Charades is a dizzyingly old game, far older than the 1968 version represented in the pictures. However, the nature of the game has changed over time.

In its current incarnation, Charades is a pantomime game. I am not familiar with one particular published version of the game, but they all have in common the following:

There are two teams of players, each team has at least two players. On its turn, one member of a team is given a word or phrase to act out, either from drawing a card or given to him by the other team. There is a strict time limit imposed, usually about one minute.

This player can do just about any type of movement to try to communicate what the word or phrase is to the other members of his team. However, he may not open his mouth, or sign specific letters to form words in any way, with the exception of the letters A or I if they are words (some do not allow even this).

Much of the pantomiming involves puns, such as holding your hand up to look far away to indicate "sea", etc...

If the other team members can call out the exact word of phrase before the time limit, they gain a point. Otherwise, if the word or phrase was drawn as a card, the other team may make one attempt to guess the answer, and if they do, they get a point. Otherwise, it is their turn to play.

Game is to an agreed set of turns or time. As a party game, winning is secondary to the enjoyment of ridiculous puns and guesses that arise during play.

Historically, charades has been the catch phrase for numerous games that involve guessing words or phrases, and is referred to in literature from nineteenth and twentieth century, much the way that bridge or whist are. For example, Charades was played in the nineteenth century with each player having to invent riddles representing the syllables of a word (I guess pantomiming would have been considered too vulgar).

Charades has achieved legendary status as one of the most well known of all games, such that pretty much everyone knows the rules, like Monopoly, and is the first game thought of when people refer to "party game".