of the board so that the balls bounce up into the skulls.
- Each kid throws 10 ping pong balls per turn. Score is based on how many balls made it into each numbered skull, e.g. two balls in the ‘5’ skull would be 10 points.
On the day of the party, I won’t lie. I was nervous. What if the kids hated the game? What if it was too hard or too easy for the age-group?
But I needn’t have worried. They loved it. It was great fun, it was tricky, but most of them got the hang of it and were able to score points each turn. Some of them were AWESOME at it, hitting 5’s and 3’s every time! Most importantly, they all had a great time.
Variations
Whether you’re having a Halloween Party or a Fall Festival, you can modify this idea to suit. Instead of skulls you could use (or make, with a simple base container):
- Witches’ hats
- Pumpkins/gourds
- Baskets covered with fall leaf decorations
The possibilities are endless, and could be expanded to other seasons and events:
- Spring: baskets covered with flower/blossom decorations, seeds, flower pots
- Summer: picnic baskets, beachballs, pineapples, ice cream cones
- Winter: snowballs, baubles, holiday lights
For different age-groups, you could vary the distance from the board based on age, and allow younger kids to bounce the balls, and older kids to just throw them. See what works for your group.
Looking for other fall activities? Check out How to Wax and Preserve Fall Leaves, Make: Collage with Autumn Leaves and Make: Halloween Decorations.
In short, the game was a huge success, took me less than an hour to make, and is ready to use again this year. So, if you need a last minute game, this is for you!
Did you make this game? Let me know how it went in the comments!
Vavv. Really good
Thanks for the tutorial. The result looks really awesome. Well done!!