Free memory game — instant play, no signup, no download
Missing Object shows you a set of items, hides them, brings them back with one removed, and asks what is gone. It is the party game Kim's Game, named after the memory training in Kipling's novel — and it is a genuinely good test, because you have to encode the whole set without knowing which item matters.
Study the full set of items.
The items are hidden briefly.
They return with one item missing.
Identify which one is gone.
Rounds add items and shorten the study time.
Set memory and change detection together. You have to hold the whole set, then compare it against a new set — and the comparison is where most people fail, not the holding.
Count the items first. Knowing there were seven makes the missing one much easier to find.
Name every item. A verbal list is far easier to compare against than a visual impression.
Group by category — 'three animals, two tools'. Then check category by category on the second view.
Scan the second view in the same order you scanned the first. Comparing in a different order is where the errors come from.
Yes, the same task — named after the training Kipling describes in Kim, where a boy learns to recall a tray of objects after a glance.
Naming and grouping pushes people well past what raw visual memory manages. That gap is the skill the game teaches.
The set returns in the same arrangement, so position is a usable cue.
Give it any label you like. An invented name works as well as the right one for memory purposes.