PULTEVENT
Irish wedding games: 7 ideas for the reception and the afters
A country hotel in the midlands, twenty to ten on a Saturday night. The meal finished an hour late because the speeches ran long (the best man had pages, the father of the bride had more), the band is still carrying amps in through the side door, and the afters crowd are arriving in their good coats looking for the bar. Two hundred people, one function room, and a forty-minute gap nobody planned for.
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That gap is where most Irish weddings wobble. The day is long by design: church in the early afternoon, the drinks reception with tea, coffee and scones, photos in the grounds, a sit-down dinner that rarely starts when the card says it will. By the time the plates are cleared, the older relations are flagging and the younger cousins have drifted to the smoking area. A few well-placed games on the big screen pull the room back together before the first dance.
I run them with PULTEVENT. The host (or a willing cousin) has the console open in a laptop browser, the hotel projector or a hired screen shows the game, and guests join by scanning a QR code with their own phones. Nothing to install. Their phones do need internet, and hotel Wi-Fi in a stone-walled function room is not always a given, so I'll come back to that.
7 games that suit a long Irish wedding day
1 The welcome screen, with a céad míle fáilte
When guests walk in from the drinks reception, the screen shows the couple's photo, their names, the date and a line of greeting in Irish or English. A slow slideshow of the engagement shoot runs underneath.
How to run it. Ask the couple which photos they actually like. Leave out the one from the stag weekend, even if the groom insists.
The room looks like it belongs to them, not to the hotel, from the moment people find their seats.
2 Whose side are you on
Photos of guests go up one by one and the room guesses from their phones: bride's side or groom's side, and how are they related. Great-aunts, college friends, the neighbour who has known the groom since he was in nappies.
How to run it. Pick guests who are happy to be looked at. Get the mothers of the couple to help with the list, they know who will mind.
By the end, the two families know a dozen new names each, which makes the dance floor far less awkward later.
3 The couple quiz
Questions about the pair: where they met, who proposed and where, which county's jersey hangs in the wardrobe, who does the driving on long trips home. Four answers, everyone votes from the phone, the fastest correct table wins the round.
How to run it. Write it in the quiz builder with the couple a month before. Keep one question only the parents could get right.
Everybody in the room can play it, from the flower girl's granny to the groom's rugby team.
4 Messages from the relations abroad
Most Irish families have somebody who couldn't make the trip home. Their short clips, recorded on a phone in a kitchen in Perth or a flat in New York, play on the big screen one after another.
How to run it. Ask for thirty seconds each, filmed sideways. Collect them a fortnight out so nobody is uploading from an airport.
The couple get to see everyone they love in the one room, and the aunts get a proper cry before the band starts.
5 Baby photos of the wedding party
Communion photos, school photos, one of the groom in a cowboy hat in 1996. The room guesses which bridesmaid or groomsman is which, and you reveal the answers one click at a time.
How to run it. Mams usually have the albums. Scan them early and keep the files off the group chat.
Short, warm and funny, and it gives the wedding party a moment in the spotlight that isn't a speech.
6 The party piece battle
Irish families have a song for every uncle. Put two of them head to head in a karaoke battle, lyrics on the screen, the room voting for the winner from their phones.
How to run it. Ask in advance who has a party piece. Never pull someone up cold, and clear it with the band so you are not stepping on their set.
It turns the old tradition of the sing-song into a small contest, and the whole room ends up joining the chorus.
7 The centrepiece draw
Instead of the usual scramble for the table flowers at the end of the night, run a raffle: guests enter through the QR code and the screen picks a winner per table.
How to run it. Do it just before the afters food comes out, when the room is fullest.
It settles the flower question politely and gives the evening crowd something to do with their phones.
Both families on one screen
Games that mix his side and her side, so the table plan stops being a border.
The relations abroad, in the room
Short video messages from Boston, Sydney or Toronto, played between courses.
Phones do the answering
A QR code on the screen, answers from each guest's own phone, results in seconds.
Fits the hotel's timings
Break screens and a countdown keep the room informed while the kitchen catches up.
Where games fit in the day
Not during the meal. People want their soup, their beef or salmon, and time to talk. The two slots that work are the gap between dessert and the first dance, and the stretch after the band's first break when the afters guests have arrived and need to be folded in.
The first slot is for the whole room: the couple quiz, whose-side-are-you-on, the messages from abroad. The second is louder: the party piece battle and a live vote or two. Allow twenty-five minutes for the first and fifteen for the second. That is plenty.
The afters crowd
Anyone who has been to an Irish wedding knows the second wave. Friends and neighbours who weren't at the meal arrive around nine or ten, and there is always a moment where they stand by the door not knowing whether to sit down. A splash screen with the couple's names and a QR code on it gives them something to look at and something to join.
One trick I use: keep a short live vote for them alone. Who will be last on the dance floor, who will sing first when the band stops. The newcomers vote, the results go up, and suddenly they are part of the night rather than visitors to it.
The hotel, the screen and the Wi-Fi
Most wedding hotels in Ireland have a projector and a screen in the function room, or can hire one in. Ask the events manager three things: where the HDMI input is, whether you can get a laptop within cable's reach of it, and what the Wi-Fi is like with two hundred phones on it.
Guests' phones need a connection to play. If the hotel network is weak and the building eats mobile signal, you still have plenty to do: splash screens, video messages and baby photos all run from the laptop, and the room can shout its guesses. Don't promise the couple a phone quiz you haven't tested in that room.
"Does the Wi-Fi reach the ballroom?"
"It does. Mostly."
Working with the band and the DJ
In Ireland the band is often the centre of the evening, and rightly so. Talk to them before the day. Tell them when you will need ten minutes, what you are running, and when you'll hand the room back. Most bands are glad of a structured break and a room that's already warm when they come back on.
If there is no band and a DJ runs the night instead, the built-in DJ deck in the console can cover the gaps between games, but leave the proper sets to the professional.
Day two and small weddings
Plenty of couples keep the party going with a second day, often in a pub or back at the hotel. That's a relaxed crowd in jeans, and the games get sillier: charades, fake karaoke, a horse race on the screen with guests racing from their phones. The laptop comes with you, the TV in the bar does the rest.
For a small wedding of forty or fifty, drop the team scoring and keep it personal: the couple quiz and the messages from abroad, with a long pause for the reactions.
Trying it before the big day
Set it up on your own TV at home first. The free 3-day demo needs no card, which gives you time to build the couple quiz, load the video clips and run through it with a sibling playing the guests. After that, the full version is a one-time licence with no subscription; the price is listed on pultevent.ru/en. The host console is available in English, and guest screens follow the language set on each guest's phone.
About the author
PULTEVENT was built by Ruslan Barashkin, who has hosted weddings, birthdays and office parties since 2014: over 500 events, best host of Moscow 2024 and of Saint Petersburg 2023 at the TOP 100 Awards. He made it for his own nights first. The rest is at pultevent.ru/en.
How to run games at an Irish wedding reception
- 1
A month out, sit down with the couple and write the quiz questions and the guest list for the photo round.
- 2
Ask the relations abroad for short video messages and collect baby photos from the families.
- 3
Call the hotel about the projector, the HDMI input and the Wi-Fi in the function room.
- 4
Agree the two game slots with the band or DJ and the events manager.
- 5
On the day, set up the welcome screen before the drinks reception ends and test a phone on the QR code.
- 6
Run the first set after dessert, the louder games after the afters crowd arrives, and finish with the centrepiece draw.
FAQ
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See also
Run brighter events — with PULTEVENT
All audience interactions, a second screen and timing in one app. Guests join by QR — internet is needed for you and for them.
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