I’m sure you’ve all heard about the sheer amount of drinking first years get up to. So it only seems natural to help you on your nights out to Fruity, Mission and the like by giving you some drinking games to help set off your careers of long nights and horrible mornings with some of the most fun and effective drinking games.
Now that fresher’s week is behind us it seems appropriate to go through the games you’ve likely already played, and if not you’re missing out! ‘Never Have I Ever’ is a simple game, but most effective at getting to know your new flatmates, who you may end up despising. All you do is say “Never have I ever…” and an action. If you’ve done it you drink. It can spark great conversation, but it usually devolves to being sexual or targeting someone’s embarrassing story. For freshers it’s a must.
‘Ring of Fire’ consists of a complex system which denotes rules for every card, which I simply don’t have time to go through, but someone’s always going to disagree with you (making for an interesting pres within itself) but essentially you draw facedown cards and do the action corresponding to it. Naturally involving drinking and when the cup in the middle is full the last person to draw a king drinks it. So this game does a better job of actually prepping for the night out, but is equally as fun.
‘Red or Black’ is a simple game, but effective, if you draw the colour of card you said then you don’t drink. But if it’s the other way around that’s a finger of your drink! There isn’t much else I can say about this game except I’ve heard it be used by lazy returning students to go and get things from upstairs, as the loser has to retrieve it.
Here is one of my personal favourites I picked up in the States, ‘Iced’. So all your mates turn up for pres expecting some of the casual games listed above. But wait what is that? Your mate Dave has found a random bottle of that grim Smirnoff Ice hidden in the kitchen. So you order him to get down on one knee and drink the whole thing. Nothing he can do, it’s too late. Now everyone at your pres is on edge, and rightly so, the rest of those Ices are waiting behind unsuspecting Strongbow Dark Fruits to get chugged.
Another unsuspecting game is ‘Thunder’. How do you spice up a pres playlist? Simple, you put AC/DC’s Thunderstruck in it a couple of times and every time it comes on the game begins. When THUNDER! Is first sung someone starts drinking (you choose) and they don’t stop until thunder is said again, when it is the person next to them drinks. This goes on for the whole song. The great part is, there is a period of over a minute where he doesn’t say it. So it sucks to be that guy.
Mushroom is just like Drunk Jenga (but not actually, as that’s a real thing), except you fill a pint glass with whatever you want and place cards on the rim one by one, creating a sort of mushroom. Two corners of the card must be in the air every time, and when the inevitable happens and an Empire falls, the loser must neck the whole thing.
Beer pong is the quintessential drinking game that needs very little explanation. You can’t watch any American film of show set in college or high school without this game being played with the iconic red plastic cup. It’s a simple concept but less simple in practice. All you need is good aim (which is hard to come by), cheap alcohol and a strong stomach. Get ready to throw, miss and down.
This last one is better for people you know well, or think you do. Mr and Mrs requires two unspecific gendered people to stand back to back. Everyone asks them questions along the lines of “who is…” or “who is better at…” and if you think it’s you drink. If you either both do or don’t drink that’s a strike and when you hit three you switch. Again this turns quickly sexual but tends to get some laughs and the job done with some banter.
So there you have it freshers, knock yourselves out with these drinking games. Because trust me, ‘Ring of Fire’ gets boring way too quickly and ‘Never Have I Ever’ works only once, when you’re in second year these games are just so boring. So use some of these next time you see that fit girl you want to impress. It won’t help, but it might make you feel smart so that’s something.
Will Nelson
Images: GQ, Smart First Graders, flask.com, Lake Bailee Recreational Park, Pinterest, imgrum