9 Best Drinking Games For Making Friends in a Hostel

Drinking games are one of the best ways to make friends in a hostel. They're a fun way to break the ice, be social and get to know people during your travels. You may already know a few of these games (especially if you went to uni and Ring of Fire or Beer Pong became a Wednesday night ritual). And these games are perfect to play in hostels for the same reason that they're so popular in Fresher's week. After a couple of drinks, it’s way easier to open up and get that dose of courage you need before partying with complete strangers. Isn’t making friends what travel is all about?

Just remember not to get too cray cray, safety first! This is our round up of the top 10 drinking games to play in our hostels…

RING OF FIRE

Most people know this card game, it’s a university Fresher favourite. The rules are lengthy but once you’ve played a couple of times it will become second nature. All you need to get started is pack of cards, a large glass for the middle of the table and your own drink. Place the cards in a circle upside down around the glass. Going round in a circle, each person chooses a card – and each card has a rule to follow – but be careful not to break the circle (or you drink).

The cards dictate everything whether its a new rule, a quick game or who is to drink. For example, if you pick a King, the rule is to pour a little bit of your drink into the glass in the middle. The unlucky person to pick up the last King has to drink the whole glass made up of a concoction of everyone’s alcohol.

Here are the full Ring of Fire rules

NEVER HAVE I EVER

A classic that never gets old. Most of you will know the rules already – come up with a “Never Have I Ever (done something that you’ve never done)” and whoever HAS done it, take a drink. It could be anything from “Never Have I Ever been to America” to “Never Have I Ever been sick on someone’s shoe”. This one is definitely an ice breaker as you get to know people very quickly. Just remember, you don’t have to admit anything if you don’t want to! Your new friends don’t need to know everything already…

BEER PONG

If you’ve never played Beer Pong before, where have you been?! This is one of our personal favourites at St Christopher’s – we love it so much you can even hire a table with your new friends at Belushi’s.

Before the game begins, each team arranges 10 cups into a triangle formation and each cup must be a third full of beer. A member of each team then alternately aim a ping pong ball at one of the cups on the other end of the table, not allowing the ball to bounce. If your aim is on point and you throw it into one of the cups, then a member of the opposite team has to down it. The aim is to be the team that gets the ball into all 10 cups first. It can get rowdy…

See the full list of official rules here

WOULD YOU RATHER

This game always goes down well once you have a couple of drinks down you. It’s pretty simple too. All you have to do is ask ‘Would you Rather?” with two options. It could be anything, but the key is to make the questions hard with two unbearable scenarios you must choose between. For inspiration, use this quiz. The people who answer the less popular option have to drink. Majority rules!

Try playing with these crazy questions…

RIDE THE BUS

Ride the Bus is a great game to kick off pre-drinks and get everyone in the mood for a drink. You’ll need a deck of cards, a beer and someone willing to be the dealer. For stage 1, each player is dealt 4 cards, but with each card comes a question and if you get it wrong, you drink. Then for stage 2, cards are arranged face down in a pyramid formation to which players take it in turn to turn over and match their cards to those in the pyramid, handing out drinks as they go. Stage 3 battles it out between 2 players. Check out this YouTube video for the full set of rules.

TWENTY ONE

This is a quick fire game that you can play 10 times over without even thinking about it. The aim of the game is easy: NOT to say the number 21. Going round in a circle, each person can say either 1, 2 or 3 numbers, consecutive to the number that the person before ended on. Start at number 1 and play until someone is forced to say the number 21, and then they have to drink.

ROXANNE

The easiest drinking game ever. You know the song ‘Roxanne’ by The Police? Split your group in two, and every time one team hears the word “Roxanne” they all stand up and drink, and everytime the other team hears “put on a red light”, they then all stand up and drink. Trust us, this will get you drinking a lot…

SHTAR

We learnt this one in a hostel bar back in the day, and it’s stuck with us ever since!

There are 4 different actions to remember:

• “Shtar”: Shout “shtar” as you swipe your right hand down and to the left. This passes an action onto the person to your left.

• “Return”: Pull your elbows backwards and thrust your hips forward as you shout “return”. This passes an action back to the person on the right and play carries on to the right.

• “Ariba”: Put your hands in the air and lift up one of your knees (karate style) while shouting “ariba”. This skips a person depending on which way play is going.

• “Pow”: Put both your hands together and point to anyone in the circle while shouting “pow”. This passes an action to that person who then carries on round to the left.

The game always starts with the ‘Shtar’ action, which always goes to the left. The aim is to pick up speed and whoever messes up or hesitates has to drink, then go into the middle of the circle and say a “Never Have I Ever” to get everyone else drinking, too! Once you get the hang of the actions, the game speeds up super fast and messing up becomes more and more likely…

FLIP CUP

This one works best with a large, even number of players – we’d say at least 6. Split into 2 teams and each person needs a plastic cup half full of beer on the table in front of them.

Starting at one end of the table, the first person on each team downs their drink. When the cup is empty, they put it at the edge of the table (hanging off it slightly) and using one hand only they must try to flip it so it lands face down on the table. Once you’ve managed to flip it successfully, the next player can start their turn and so on. Whichever team finishes first is the winner of the flip cup race!

Want more? 

Here are 20 ways to break the ice in a hostel