Box game

I was at the pub yesterday with my uni friends and we started playing this game called the triangle game. it's a concealed rule game about figuring out who the triangle belongs too. After we finished that one we moved onto a game about how many things are in a box. a typical question would go something like
bill: I put 3 shoes in a box, I shake the box really hard, super super hard, how many shoes are now in the box?
I tried for several minuets to get the answer to this but I just can't work it out. I forgot about it for most the evening but I woke up this morning and tried to research it but I can't find anything about it. has anyone heard of this game and know the answer so I can move on with my life please 😭

isnt the answer 3?

no they kept saying diffrent answers for diffrent things in the box (that was just an example question) but I can't figure out the hidden rule to for out the answer.

Could it be a variation on the 'Nine Knives' game? Someone lays out up to 9 butter knives in a pattern in front of them and asks 'how many?' The answer is not the number of knives, it's how many fingers and thumbs they are displaying when they put their hands on the table or floor in front of them, eg they'll tuck their thumbs under their palms so the answer is 8, even if there's 5 knives.
Were there any hand gestures or something like tapping fingers, winking that gave a number?

hmm maybe , I think it was to do with the words they were saying so it could be like that but with certain words?