Looking for ideas for wholesome bachelor party fun
My husband and I have a bachelor party weekend coming up for two of our friends (they’re a gay couple). Rather than having the kind of raucous, adult adventure that people commonly associate with “bachelor party”, we’re looking for more wholesome, nerdy stuff.
For example: we’ve already got an escape room lined up, and I’ll be bringing the full set of Jackbox games. What I’m looking for is other recommendations for party games and activities, especially ones that work with people who aren’t super familiar with one another. Everyone there will know the grooms, but we don’t all know each other.
Also, games/activities should be relatively simple to learn and play. There will be drinking.
Recommendations don’t have to be entirely clean or family-friendly by the way (we’re not opposed to something like Cards Against Humanity, for example), but we’re not a group that likes particularly raunchy stuff.
When my college buddy got married, his best man rented out a theater to play videogames. Playing Mario Kart and Mario Party and Smash on a theater screen is a great experience. I'd recommend that. It works for most videogame setups really.
You're telling me I can just rent a theater and they'll hook up my games to play on the movie screen for me??
Edit: I did a quick Google, looks like Cinemark charges $275 for 2 hours. Not a great deal, imo, but probably worth it for a bachelor party. AMC and Regal didn't seem to have options for videogames, just private movies. But individual theaters might let you do it depending on the manager if you ask.
We went to an Alamo draft house. I don't know how much it cost, but I do know we had to spend a certain amount on food and what not. It's worth it if you do it for a group if you can find a theater
A friend who was a nerdy guy into engineering and hacking and whatnot had his bachelor party at a maker space where we collectively designed and plasma cut steel centerpieces to hold flowers on some of the tables at the wedding. It was cool and fun and different. The point being - we did something this groom was very into and we all were there for it.
Just a different way to think about it maybe?
I'm sure it'll be great - there's already a ton of great ideas here on the thread.
When I was surprised by a load of my friends turning up at my house to have a stag party that I didn't ask for, we played a load of Spaceteam which is easy to learn, great fun and can be played just about anywhere. I'd also give a mention to Keep Talking And Nobody Explodes although that's probably one for earlier in the night before too many beers have gone down. The latter is particularly good if the bomb handler is wearing a VR headset but works fine with a screen nobody else can see.
boosted for keep talking and nobody explodes, played that game a bunch during the vr release with several buddies, printed out manuals for everyone and had a giant whiteboard and a bunch of markers. Once your team can get defusal down to a system, it's an awesome experience
Fishbowl (we do 5 papers per person) - https://funattic.com/how-to-play-fishbowl-game/
If drinking we play someone has to take a sip to pass to a new paper
Thumper - https://www.drinkinggames.beer/thumper.html
Catch Phrase - you can get it as an app on your phone (I use Phrase Party and think it’s the best one). Like fishbowl, 2 teams of every other person. Then each person goes and gets one word then passes the device. You can say anything but the word to get your team to guess the word. The team stuck with it when the clock ends loses that round.
Activities not games: axe throwing, go karting, mini golf, regular golf, hiking, scavenger hunt, paint nite, laser tag. Homemade obstacle course/olympics: spoon/egg race, dizzy bat, flip cup, bean bag toss, …
Lawn games: cornhole, ladder toss, polish horseshoes.
You could cook like everyone does a make your own pizza night.
Great list! You sound fun. I came to offer a comedy club - did this for a sober bachelor party once and it was a riot.
Ah yes comedy club is a great idea. Improv if you have one around is a fun party atmosphere, and some will “highlight” the bachelor if you give them a heads up.
+1 for the go karting.
Me and a good friend did this for his stag do, and the karting venue also had laser tag that we did as well. Was a good day out.
Even better if you can find a competitive high-speed go-kart track. Standard go karts are fun, but it's a whole other thing in the 50mph ones that people compete with. 3 races is gonna be enough for anyone.
Thank you for finally teaching me the name of Fishbowl! We play it every Christmas at a family friends' house, always a crowdpleaser. Especially when people get a bit tipsy and can't remember anything that was on the papers.
For the most organized bachelor party I've been in, the best man sent out a checklist to all the attendees with a couple options for a full day. We ended up racing in an indoor mini Indy, and took over an indoor paintball range. Good times.
Video game decathlon type deal:
Set up a few TV's with a few different systems, each with one or two games that most people have played or that fit different video game disciplines. Hold a bracket competition where you rotate from system to system and compete for ranking. Then crown one winner overall?
I had a friend do a “manly” self care type of day which I thought turned out really well.
It started with shaves, beard trims, and massages at a barber shop they rented out. After, it was 18 holes of golf and a lunch at the club.
Then they rented out a room to sample cigars and whisky followed up with a dinner at a steakhouse. It was then onto a pub and billiards until everyone filtered out over time.
Recently had a similar combined bach party for a few friends with a mix of people who didn't know each other too well - one of the early games we played was trivia about the couple. It was a great way to break the ice with something fun and a way to get to know people in a group. For example, one was "name 3 people here that were roommates with 'Tyler'," - I was roommates with him but didn't realize 'Jeff' was too! Then I had something in common with 'Jeff' that we can connect and talk about.
Ooooh, this sounds so fun! My go to for parties with unacquainted guests is to have folks meet and greet in the kitchen. Making pizzas can be a great one. Having a selection of ingredients and sauces lets your guests run wild with their creativity and you'll end up with a huge array of pizzas. Big innovations in food tech mean that there are great vegan options for cheese as well now. We'll often get enough dough for to let everyone pair off into groups of 2 or 3 and then pick time slots. The appointed group will make their creation and whack it in the oven, when it comes out they cut it into enough pieces for most people to try and then the next group is up. This lets the party continue as usual with minor pauses for the unveiling of the new pizza and let's people compare and contrasts the pizzas (so games remain uninterrupted). I find it's a great ice breaker and takes minimal prep on your end to get the ingredients/dough.
Another fun option is a murder mystery party. You can still do the games throughout the party but there can be an overarching game of the murder mystery throughout. People dress up and get into character which is always fun. The murder mystery usually has 3-4 moments where something has happened and otherwise the party continues uninterrupted.
Paintball. Rafting. Concert. Racetrack.
Anomia is one of my favorite party games, and I think it'd work great for this. the rules are trivial to learn and it doesn't require any knowledge about the other players.
Superfight is essentially Cards Against Humanity with the raunch turned down and the nerdy (and arguments) turned way up, which fits your bill perfectly.
You can even go crazy with it like my friend group did and turn it into a prompt generator for simple tabletop RPG sessions.
Update: Thanks for all the suggestions, everyone! Lots of great stuff here.
Also, a follow-up question: we got the idea to run our own Taskmaster game for the group (which we are delighted about -- my husband is kind of a Greg Davies, and I'm very much an Alex Horne). If anyone has any suggested tasks that we can do, let us know!
We're looking specifically for tasks that aren't too heavy on the supplies/setup requirements and that aren't going to cause any damage/mess to the place where we're staying. Also, for logistics' sake, most of these will be live tasks done concurrently, but we might have a few where people conduct them separately.
A few example tasks we're thinking of:
We welcome any other ideas for good tasks!
Red Flags is a funny party game that's as easy to pick up as Cards Against Humanity:
https://www.grimrabbit.com/products/red-flags-game