I’ve played entirely too many games in my chequered college career. These are the version I played in college, but the rules to other versions can be found on PartySchool.com’s guide to drinking games.
Up the River, Down the River (a/k/a Up and Down the River, a/k/a “Abuse the shit out of someoneone all in the guise of entertainment”)
Fun for four to six players. Deal four cards; face up in front of each player. The ‘dealer’ then deals the remaining cards one at a time, laying them into four piles from left to right. If any of the players has the matching card as they go “up the river”, they give 1, 2, 3 or 4 drinks away to any of the other players, depending on where the card falls in the four piles. After the fourth card is dealt, You’re now going “down the river” and instead of giving away drinks you now take 4, 3, 2 or 1 drink as the cards are laid atop the piles. Repeat as needed.
Pyramid (a/k/a “You think I’m bluffing, dipshit?” a/k/a poker for drunks who can’t add)
Deal four cards to each player, face down (and for God’s sake, don’t let anyone else see your cards). Deal a pyramid of cards face down, each row will correspond to the number of drinks to be given away. (If you go beyond 4 rows or have more than four players, you may want to use two decks of cards.) As each card is flipped, a player (any player) may tell any other player to take a drink, whether or not they have that card in their hand or not. The other player may ask to see the card, however. If the card cannot be produced the player who ‘gave out’ the drink must drink double the number at stake. If the card is produced, the person attempting to call the bluff must drink double. If someone’s bluff is called and they turn the card in question over, it is replaced by a fresh card from the deck.
3-7-11 (Drunken Craps - Central PA regional version)
Two dice and six or eight people when combined with enough ethanol to float a small barge can be an entertaining combination. The “shooter” rolls the dice and hopes for a) a combination on the two dice that add up to 3, 7 or 11 or b) doubles (besides snake eyes). If one of those combinations do not result, the dice are passed to the next player. If the shooter does roll a a 3, 7 or 11, his or her turn continues. If doubles results, the shooter picks one of the other players who must pick up one die and try to ‘match’ the remaining die. If the challenged player fails to match the die, he or she must drink the number of drinks that show on the die he ro she rolled. If there is a match, the original shooter must then pick up the die and try to match. If the match is unsucsessful, the shooter looses his/her turn and must drink double the number on the die. If he matches it goes back to the challenge player, etc. etc. Two exceptions to the doubles rule exist: snake eyes (double ones) means the shooter looses his or her turn and must drains the glass; boxcars (double sixes) means a social and everyone drinks and the shooter rolls again. Trust me, it’s not as complicated as it sounds. (or perhaps I’ve just played it too many times).
Bullshit
Every player gets to pick their very own species-specific type of excrement. The person who’s chosen to start uses the generic opening, “I was walking down the road and stepped in some _______shit,” inserting a specific type of animal in the sentence. The person who’s species has been named must respond with “Bullshit!”, and the original player asks “Who shit?” At this point, the chosen player must come up with another person’s species. The new chosen player responds with “Bullshit!” and the previous player takes over the position of the original starter. As each player chosen names an animal, another person is drawn into the web until someone makes a mistake and must drink. Stumbling over the phrasing counts as a mistake as does naming the wrong species of animal shit or not realizing when your animal has been named.
Here’s the description from PartySchool.com’s website:
This is one of those games that isn’t much fun until the beverages have been flowing freely. But ones things get a little fuzzy in the minds of the participants, it can be highly amusing.
Bus/Buzz/Fizz-Buzz
We called it Bizz-Buzz and the way we played seems to have combined the various versions already discussed.
Threes and multiples of three were replaced by bizz, and the order reversed;
Sevens and multiples of sevens were replaced with buzz, again with the order reversing;
Numbers containing 7 as one of its digits are replaced by bizz-buzz and there is no reversal of the order.
(We liked to drink a lot at our school, and we weren’t very good at math, it was a liberal arts school.)
So, who’s going to bring the dice and cards to the NYC Dopefest?