how to play your own game of survivor
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A few months ago, my good friend, renowned climate scientist Dr. Mika Tosca, reached out to me with a request. She said: I’m turning 40 in a few months. Do you think it would be fun if we rented a big house and played a three-day game of Survivor? And if so, would you be the Jeff Probst?
Reader, what do you think I said? Of course I said yes. Below is how we played our game, along with some tips and tricks for your own homegrown game of Survivor, Applebee’s not included.
Friday
We arrived at our 9-bed, 3-bath Michigan lake house late Friday afternoon after battling Kamala’s DNC traffic on our way out of Chicago. (Did we all decide to vote for Jill Stein after sitting in standstill traffic on Lake Shore Drive for a half hour? I’ll leave it a mystery.) Getting to the house was less stressful because Mika assigned bedrooms ahead of time (we are all gay and have seen enough Real Housewives to know that 99% of fights in the gay community start when people don’t get the bedroom they want!!!).
Prior to the trip, we split our 12 players into 2 tribes of 6: an all-gay tribe and a tribe of trans people + women. There was one main Signal chat for all players and 1 private chat for each tribe. The only rule concerning phones was that you could not screenshot a private chat and send it to someone else - all scheming had to be based on hearsay and trust, like in the Cold War. (Fortunately, everyone adhered to this rule, because it’s basically impossible to enforce.)
Friday Night: We started out by playing a game of Memory Match. I placed 48 pictures of famous Survivor players face-down on a table and each team took turns flipping over 2 photos, trying to match them; each match earned one point. The gay tribe, The Old Mimis, won by a few points, which sent the trans tribe, The Pinkos, into an early tailspin. I was worried that this challenge would be too simple, but it turned out to be kind of the perfect way to ease people into the game. Anyway, there was no Tribal Council Friday night, just scheming and enjoying the lake.
I should also mention that hidden immunity idols were a big part of this game. I planned it so that two idols were in play at any given time, and on Friday I hid one idol in one of the house’s bedrooms and offered a clue to the second idol to the winning team over Signal. (The clue I gave was “1 8 26 32 19 8 14 38”; can you crack it?)
Saturday
Saturday Morning: When I was planning the challenges for this game, it came down to two questions: What have I always seen on Survivor and wanted to recreate in real life? and What can we conceivably do on a real-life budget? (Obviously I wanted to build a Simmotion machine but like, in what world?) So we kept it simple for the first elimination challenge and played a game I not-clunkily-at-all called Idol Knockoff Game. We had 1 player from each tribe face off against each other at a time; each player held a small stand that had a plastic dinosaur on it and had to knock their opponent’s dino to the ground first. The Old Mimis won, sending the Pinkos to Tribal Council, where they voted out two of their members.
Saturday Afternoon: Around lunch, we merged the tribes and entered our first individual elimination challenge. This one was inspired by my favorite challenges on Survivor: the endurance challenge. In this Water Bucket Endurance Challenge, each player held a full bucket of water over their head for as long as they could. After 10 minutes, all remaining players had to stand on one foot. God, it was fun to be Seth Probst for this, because it ended in a standoff, just like on the show! I got to say things like “Dig deep!” and “It’s all gonna come down to who wants it more!” I wasn’t wearing khaki shorts but in that moment I was, in my soul.
One of the Old Mimis won, which painted an early target on his back. Interestingly - maybe just because we were only there for a few days, maybe because of the social makeup of our group - most of the gameplay and alliances fell along the original gay vs. trans tribe lines. Anyway, about 30 minutes after the challenge, we had Tribal Council, where I tried to ask questions like Papa Jeff would and then two people were voted out.
Saturday Night: Prior to this challenge, I sent a survey for everyone to fill out, with questions like Who is the best dancer? Who has the juiciest lil’ ass? And Who is the grubbiest little coke goblin? Then, we played Touchy Subjects: I asked everyone to guess who the most common answer was for each question, and everyone received a Skittle for guessing correctly. They could then drop their Skittle in another player’s bucket; three Skittles and that person was out. Mika won! Two people were voted out at Tribal Council.
Sunday
Sunday Morning: We were down to our final six players, and Sunday morning’s Tribal Council was the last time that a hidden immunity idol could be played. We did a Water Sponge Race, which basically involved running from a bucket full of water to an empty bucket and filling it to a designated line using only a sponge. (This was the closest we could really get to an obstacle course, given that the lake house didn’t have much of a backyard.) Mika won again, and two people voted out brought us to our Final 4.
Sunday Afternoon: This was the challenge I was most worried about, but it was a hoot. Basically, each participant was given dried spaghetti and marshmallows and told to Build The Tallest Tower they could in 10 minutes. Some of the structures that were built defied all logic and reason. (Have you ever seen what happens to spiders’ webs when they ingest different drugs? It was a lot like that.) At the end, the winner immediately chose who they wanted to kick out, and we went directly into our Final Tribal Council. Mika was kicked out and three members of the Old Mimis squared off against each other, defending themselves against claims of transphobia and dishonesty, with one of them emerging the winner of the game due in part to their organized and passionate opening speech.
Then we went home and slept for 100 hours.
Here are some little things that helped make the game extra-fun:
Drugs. Look, you can have a good time without drugs, it’s not a necessity. But, given the short timespan we were playing in, narcotics played a role in mimicking the kind of instability and irrationality that comes with hunger on Survivor. I never could have predicted that one player would take a tab of acid before Tribal Council and become so paranoid that she would convince Mika to play her idol incorrectly! Who could have foreseen that another player would be force to sprint on ketamine, thus blowing their shot at immunity? Etc.
Lighting and music. It helped a ton that Mika’s friend group comprises artists in a wide variety of fields - visual art, writing, music, lighting, etc. Whenever I needed music for a challenge or Tribal Council, someone was quick to play something appropriate, and one lighting designer created a beautifully atmospheric Tribal Council area that mimicked the campfire vibe of the show. Sitting down amidst the red-orange lights with tribal drums in the background really kickstarted the feeling of, Oh shit, something is about to go down.
Filming confessionals. We taped Mika’s second phone to the wall where people were casting their votes and instructed them to say something if they felt like it. The resulting footage was absolute gold, whether it was one player speaking entirely in Survivor-speak (“it’s either you or me”) or another player revealing that he was sending a rival home because of a shitty drink he mixed. If you’re running your own Survivor game I really urge you not to skip this step.
Tribal Council. We decided to have Tribal Council within 20-30 minutes of each challenge. This worked well because it not only mimicked the pacing they do on the show but also because it then gave everyone a few hours of downtime (and scheming) before the next challenge.
Rewards. We didn’t offer rewards and that’s my one major regret. I think every challenge would have been 200% funnier if everyone was feverishly competing for a spoonful of peanut butter or a room-temperature burger from Applebee’s. Next time!
Clipboard. I felt like a camp counselor again wearing my little hat and holding a clipboard. If you’re a Type A bitch like me, holding a clipboard is one of the purest highs on Earth.
That’s it - I got nothing for ya. Grab your stuff, head back to camp.
Oh my GOD Seth, this sounds so fun! Now I’m wishing there were drugs on Survivor!