5 Drinking Games You Can Play At Home

No one loves competition more than I do. The need to win and be the best at anything fuels my soul; I’m an Aries, so it’s not my fault.

Combine that with alcohol, and you’ll be hard pressed to find me at a party anywhere other than where the drinking game is being played. Drinking games have been part of drinking culture for years. Whether your first game of beer pong was on top of your college dorm’s unscrewed closet door (I see you, UCI) or you pulled the last king in King’s Cup and had to drink the nasty concoction of jungle juice, beer, and tequila, odds are you’ve come across many drinking games in your life. Here, I give you some of my favorite drinking games that will have you yelling at your teammates in frustration (sorry, past and future teammates) or running around in celebration at your triumph.

I have left out the more common games like Beer Pong, King’s Cup, and Rage Cage, and focused more on games that you may have not played before. Expand your horizons! Narrowing down the number of drinking games to five was tough. Please also practice safe social distancing. Some of these games (looking at you, Beer Relay) are not COVID-friendly because of the use of shared cups and others (ahem, Baseball) require more people than you’re likely to have in your quarantine bubble. But others, namely the card games and no equipment games, can be played virtually and safely from the comfort of your couch.

Without further ado, and in no particular order:

Ball Games

Baseball

Now I’ve seen Baseball played a few different ways, but my preferred cup set up is 1-2-1-1 from the front to back. The first cup is considered a single, the two cups are a double, then a triple and a home run. Both teams have three cups along the side of the table, each cup representing a base. These cups are used for stealing. The goal is to score as many “runs” as possible by shooting at the rack of cups or stealing bases. Each player gets three shots to try to make a cup. However, if your shot bounces off the cup and the opposing team catches your ball cleanly with their off-hand or if you miss the table entirely, you’re considered out. If you make it in the single, double, or triple cups, you then stand behind that designated base aka steal cup. The opposing team must drink the made cup(s) and has someone play defense against the runner before the next team member in batting order shoots. A player on base can steal at any time by drinking and flipping their base cup before a player of the opposing team. Like regular baseball, each team gets three outs before the other team gets to step up to bat. Make sure you choose how many innings you’re playing beforehand and come up with some creative team names like Life’s a Pitch or Bat and Boujee!

Beer Relay

If you know me, I do not run and I would not endorse a game that requires you to do so. That being said, this game is more of a triathlon of drinking games. Combining Flip Cup, Rage Cage, and Beer Pong, this team game can be played with up to ten members per team. Set up with each team having two cups on one end of the table and a Beer Pong rack at the other end — the two teams will race to clear their rack. Each member of the team must drink and flip the first cup, drink, bounce the ball into the second cup, then shoot at their rack. Once a cup is made, pulled, and the beer drank, the next member can start their leg of the relay. Two tips: the rest of the team can rebound with someone is shooting at the rack, and don’t forget to refill your first two cups before flipping and bouncing! I don’t recommend playing this game until there is a way to play it COVID-safe, as there is a lot of sharing of cups.

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No Equipment Needed

Cheers to the Governor

Whenever you say “Cheers to the Governor” you have to say it in a British accent, obvs. Sitting in a circle, players go around clockwise, counting to 21. The first rule is that 7 and 14 are switched, so after a player says 6, the next player says 14, and the player after that says 8. The same goes for 14; a player says 13, next player says 7, and player after that says 15. Once the group successfully gets to 21, you say “Cheers to the Governor!” and everyone drinks. The person who said 21 gets to make a new rule for one of the numbers. The game is over when every number has a rule assigned to it or you get too frustrated to try to complete the game. And of course, if you’re the one who messes up, you drink.

Some great rules I’ve played with:

• On a certain number play switches direction and starts going counterclockwise
• Instead of saying a number you make a silent cue to try to trick the following person.

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Card Games

F*** the Dealer

Ok, a little crude, but this one’s simple. One person (the dealer) has a deck of cards and peeks at the first card. The person to their left takes a blind guess at what number that card is. If the player is right, the dealer drinks twice and play continues to the next person. If the player is wrong, the dealer reveals if the card is higher or lower than what the player guessed. The player gets to guess again and if they’re right, the dealer drinks once. If they’re wrong, the dealer flips the card into the center of the board and the incorrect guessing player drinks the difference between what they guessed and the card flipped by the dealer (ex. guess is 3 but the card is 7, player drinks 4). Play continues this way until the dealer stumps 3 people in a row. The dealer then passes the deck to the player on the left. Of course, this game gets harder for the dealer as more cards come out of the deck because you can clearly see what cards have been played. So make sure you don’t end up becoming the dealer and getting f*****!

Auctioneer

This game is best played with two decks of cards, all shuffled together. Each person is dealt five cards. The dealer, or auctioneer, flips a card into the middle and one drink is automatically assigned to the person sitting to the auctioneer’s left. If any of the players have a matching card in their hand, they throw it down and increase the drink count to two. They can then choose who they want to give those two drinks to. Since there are two decks, you can give away a maximum of eight drinks (at that point, you’d might as well take a shot). The auctioneer will count “Going once, going twice, SOLD!” to end the round. As you play your cards, draw a new one from the deck. Hot tip: try to hold out until the auctioneer counts down, you don’t want to put your card down too soon only to find the person you gave drinks to has a matching card and sends the drinks back your way!

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Play these games and let me know how it goes! And if you need someone to play against, hit me up, I’m always down to school anyone in any game. Just remember to have your favorite drunchies on hand and hangover remedies easily accessed. I’m personally a fan of the “hair of the dog” theory, anyone else? Have fun, and remember, drink safely!