From Beirut to beer die, drinking games provide good times

Disclaimer: Do not read this article unless you are 21 or can produce a good false I.D.

Where there is alcohol, there are college students and where there are college students, there is thinking. Not necessarily intense thinking, but enough electromagnetic brain waves dedicated to the invention of innumerable drinking games. No one knows where the first drinking game originated or who invented it, but then again no one knows whose spectacular idea it was to let grain, potatoes, and grapes "ferment" (rot) and then drink it. You just don't question brilliance.

The beauty of drinking games is that even when you lose, you win. In fact, the best games aren't about winning; they're simply thinly veiled excuses to drink. With such a positive philosophy steering our mentalities, the world should be thankful we college kids will be running things in a few years ... regardless of the fact that most of us still don't know what we want to be when we grow up (I'm leaning toward Indian chief).

When classics like Flip Cup, Quarters and Beirut get a little stale, consider some of these lesser-known drinking games invented by your innovative peers. There is no end to the art form that is the drinking game. Whether or not one can get a research grant to study this art is still under investigation. This reporter recently took the initiative to do a little research on the topic anyway, going so far as to travel to several college campuses and canvas the students there for their most popular homegrown drinking games. Read on for everything you wanted to know about drinking games but were afraid to ask.

Beer die

This beauty comes to us from Colby College in Maine. Today it is regularly played in the hallowed halls of their dormitories where there is nary an R.A. willing to bust up a good party. The game hearkens back to the days when Colby still had a Greek system and it was originally presided over by a fraternity brother designated as "God" whose discretion it was to command anyone to drink for no particular reason at any point during the game.

This element has since been jettisoned but was initially included to keep the pace going, and isn't a bad idea to reintroduce to any game. In fact it could really add a lot to any social situation in general:

Professor: "Ricky, is that a flask you're drinking from in class?"

Ricky: "Yes, but God told me to."

Called "Beer Die" because it involves dice, not death, the game is similar to Beirut in that it involves a projectile and cups filled with beer. But that is about where the similarities end. Two teams of two sit at either end of a long picnic table. Each player has his own cup of beer set a wrist's length away from the side edge of the table and an elbow's length away from the back edge. Each player takes turns throwing a die underhand toward his opponents' cups at the opposite end of the table. If the die hits the cup, a "plink," the opponent drinks once. If the die lands in the cup, a "plunk," they drink the entire cup and refill. With plunking comes initiation into the hall of fame. The plunker's teammate gives him a nickname, usually based on a personal joke, and the plunks he makes are tallied under the nickname, written on the table in permanent marker for all time.

The game is played to five or seven points (must win by two), which are won when, using only one hand, your opponents fail to catch any die that bounce off the back edge of the table. If the thrower misses the cups and table altogether, throwing a sort of "air ball" he drinks. However, if the thrower plunks his own cup, the ultimate lapse in Beer Die, both he and his teammate have to play the rest of the game totally naked. This game is best played with a good friend who will maybe (maybe) forgive you if they are made to strip down and who can think of a good name for the plunk hall-of-fame. If there were any lesson to be learned in Beer Die, it would be that it's all about the team, through good times and bad.

The Vegetable Game

Derived from a summer camp game, adding to the long list of childhood games that can be turned into drinking games with the simple introduction of -- yes, drinking -- this one has much more innocent origins than Beer Die. The game works on a quick reaction concept rather than a skill concept. Each player is a different vegetable and can only be addressed by their vegetable name. You "call" different players with the refrain "carrot calling asparagus" and then asparagus would continue with "asparagus calling radish," for one example.

The catch is that you can't show your teeth the entire time but you can't put your hand in front of your mouth. This makes for what looks like, at first glance, a retirement community game where senile senior citizens who forgot to wear their dentures are under the delusion that they are actually vegetables. It also makes for a lot of laughing, which is pretty difficult to do without showing your teeth. Naturally, if you mess up, you drink.

Drink, Okay

This seemingly simple game originated in the Connecticut high school circuit and was introduced to Hopkins by sophomore Mack Sanford who thinks he invented it, but isn't sure. If that tells you anything, it's that this one can get more intense than it would appear.

One player orders another to drink, like so: "Drink". Simple enough. But if the second player forgets to say "Okay" they drink twice. Still pretty basic. What makes it a challenge is that anyone can tell anyone to drink at any time; there is no progression or taking turns.

The idea is to make each person drink again before they are able to catch a breath from their last sip and order someone else to drink. The strategy is to keep drinking until no one is looking at you and then stop to order someone else to drink.

Finger pointing helps, but especially when there are a lot of players, the game can quickly digress into a confusing jumble of cross-commands and one long chug if you don't stay on your toes.

Battleship Beirut

This game, a combination of the classic Milton Bradley board game and Beirut, is a good game for any heavy-drinking, hard-swearing sailor. A huge rectangle of plastic cups at both ends of a Beirut table form the grid for each side's battleships, arranged any way they want.

Just like in the game, a destroyer equals two cups, submarines and cruisers are three, a battleship is four, and a carrier is five. Each cup has a little bit of beer in it, but the cups that represent ships are filled all the way.

The object of the game is to figure out where the battleship cups are and to aim for them first, operating on the theory that it is fun to yell out, "Direct hit!" and also that the more beer you make your opponent drink, the worse their aim will get, and you will be master of the high seas. Arrr.

George

This is a good get-to-know-you kind of game because if you don't know everyone's name before you play, well you probably still won't at the end either if you've been doing the required drinking. But somewhere in there, for a fleeting moment you will know all your neighbors' first and last names and there will be world peace.

Everyone sits in a circle and goes by their first or last name, except one player who is designated as simply, "George." Inevitably someone will ask who the game is named after. Feel free to make this person drink. Someone begins the progression of going around the circle calling other players by only first names or only last names. George is the only one who can switch it, which he or she does simply by calling out a last name instead of first and vice versa. If someone messes up, they drink and switch seats, and then becomes the name of the seat just vacated. As the game progresses this gets pretty confusing, since the seat keeps the name of whoever sat there from the beginning. Oh yeah, and also because you're drunk.

Beer Hockey

If you like beer and if you like hockey, and let's admit it they kind of go together, boy, are you in for a treat. Although there is no ice involved (although I'm sure it could be worked into the game in some way) this is probably the safest way to play hockey while drunk. You need a quarter, beer cans and people. Don't forget the people. Someone spins a quarter in the center of the table and then calls out another player's name. This player then flicks or backhands the quarter toward another player's beer can or "goal." Each player can block their goal by wrapping their hand around the front of their can with only their pinky and pointer fingers extended in a kind of devil horn's gesture. If scored upon, you drink and then spin the quarter. If you don't make the shot, you drink and spin again. The quick reaction and sudden movement that go with this game can make for some cans getting knocked over. This is tantamount to starting a huge hockey brawl and naturally, you sit in the "penalty box," where you must chug an entire beer for such unsportsmanlike conduct. Happily, however, no one has ever lost any teeth in this game. Yet.

Meniscus a.k.a Sink the Bismarck

This game is an import not from Germany as would make sense, but from Wesleyan College in Connecticut. Being brainy college kids more than nihilists, Wesleyanites changed the name to Meniscus after that chemistry lab phenomenon involving fitting more liquid into a container than is possible. It involves something called cohesion and would require me to understand science in order to explain it, so I won't. All you need to know is that Meniscus also involves a liquid (beer), a container and trying to fit more beer into the container than is possible. One small cup or double shot glass is floated in a larger cup or bucket filled with beer. Each player goes around the circle pouring beer into the smaller floating cup. The person who sinks it, drinks it. The strategy is to pour a lot of beer into the cup so that the people next to you will have to execute difficult-to-do teensy tiny pours. Who knew science could be so much fun?

Beer Hunter

This is the best game in the world. An import from the Great White North of Canada, it is essentially a game of luck. Several cans of beer are placed on a table and one is shaken up very, very vigorously. Everyone closes their eyes and takes turns mixing it in with the other unshaken beers until no one knows where the rocket can is. Each player takes turns choosing a can and opening it. If it doesn't explode they drink the whole thing. The pure genius of this game though, is that the beer can't be opened away from the player's body. They must hold the can to their head thus insuring that if they do get the shaken can, they will get a wet-head. This, I assure you, never ever gets old. It is hilarious every time.