Games

I’ve created a bunch of games over my lifetime. Here, in all their glory, are all the ones I could find in the archives:
• • •

People projecting their labels on you

hold hands with a friend of yours of the opposite sex for one day. See if you can make it 24 hours without anybody commenting. After that, try groping each other for one day.

UPDATE (2010): Even I don’t know what I was blathering about for this post! I probably tried clarifying “sooo… you wanna just stay friends, right?” when I should have been consoling a girl on her boyfriend’s death.

Fun with Spell Check

the aim of this game is to type in two identical sentences and have one of them spell-checked (always picking the first recommended word)…

UPDATE (2010): This is actually a terrible game!

Win, Lose, or Drew

Get online just as someone posts something , then keep changing the page until the person realizes that they’re being messed with.

A False Sense of Humor

Say something in such a way that people laugh or otherwise react immediately then pause while the whole meaning of what you said hits them and react to the whole of it. In other words, try to mislead them into a reaction while pretending you didn’t. Uncomfortable hilarity ensues.

Tempting Death

Stop looking both ways before crossing the street, stop using seat belts, stop all of life’s little preventive measures for your safety. Alternatively, find a street with a dozen stop signs in a row and drive your car down it at 200 kmph without stoping at any of them.

Person, Person, Walking Advertisement

The goal is to find the most people in a row without running into somebody that is wearing clothes or carrying objects that have a name brand or logo prominently displayed.So you go by walking on campus and you say “person” over and over again until you run into someone wearing a giant Nike shirt (for instance), then you start over again.

Oil Crisis in Action

The goal is to find the most cars in a row that have just one person in them. Double points for Suburbans or SUVs. Once you find a car that has two people or more, you must start over.

Double Take

The aim of the game is to make people do double takes. The person that gets the most in one day wins. So far I’ve always won as I’ve never shared the aim of the game with anybody.

Oomph maximization projekt

Get Twelve Hugs and a Laugh Today.

Intelligence in Inappropriate Places projekt:

What intelligence is there in places you’d least suspect? Let’s look in bathroom stalls and random walls to find thoughts to live by for one day.

You’re never going to guess who, trust me

Come up behind a total stranger (extra points if they’re talking in a group) and cover their eyes. They will try to guess who you are. After a minute, uncover their eyes and when they ask “do I know you?”Say, “of course not, what would be the fun of the game if you did?”

98% Fewer

While not getting arrested:

prevent humans from acting in such a way as to cause pain to other creatures
not help humans survive when I am able to do so at will
find a way to eliminate humans that is socially acceptable (or create a coalition of people whose purpose is to eliminate humans, and is accepted by society)
sterilize humans.

Nerd Heckling

While listening to a serious speech you disagree with, shout out random (or stastically inconsequential) comments like, “Your mom and I did the 1000101!” or “The question to life, the universe, and everything is how many times over does your speech suck!” or “you roll 3d20 and get snake eyes, oooh, pwned!”

An Audience of Two

After e-mails, the previous messages in a thread are usually included. Most people just skip past it, thinking they already read the thread. This is where my anti-socialness and constant need to write to entertain myself pays off.

Whenever I start to notice that the tail-end of a conversation has become rather lengthy (hereby defined as messages averaging 40+ kb), I start to tweak it just to see if anyone will notice.

Example:

2: dancing LOL

1: What r u doin’????

2: I ate a big sub and it gave me gas. How FUN!!1! OMG

The trick is to keep the length and end of the messages about the same.

Extreme Analogies

Every time somebody says a qualifier, respond with the formula of “yeah, but not as [qualifier] as [random, absurdly complicated extreme].”
For instance:

“That was uncomfortable.”
“Not as uncomfortable as a 400 pound man doing the tango naked with a Mother Superior in front of sixteen primary school children!”

Random Hurtful Hypotheticals

An idea for a new game came to me while posing an obscenely hurtful thought experiment to my mate over the question of trust. The game is thus:

2: Imagine you realized one day that you were terrible in bed and had been for years and that every encounter you had had left the woman feeling worse than before, but nobody said anything to not hurt your feelings. Then you found out that they’d told every one of your friends this behind your back and they’d filmed an encounter and
giftwrapped it and were planning on giving it to your mother for Christmas as a
prank. How would you feel?
1: Pretty damn awful. Why?
2: No reason, I just thought I’d ask.
1: Oh.

Random Intelligence

The point is for me to provide you with five to ten new (to me) facts, figures, or stories. These need not be particularly rare, important, or obvious, but interesting and true. The goal is to cover the huge gulf that is my ignorance of the world around me with a few random facts that I can throw out if I ever have to discuss these in public.

Mean juxtaposition

Combine two extreme opposites in a list in the hopes that the person you’re talking to (preferrably on IM) will respond to the first and expected last as one… only to realize too late that they were just jerks.

Example:

2: So, I got a new puppy today…
1: That’s nice.
2: And a 100 % on my Final exam…
1: cool, cool.
2: And I got a new girlfriend and a new DVD player…
2: And I found out I have two weeks left to live.
1: Congrats
1: Wait. No! Sorry. I’m talking about the gf and DVD player.
2: Bastard.
2: Oh.. sorry.
2: You’re still a bastard, though… jackass.

Sayonara Small Talk

When speaking with someone you barely know, ask coarse, random, insightful, or personal questions as if you’d known them for years. The goal is to eliminate all ‘small talk’ from the face of the planet.

1: So, how was your weekend?
2: Good. And what’s your greatest fear? Also, do you believe in the gods? And how big is your penis?

You know what you should do?

The game is to give advice that will, if followed, produce the most awkward and objectively hilarious situation possible. The goal is to keep a straight face while giving it and give it interchangeably with regular, good advice.

New Year’s Resolutions

18 New Year’s Resolutions, each of which has 20 days (about three weeks) to be completed. The goal is to have them be measurable statements and complete as many as possible in the year.

Auf wiedensehen small talk

Instead of avoiding small talk, you continue it– in staccato. Here’s an example. Remember, the aim of the game is to keep the person as uncomfortable as possible for as long as possible without them realizing that you are enjoying their discomfort:

Andy: So how are you today?
Pixel: I’m good. Just here, working.. You know.
Andy: Yeah. Work sucks.
Pixel: Yeah, sometimes..
Andy: Well…
Pixel: Sometimes it’s not bad though.
Andy: I know what you mean. Everything has its good parts.
Pixel: Oh, yeah. I completely agree.
Andy: ….
Pixel: Totally.
Andy: Well, I gotta–
Pixel: Like, whenever I don’t have to do what the boss-man says, I’m happy.
Andy: Yeah…
Pixel:
Andy: Anyway, I have work to do.
Pixel: Yeah, me too.
Andy: Well–
Pixel: Work sucks.
Andy: Yeah, sometimes..

You let the conversation wane into a stand-still, then, just as they try to get out of it— You zoom back into the conversation and suck them in with you!

The Syllabus Hunt

Participants have seven days to collect as many syllabi as they can. They may sit in on the classes, or e-mail the professors for them, but they may not print out syllabi from school Web sites (unless they are registered for the class).

Rules:

No sharing syllabi, nor borrowing or stealing syllabi from other people.
No revealing the nature of the game.
No one can suspect that you are not actually in the class.
You may not actually lie to anyone. If anyone asks you your name, you must be honest, even if it violates rule 2.
Violating rule 2 or rule 4 disqualifies you, so try not to be asked any questions

The Hidden Artist

Show up before class every day and draw something amusing on the chalkboard. Then leave for a few minutes and come back when there are other people in the class. You lose if your drawing is acknowledged or erased throughout the class period. Winner is the one with the most amusing and elaborate drawing.

You may never get caught.
Bringing your own colored chalk means extra points.
No revealing the nature of the game.
You may not actually lie to anyone. If anyone asks you if you did it, you must be honest, even if it violates rule 2.
Violating rule 2 or rule 3 disqualifies you, so try not to be asked any questions.

Prospie Week Games

I’m making a list of things all of the current graduate students could do while the prospies are here. The winner will be whoever does most.

Who can make the most Facebook friends with prospies.
Who can get the most prospies to hug them.
Who can get into a drinking contest with a prospie (and win).
Who can get into a philosophical argument with a prospie and make him concede the point.
Who can get a prospie to tell them a secret (extra points if it is a member of the opposite sex).
Get honesty from a Super Prospie (a prospie with multiple acceptances to top-ranked programs. Honesty would be something along the lines of “I just came here for the free trip.”).

Euphemizer

Come up with a nickname for your naughty parts that is also jargon you hear in your work/field/profession. I call mine the “Nomological Dangler.” What’s yours?

Spot the Logical Fallacy

Get together with a group and play a drinking game with logical fallacies using the sheet from this post.

Here are the rules:

The first person to spot a logical fallacy must exclaim it, but only AFTER the speaker commits the fallacy.
The winner is the person who catches the most logical fallacies.
After the debate, a discussion on psychological, rhetorical, and propagandistic techniques will commence, but nobody is allowed to have a debate over the issues, unless there is a direct appeal to their logical consequences.
No headbutting is allowed.

Unnecessary Qualifiers

Here’s a fun game: in a regular conversation, throw out qualifiers which raise more questions than they answer. Example:

My day was fine. Unlike some people, I didn’t accidentally have my fly down all day.

I haven’t ever been caught cheating on my girlfriend.

I don’t have herpes anymore. No, I don’t have herpes outbreaks.

I was really good last week: I didn’t pick up any hookers.

I didn’t stab any hobos… last night.

Get it? These are all true statements, but the unnecessary qualifiers completely change their meaning. You try!

Friend, I hardly know thee

Pick a friend you know really well then spend an entire evening pretending to be shocked by their normal behaviors as if you didn’t really know them at all.

Example using my friend Bre:

“Wait, you’re drinking? I thought your extremely religious convictions would be against that!

…You’re not religious? Oh, man, so you’re not going to thank me for erasing all of your Pearl Jam music?

… oh, wow. I’m so sorry. Please don’t be mad: I’m afraid you’ll hurt yourself or others!”