Drinking games are game

Game

A game is structured playing, usually undertaken for enjoyment and sometimes used as an educational tool. Games are distinct from work, which is usually carried out for remuneration, and from art, which is more often an expression of aesthetic or ideological elements...

s which involve the consumption of alcoholic beverage

Alcoholic beverage

An alcoholic beverage is a drink containing ethanol, commonly known as alcohol. Alcoholic beverages are divided into three general classes: beers, wines, and spirits. They are legally consumed in most countries, and over 100 countries have laws regulating their production, sale, and consumption...

s. These games vary widely in scope and complexity, although the purpose of most is to become intoxicated as quickly as possible. Evidence of the existence of drinking games dates back to antiquity

Classical antiquity

Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ancient Greece and ancient Rome, collectively known as the Greco-Roman world...

.

The rapid consumption of alcohol, key to many drinking games, worsens judgement and decreases inhibition, and may lead to alcohol poisoning. As a result, drinking games have been banned at some American universities.

History

Ancient Greece

According to Dr Rupert Thompson, the Orator of The University of Cambridge, the earliest reference to drinking games in Western literature is from Plato

Plato

Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...

's Symposium

Symposium (Plato)

The Symposium is a philosophical text by Plato dated c. 385–380 BCE. It concerns itself at one level with the genesis, purpose and nature of love....

 The Drinking Party. The game was simple: fill a bowl with wine

Wine

Wine is an alcoholic beverage, made of fermented fruit juice, usually from grapes. The natural chemical balance of grapes lets them ferment without the addition of sugars, acids, enzymes, or other nutrients. Grape wine is produced by fermenting crushed grapes using various types of yeast. Yeast...

, drink it and pass it on to the next person. Kottabos

Kottabos

Kottabos was a game of skill popular for a long time at ancient Greek and Etruscan symposia , especially in the 5th and 4th centuries BC. The game is played by flinging wine lees at targets...

 is one of the earliest known drinking games from ancient Greece

Ancient Greece

Ancient Greece is a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history that lasted from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Included in Ancient Greece is the...

, dated to the 5th to 4th centuries BC. Players would use dregs to hit targets across the room with their wine. Often, there were special prizes and penalties for one's performance in the game.

Ancient China

Drinking games were enjoyed in ancient China

China

Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

, usually incorporating the use of dice

Dice

A die is a small throwable object with multiple resting positions, used for generating random numbers...

 or verbal exchange of riddle

Riddle

A riddle is a statement or question or phrase having a double or veiled meaning, put forth as a puzzle to be solved. Riddles are of two types: enigmas, which are problems generally expressed in metaphorical or allegorical language that require ingenuity and careful thinking for their solution, and...

s. During the Tang Dynasty

Tang Dynasty

The Tang Dynasty was an imperial dynasty of China preceded by the Sui Dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period. It was founded by the Li family, who seized power during the decline and collapse of the Sui Empire...

 (618-907), the Chinese used a silver

Silver

Silver is a metallic chemical element with the chemical symbol Ag and atomic number 47. A soft, white, lustrous transition metal, it has the highest electrical conductivity of any element and the highest thermal conductivity of any metal...

 canister where written lots could be drawn that designated which player had to drink and specifically how much; for example, from 1, 5, 7, or 10 measures of drink that the youngest player, or the last player to join the game, or the most talkative player, or the host, or the player with the greatest alcohol tolerance, etc. had to drink There were even drinking game referee

Referee

A referee is the person of authority, in a variety of sports, who is responsible for presiding over the game from a neutral point of view and making on the fly decisions that enforce the rules of the sport...

 officials, including a 'registrar of the rules' who knew all the rules to the game, a 'registrar of the horn' who tossed a silver flag down on calling out second offenses, and a 'governor' who decided one's third call of offense. These referees were used mainly for maintaining order (as drinking games often became rowdy) and for reviewing faults that could be punished with a player drinking a penalty cup. If a guest was considered a 'coward' for dropping out of the game, he could be branded as a 'deserter' and not invited back to further drinking bouts. There was another game where little puppets and dolls dressed as western foreigners with blue eyes (Iranian peoples

Iranian peoples

The Iranian peoples are an Indo-European ethnic-linguistic group, consisting of the speakers of Iranian languages, a major branch of the Indo-European language family, as such forming a branch of Indo-European-speaking peoples...

) were set up and when one fell over, the person it pointed to had to empty his cup of wine.

Endurance

The simplest drinking games are endurance games in which players compete to out-drink each other. Players take turns taking shots, and the last person standing is the winner. Some games have rules involving the "cascade", "fountain" or "waterfall", which encourages each player to drink constantly from their cup so long as the player before him does not stop drinking. Such games can also favor speed over quantity, in which players race to drink a case of beer the fastest.

Tolerance games are simply about seeing which player can last the longest. It can be as simple as two people matching each other drink for drink until one of the participants "passes out". Power hour

Power Hour

Power Hour, with its variants Centurion and 21 for 21, is a drinking event where player drink a specified number of alcohol shots within one hour...

 and its variant, centurion

Centurion (game)

Centurion, also known as Century Club, Century Challenge, One-Hunzy-Hunzy, Chicken of the North, Hundred's Club and Century Clock in North America and the UK, is a drinking game. Although there are variations in the rules, a basic premise remains; drink one hundred shots of beer in as many minutes...

, fall under this category. Another is the "Datsyuk Game" where a Datsyuk

Pavel Datsyuk

Pavel Valerievich Datsyuk is a professional ice hockey player from Russia and alternate captain for the Detroit Red Wings of the National Hockey League . He is known for his stick-handling and is considered the best two-way forward in the game today, having won the Frank J. Selke Trophy in the...

 highlight reel is played on YouTube and contestants drink every time the word Datsyuk is mentioned. The ceremonial playing of the Russian national anthem before the game is an important tradition.

Speed

Many pub or bar games involve competitive drinking for speed and not necessarily for the quantity consumed. The object of these games may not be inebriation, but may simply involve "bragging rights" or wangs of cash which benefit the fastest drinker. Examples of such drinking games are Edward Fortyhands, boat races

Boat race (game)

A boat race , is a drinking game between two teams of equal numbers. Rules vary widely but normally involve a team drinking in series and aiming to finish first. Common rules include those regulating the number and gender of drinkers, the vessels from which the liquid must be consumed and...

, Tour De Franzia, beer bonging, shotgunning

Shotgunning

Shotgunning is a means of consuming a canned beverage, particularly beer, very quickly by punching a hole in the side of the can. With this method, it is possible to easily drink a canned beverage in under 10 seconds.. A related technique, strawpedoing, is used for containers not easily punctured...

, flippy cup(a team-based speed game), and yard

Yard glass

A yard of ale or yard glass is a very tall beer glass used for drinking around of beer, depending upon the diameter. The glass is approximately 1 yard long, shaped with a bulb at the bottom, and a widening shaft which constitutes most of the height....

. The trick to speed drinking is opening the throat.

World records

The Guinness Book of Records began to list world records for speed drinking in this category in the early 1960s. These early drinking records involved drinking beer

Beer

Beer is the world's most widely consumed andprobably oldest alcoholic beverage; it is the third most popular drink overall, after water and tea. It is produced by the brewing and fermentation of sugars, mainly derived from malted cereal grains, most commonly malted barley and malted wheat...

 from challenging vessels such as the yard glass

Yard glass

A yard of ale or yard glass is a very tall beer glass used for drinking around of beer, depending upon the diameter. The glass is approximately 1 yard long, shaped with a bulb at the bottom, and a widening shaft which constitutes most of the height....

, which, if not correctly mastered, resulted in the user receiving a blast of beer in his or her face. The 1969 edition of the Guinness Book lists The Broom (age 20) as having consumed a 2.5 pint

Pint

The pint is a unit of volume or capacity that was once used across much of Europe with values varying from state to state from less than half a litre to over one litre. Within continental Europe, the pint was replaced with the metric system during the nineteenth century...

 yard of ale in 6.5 seconds on December 17, 1964. The 1974 edition lists Jack Boyle, age 52, of Barrow-in-Furness

Barrow-in-Furness

Barrow-in-Furness is an industrial town and seaport which forms about half the territory of the wider Borough of Barrow-in-Furness in the county of Cumbria, England. It lies north of Liverpool, northwest of Manchester and southwest from the county town of Carlisle...

 as having consumed a 3 pint yard of ale in 10.15 seconds on May 14, 1971. In the mid 1970s, Guinness began to list speed records achieved using any drinking vessel. The 1977 edition dropped the earlier records established by Hill and Boyle, and listed a 2.5 pint yard record by the RAF

Royal Air Force

The Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...

 at Upper Heyford, Oxfordshire

Upper Heyford, Oxfordshire

Upper Heyford is a village and civil parish about northwest of Bicester in Oxfordshire, England.-Location:Upper Heyford is on the east bank of the River Cherwell. "Upper" distinguishes it from Lower Heyford which is about "lower", downstream along the Cherwell valley...

 in 5.0 seconds and a three pint yard record established at Corby Town F.C.

Corby Town F.C.

Corby Town F.C. is an English football club based in Corby, Northamptonshire. They will be members of the Conference North for the 2011–12 season. The Steelmen play their home games at the newly built Steel Park, adjacent to their previous ground, Rockingham Triangle Sports Stadium, which is...

 on January 23, 1976 in 5.5 seconds". The 1977 edition listed the new world record established at the Gingerbreadman Pub by Steven Petrosino, (age 25) of New Cumberland, Pennsylvania

New Cumberland, Pennsylvania

New Cumberland is a municipality at the eastern tip of Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, United States. New Cumberland was incorporated as a borough on March 21, 1831. The population was 7,349 at the 2000 census...

 on June 22, 1977. Petrosino drank 1 litre

Litre

pic|200px|right|thumb|One litre is equivalent to this cubeEach side is 10 cm1 litre water = 1 kilogram water The litre is a metric system unit of volume equal to 1 cubic decimetre , to 1,000 cubic centimetres , and to 1/1,000 cubic metre...

 of beer in 1.3 seconds.
Petrosino approached the challenge scientifically, and used two specially designed half-litre drinking vessels to establish this world beer record. The 1977 edition also lists Peter G. Dowdeswell of Earls Barton

Earls Barton

Earls Barton is a village and civil parish in eastern Northamptonshire, notable for its Saxon church and shoe-making heritage.The village was the inspiration for the film Kinky Boots and part of the film was shot here...

 for drinking two pints of beer from a single vessel in 2.3 seconds on June 11, 1975 and two litres in 6.0 seconds on 7 February 1975. These records were all dropped from the Guinness book in 1991 due to concerns about litigation

Lawsuit

A lawsuit or "suit in law" is a civil action brought in a court of law in which a plaintiff, a party who claims to have incurred loss as a result of a defendant's actions, demands a legal or equitable remedy. The defendant is required to respond to the plaintiff's complaint...

.

Competitive skill games

Some party and pub games focus on the doing of a particular act of skill, rather than on either the amount a participant drinks or the speed with which they do so. Notable examples include beer pong

Beer pong

Beer pong, also known as Beirut, is a drinking game in which players throw a ping pong ball across a table with the intent of landing the ball in a cup of beer on the other end. The game typically consists of two two-to-four-player teams and multiple cups set up, in triangle formation, on each side...

, quarters, and chandeliers

Chandeliers (game)

Chandelier is a drinking game that is a spinoff of Quarters. It moves a lot faster than Quarters, since there are a lot more targets to hit. The game involves a lot of beer as it gets consumed very quickly.-Set up:...

. To some extent, the focus of the players on doing the act of skill, rather than simply drinking, means that these games could be played for a longer time without participants getting significantly intoxicated.

These games, however, do not allow the participants to choose how much they drink, as this is dependent on the act of skill. This means that the drinking will necessarily be distributed unevenly between players, depending on the how skilled the players are at the act that is the basis of the game.

Thinking

Thinking games rely on the players' powers of observation, recollection, logic and articulation. Such games are not difficult at the onset, but become much more challenging as the game continues as players become inebriated

Drunkenness

Alcohol intoxication is a physiological state that occurs when a person has a high level of ethanol in his or her blood....

 and their coordination and memory deteriorate.

Numerous types of thinking games exist, including 21

21 (drinking game)

21 is a drinking game. The game progresses by counting up from 1 to 21, with the player who calls "21" suffering a drinking penalty before the next round starts. The loser may add one new rule to the game, and starts the new round.-Rules:Players are arranged in a circle, facing inwards...

, beer checkers

Beer checkers

Beer Checkers is a two-player drinking game, played on a standard checkerboard , using cups of beer in place of the regular checker pieces .-Equipment:...

, bizz buzz, buffalo

Buffalo (drinking game)

Buffalo is a drinking game popular around the world. People who play the game refer to themselves as "Buffalos".-Rules:The rules are fairly simple, though widely varying, and involve which hand a player may use to drink. One version of how to play the game is as follows:# A player can hold their...

, bullshit, tourettes, matchboxes, never have I ever, roman numerals

Roman Numerals (game)

Roman numerals or poo bum dickie is a drinking game played by a moderate gathering of people, all with alcoholic beverages. The premise is that players must count upwards from one around the circle in Roman numerals. The Roman numerals are replaced by words chosen for their humour, with many...

, fuzzy duck, pennying

Pennying

Pennying is a drinking game popular amongst students attending various universities throughout the United Kingdom. It is one of the International Drinking Rules, or Pub Rules...

, wine games, and zoom schwartz profigliano

Zoom Schwartz Profigliano

Zoom Schwartz Profigliano is a verbal "tag" drinking game with many variations. One player at a time is active . The active player states a command from a predefined set of words, which typically include "zoom," "schwartz," and "profigliano." The command shifts active status to another player,...

. Trivia

Trivia

The trivia are the three lower Artes Liberales, i.e. grammar, rhetoric and logic. These were the topics of basic education, foundational to the quadrivia of higher education, and hence the material of basic education, of interest only to undergraduates...

 games, such as Trivial Pursuit

Trivial Pursuit

Trivial Pursuit is a board game in which progress is determined by a player's ability to answer general knowledge and popular culture questions. The game was created in 1979 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, by Canadian Chris Haney, a photo editor for Montreal's The Gazette and Scott Abbott, a sports...

, are sometimes played as drinking games.

Physical

Several games involve a skill such as scoring a ping-pong or darts. Players must have good aim throughout the entire game, even as they become increasingly inebriated. Examples of these games include beer pong

Beer pong

Beer pong, also known as Beirut, is a drinking game in which players throw a ping pong ball across a table with the intent of landing the ball in a cup of beer on the other end. The game typically consists of two two-to-four-player teams and multiple cups set up, in triangle formation, on each side...

, caps

Caps (drinking game)

Caps is a drinking game that involves throwing bottle caps, into plastic cups , or at other bottle caps balanced on open beer bottles ....

, pong

Beer pong (paddles)

Beer pong is a drinking game loosely based on ping pong, that involves use of paddles to hit a ping pong ball into obstacles on the opposing side. The origin of beer pong is generally credited to Dartmouth College...

, beer darts

Beerdarts

Beerdarts is a drinking game involving aluminum beer cans and metal darts. Although many variations exist, the basic idea is to throw a dart at your opponent's can that has been placed on the ground at their feet...

 and blackout

Blackout (drinking game)

Blackout is a drinking game which mixes beer pong and flip cup with at least 4 players on each of the two teams.-Set up:The game is played on a beer pong table with six disposable cups set up in beer pong fashion at each end of the table, and one cup for flipping for each of the players...

.

Card and dice

Several popular drinking games involving cards

Card game

A card game is any game using playing cards as the primary device with which the game is played, be they traditional or game-specific. Countless card games exist, including families of related games...

 are asshole, fuck the dealer, horserace

Horserace (drinking game)

Horserace is a drinking game using playing cards that is inspired by horse racing. Participants bet amounts of alcohol on one of four aces, much like bettors would bet money on horses at a racing track.- Preparation :...

, Kings

Kings (drinking game)

Kings is a drinking game that uses playing cards. It is common among university students in Canada, South Africa, Chile, New Zealand, Australia, the United States, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Sweden, the Netherlands, Lebanon and Belgium. Players must drink and dispense drinks based on cards...

, liar's poker

Liar's poker

Liar's poker is a bar game that combines statistical reasoning with bluffing, and is played with the eight-digit serial number on a U.S. dollar bill. Normally the game is played with a stack of random bills obtained from the cash register. The objective is to make the highest bid of a number that...

, pyramid

Pyramid (drinking game)

Pyramid or beeramid is a card game that is most commonly used as a drinking game.-Set up:One begins by creating a pyramid of cards by placing them face down on the table in rows . Next, the dealer passes out four cards to each player, face down...

 , bloody knuckles, Ring of Fire, ride the bus

Ride the Bus

Ride the bus is a drinking game played through using a standard pack of cards and enough alcoholic drink.The recommended number of players is between three and seven.If eight play, one acts as dealer and receives no hand; the dealership rotates each round....

, and Black or Red

Black or Red

Black or Red is an American card game, often played as a drinking game.In its most basic form it is one of the least complicated of drinking games. Gameplay requires a standard 52-card deck and may be played with any number of participants, to include a single player.Traditionally each player takes...

.

Dice games include beer die

Beer Die

Beer Die is a table-based drinking game. Opposing players sit at opposite ends and throw a die over a certain height with the goal of either landing the die in their opponent's cup or having the die hit the table and bounce over the scoring area to the floor...

, dudo

Dudo

Dudo , also known as Cacho, Perudo or Cachito is popular dice game played in Peru, Chile, Bolivia and other Latin American countries. It is a more specific version of a family of games collectively called Liar's Dice, which has many forms and variants...

, kinito

Kinito

Kinito is a drinking game involving people, two dice, a table, a cup or basket, and beer or sangria. Originally from Spain, this game evolves from Kiriki into a more social game. The object of the game is to force either the person preceding you or the person following you to drink.-Play:The...

, liar's dice

Liar's dice

Liar's dice, or Liar dice, with roots originating in South America and popularized in early Spanish History, was brought to Spain by the Spanish conqueror Francisco Pizarro during the 16th century. It became extremely popular in Hong Kong and consequencially China...

, Mexico

Mexico (game)

Mexico is an elimination-style dice game, in which several players agree to play a set number of rounds. After each round, one player is eliminated. When all players but one have been eliminated, the remaining player wins the game...

, mia

Mia (game)

Mia is a simple dice game with a strong emphasis on bluffing and detecting bluff related to Liar's dice.-Equipment:Two dice and a flat bottomed container with a lid or a dice cup are needed. This game is played by three or more players.-Play:...

, pounce!

Pounce!

Pounce!, Cat and mouse, Buttons, Catch me if you can and Not now but now are some of the names used for a children's game and drinking game, usually played by at least three players....

, ship, captain, and crew

Ship, Captain, and Crew

Ship, Captain, and Crew is a dice game of nearly pure chance. The game can be played with as few as two people, but is usually played in groups of five to twenty people.-Object:...

, tablero da Gucci

Tablero da Gucci

Tablero da Gucci is a drinking game adapted from an SCA gambling game, Tablero de Jesus .-History:This form of the game was conceived within the medieval recreation group, the Society for Creative Anachronism, forgoing the use of coins in Tablero de Jesus and substituting beer in its place...

, and three man

Three Man

Three Man is a drinking game of skill and strategy, but essentially it's just two dice. The game can be played with a larger group of people than other drinking games and is designed so as to not require a great deal of participation from the players not directly involved in the current dice...

.

Film

Film drinking games are played while watching a movie (sometimes a TV show or a sporting event) and have a set of rules for who drinks when and how much based on on-screen events and dialogue. The rules may be the same for all players, or alternatively players may each be assigned rules related to particular characters. The rules are designed so that rarer events require larger drinks. Rule sets for such games are usually arbitrary and local, although they are sometimes published by fan clubs.

Matching the characters in the film Withnail and I has become an accepted drinking game, although the levels of consumption required for a single player are hazardous.

Music

Rock

Rock music

Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...

 and pop music

Pop music

Pop music is usually understood to be commercially recorded music, often oriented toward a youth market, usually consisting of relatively short, simple songs utilizing technological innovations to produce new variations on existing themes.- Definitions :David Hatch and Stephen Millward define pop...

 tracks can also be used as a basis for drinking games. "Roxanne

Roxanne (song)

"Roxanne" is a hit song by the rock band The Police, first released in 1978 as a single and on their album Outlandos d'Amour. It was written from the point-of-view of a man who falls in love with a prostitute.- History :...

" by The Police

The Police

The Police were an English rock band formed in London in 1977. For the vast majority of their history, the band consisted of Sting , Andy Summers and Stewart Copeland...

 is one example. One more example is the song "Thunderstruck" by ACDC in which players take a drink every time the word thunder is sung. Also the song "Real Nigga Roll Call" by Lil Jon & Ice Cube, is another song that may be used for this method.

Sporting events

Sport related drinking games involve the participants each selecting a scenario of the game resulting their drink being downed. Examples of this include participants each picking a footballer in a game. Should this player score or sent off a drink must be taking, or extreme versions include a drink for every touch a player takes of the ball. Multiple players may also be selected.

Athletic races involving alcohol including the beer mile

Beer mile

A Beer mile is a drinking game combining running and speed drinking. Typically, the game takes place on a standard 400 meter or 1/4 mile running track. The race begins at the 1-mile starting line with the consumption of a standard amount of beer, followed by a full lap around the track...

, which consists of a mile run with a can of beer consumed before each of the four laps. A variant of this game is known in German speaking countries as Bierkastenlauf (beer crate running): A team of two is carrying a crate of beer along a route of several kilometers and has to consume all bottles prior to crossing the finish line.

Resources

• Benn, Charles (2002). China's Golden Age: Everyday Life in the Tang Dynasty. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-517665-0.
• Schafer, Edward H. (1963). The Golden Peaches of Samarkand: A study of T’ang Exotics. University of California Press. Berkeley and Los Angeles. 1st paperback edition: 1985. ISBN 0-520-05462-8.