Brandon Yunker

Correspondent

Berry Lounge. Where on a Monday night you can interact with Mafia thugs, doctors, oracles, vampires and possibly even the great Cthulhu. It isn’t merely fantasy. It’s fun.

Every Monday evening, at 9:00 p.m. in Berry Lounge (located in the Honors Village), a group of students gather to play “The Lounge,” a version of the party game known as Mafia (or as it is sometimes referred to, Werewolf). Students from the Honors Village and other parts of campus gather for an evening of shenanigans, strategy and everything in between. 

“You get to have fun with friends and crazy things happen,” said Alex Gregory, a senior in electrical engineering who has started a Kickstarter campaign to bring the game to a wider audience. “You get to lie and manipulate the group. It offers a different dynamic than any other game.”

The Mafia party game was created in the 1980s by Dmitry Davidoff and it became popular in colleges and schools around Europe, eventually spreading to the United States. In the 1990s, Andrew Plotkin developed a version of the game using a Werewolf theme as opposed to a Mafia theme, which led the game to become popular among science fiction writers. Mafia is a social deduction game that exists in many forms with varying sets of rules and roles.

The game typically has 12-19 players. In “Monday Night Mafia,” the number of games played on a single evening varies. According to Gregory, the second game of the evening will have the largest number of people playing.  

The general rules of the game, as explained on the Kickstarter site, are as follows: Players assume the role as one of the members of a town. One person assumes the role of Narrator, explaining the events of the game and overseeing it. Some players are members of the Mafia, looking to exert their power and influence on the town by eliminating those who oppose them. Some players are townspeople, looking to get rid of the Mafiosi and bad guys who are plaguing the town. Or some players will assume one of 22 different third party roles.

A night phase begins the game as the narrator hands out cards containing roles to the players who are “sleeping.” The players will then look at their roles and go back to sleep. Certain roles are then awakened by the Narrator in a particular order, and use their powers upon other members of the town. For example, members of the Mafia silently choose a target to “kill,” eliminating that player from the game. 

When all of the necessary roles have been awakened, the day round begins. The Narrator will announce what has happened during the night and the players are allowed to freely discuss the game while coming up with ideas about who is in the Mafia. After a few minutes, the narrator will ask the players to nominate those who are believed to be in the Mafia, and the defendants get a 20 second defense.

If the townspeople reach a majority vote on a candidate, they are killed off and sent to the Morgue with the other deceased players. If a majority is not reached, the next night round begins. The game is won when one of the roles reaches a win condition. 

According to Gregory, The Lounge differs from other mafia games because it puts an emphasis on third party roles. The game contains 108 cards and 82 roles, ranging from doctor, pope and sheriff to serial killer, voodoo lady and ninja. Each role has certain abilities that can benefit players, hurt other players, or cause chaos within the game.

According to Bryan Allen, a senior in electrical engineering and longtime player, The Lounge allows people to come in and be creative with the roles they play. Some roles allude to pop culture, including Captain Jack Sparrow and Dr. Zoidberg.

“Sometimes we have themed nights. We’ve had a Gilligan’s Island night, a Harry Potter night,” said Allen. “It keeps it fresh.”

Allen began playing his freshman year in 2009 and Gregory has been playing the last two years. The game started off as an Honors Village event but according to Allen, spiraled out of their hands and into the hearts of the devoted players of the game. 

Students who left the village continued to play the game, and while it isn’t an official Honors event anymore, The Lounge is strongly recognized by the Quadlings of the Honors Village; its presence undeniable. 

The Lounge is not merely a game, it is an experience to be had. It is an exercise in logic, strategy and socialization with a flow of fun, frenetic energy that absorbs its players, leaving them coming back for more.