Group camping trips are always a good time, but they can get even better when you add some games into the mix. Of course, you don’t want to bore your squad. If you’re ready to ramp up the fun factor, you’ll need to pick the best camping games possible to keep everyone entertained.
8 great camping games for adults are:
- Two Truths and a Lie
- Sardines
- Wink Murder
- Enemy Lines
- Who Am I?
- Frostbite
- Psychiatrist
- Ghosts
Of course, every group is different. The best camping game for you will depend on the number of people in your group, your personal interests, and how well you know each other. Read on to learn about the top games out there so you can make your next camping trip one for the history books!
Table of Contents
What Makes A Good Camping Game For Adults?
First and foremost, adult camping games need to be fun. They’re an instrument we use to pass the time in a pleasurable manner, and they’re a great way to bond with friends. You’ll recognize a good game immediately once you play, because it will give you a sense of satisfaction even if you lose.
An adult camping game should be tailored to fit adult interests. This doesn’t mean it has to be scandalous. It could simply involve a high level of activity or deep critical thinking. Of course, it could involve raunchier elements if your group prefers!
A good game should also involve variance, critical thinking, or humor. As long as at least one of these elements is present, you’re in for a good time. However, everyone is different. Some enjoy more in-depth psychological games, while others prefer laughter to be the main focus. Luckily, you’ll find games on our list below that fit all tastes!
8 Great Camping Games For Adults
1. Two Truths And A Lie
Required Players: 4+ | Difficulty: Easy | Special Equipment: None
You may have heard about Two Truths and a Lie. The concept of this game is simple, and gameplay is easy and straightforward. Each member of the group states three “facts” about themselves. Two statements are true, and one is a lie.
The other members of the group must guess which of the statements is a lie. At the end of the session, whoever has guessed correctly the most times wins the game. Games can last as long as you like, from just a few minutes to several hours. Some have been known to play Two Truths and a Lie on and off for days on end.
Get To Know Your Group
Two Truths and a Lie is the perfect icebreaker to use in groups where you’re just getting to know each other. It provides insight into different group members’ personalities and life experiences, bonding everyone together through the sharing of personal information.
In order to excel at the game, players need to draw upon their most outrageous experiences. If you state two vanilla facts about yourself and one ridiculous lie, everyone will be able to easily discern the lie. But if you weave in your weirdest moments, it’s much harder to pick out the lie. The game also gets more interesting and much more entertaining.
Perfect For The Campfire
This game is perfect for the end of the day when everyone is sitting around the fire toasting marshmallows or having a few drinks. It keeps the energy flowing but is relaxing and stress-free. Two Truths and a Lie requires no special equipment, note-taking, or moving around, so you can play it any time you have a few minutes to spare.
2. Sardines
Required Players: 8+ | Difficulty: Moderate | Special Equipment: None
Sardines is a fresh twist on the classic hide-and-seek game we’re all so familiar with. With this one, you’ll be playing in reverse. Instead of everyone hiding while one person seeks them out, Sardines requires one person to hide while everyone seeks them out.
One by one, each member of the group will eventually find the hidden person. When they discover the hiding place, they don’t scream or shout. Instead, they join with the original hidden member and hide alongside him or her. Eventually, the group begins to look like a tin of sardines squished together in one hiding spot as they strive to remain unseen by the remaining members.
Good For Big Groups
The more people you have, the more fun it is to play Sardines. It gets incredibly comical trying to keep a big group quiet, and there are sure to be some funny mishaps as everyone tries to stay out of sight in a space that’s rapidly becoming too small for them!
As a camping game, Sardines is optimal. The great outdoors provides the perfect hunting ground, with plenty of interesting places to hide. And because there’s so much space to spread out, you can welcome as many people as you want. Sometimes, people from neighboring campsites will want to join in after hearing the raucous fun.
Play This Way
It’s a good idea to set a physical boundary line for Sardines. You don’t want members to wander off too far, as getting lost isn’t very fun. Instead, form a map with boundaries marked by natural objects. For example, you could instruct players not to go north of the giant pine tree, or to keep to the left of the parking lot.
Sardines is great to play outside during the day. It’s an active game requiring a lot of movement so it’s perfect for high-energy hours. However, you can also play during dusk and even in the dark if you feel safe doing so. This increases the difficulty, but it also ramps up the fun because using your ears and the limited sight by a flashlight can make the game much more interesting.
3. Wink Murder
Required Players: 6+ | Difficulty: Moderate | Special Equipment: None
Wink Murder is one of those classic games that gets adopted quickly during any camping trip. It begins with everyone sitting around in a circle with their eyes shut. One person in the group is selected to be the “Godfather.” The Godfather walks around the circle and silently taps one person on the head. This person is the “Murderer.”
Nobody should know who the Murderer is except the Godfather. Once the Murderer is chosen, the night continues as normal. The conversation flows freely, and everyone is having a good time. Until they’re brutally murdered, that is! The Murderer kills by winking. If he or she winks at you, you die and you’re out of the game.
However, the wink is done subtly so that other members of the group don’t see it. If they don’t know who winked, they won’t know who the Murderer is. For the Murderer, the goal is to kill everyone before they are found out. For the rest of the group, the goal is to discover who the Murderer is before everyone gets murdered.
This Game Keeps On Giving
Wink Murder is a good time that doesn’t have to stop when the night ends. If the Murderer isn’t discovered by the end of the evening, the game can continue throughout the following day. Players can dip in and out whenever the vibe is right. Wink Murder can last for days in large groups, and everyone is shocked when they discover who the Murderer really is!
With Wink Murder, it’s fun to get theatrical. If you’re the one being murdered, fall to the ground dramatically. Clutch your heart, scream, and moan to add more production value to the game. You’ll get a good laugh out of everyone as you entertain the group with your acting skills!
4. Enemy Lines
Required Players: 12 | Difficulty: Hard | Special Equipment: 12 Treasures
When you’re camping without the distraction of cell phones, internet, or video games, you need an engaging and entertaining game to pass the day. Enemy Lines fits the bill perfectly. This is an active game requiring an active imagination to go along with it, but you’ll get to reap some seriously fun rewards if you learn to play.
You need a big group for this one. Twelve people works best, but you could play with ten if you’re in a pinch. Players split up to form two teams of equal number. Each team must produce six “treasures,” which can be any object that’s easy to pick up and carry. Lighters, tennis balls, granola bars – anything small will work.
Making The Field
To play the game properly you should have a big, flat area. It can be a clearing in the woods, a sandy riverbank, or you can borrow the sports court at your campground. This will be the field area. You’ll divide the area in half, with each team getting a designated side.
At the far end of each side will be the “prison.” You will place the other team’s treasures in your prison, effectively holding them hostage. The object of the game is for each team to reclaim the stolen treasures and bring them back over to the other side.
You’ll attack from your own side, advancing across enemy lines to try and reach your treasures while dodging enemy teammates to try and make it across unscathed. Alternatively, you can sit back and play defense on your own side of the field, making sure the enemy doesn’t break their own treasures out of your prison.
Hostages
As soon as you cross enemy lines from your own side, you can be tagged by an enemy team member. When this happens, you must go with them to their prison and sit with your team’s treasures. If a member of your own team reaches the prison without being tagged, they can choose to release you.
They could also choose not to release you, instead taking one of the treasures back with them. The first team to reclaim all their tagged members and all their treasures wins the game. Because members from both sides can constantly be imprisoned, this game takes a while to complete.
Expect to spend a few hours playing the game and don’t be surprised if you work up a sweat doing it! With everyone running around wildly trying to tag other members and get to the treasures, the exertion adds an extra level of excitement to the whole activity. Not to mention it will help you work up an appetite for the nightly barbecue!
5. Who Am I?
Required Players: 3+ | Difficulty: Moderate | Special Equipment: Sticky Notes & Pen
Who Am I is a true classic. With this one, everyone in the group writes down the name of a famous person on a sticky note. Then, they attach the note to another group member’s forehead, without informing said person of the name written on the note. The person with the note on their forehead becomes the “Star.”
Everyone interacts with the Star as though they really are the famous character written on the note. They make comments, jokes, or simply poke fun. Meanwhile, the Star can ask questions regarding their identity, but they must be yes or no questions. The object of the game is for the Star to guess which name is on their forehead.
This is a perfect icebreaker game, as it can provide a great way to learn about other people and their critical thinking processes. It’s also a great way to interact with people you’ve known forever, as you can play off their personality traits to ensure much fun and laughter and help everyone have a great time.
Get Creative With It
Who Am I has potential to be one of the best games on this list, as long as you’re willing to take chances. Writing down names like “Britney Spears” could be ok with the right group. However, you don’t have to limit yourself to pop musicians or actors.
The Star doesn’t have to be from this era. You can choose famous people from long ago, like King Tut. You don’t even have to pick a real person. It can be a character in a movie, from a book, or even an urban legend. The choice is yours!
6. Frostbite
Required Players: 6+ | Difficulty: Hard | Special Equipment: Camping Tent
Frostbite requires rapid movement, critical thinking, and leadership skills. The object of the game is to set up your camping tent. To play, you’ll split the group into two teams. Each team will have a leader whose role is to supervise the tent setup. However, everyone pretends there has been a giant snowstorm.
Each leader has gotten frostbite, and now they can’t move. They can only instruct their team on what to do with verbal communication. To further complicate things, all players have gotten snow-blindness. They’ll don blindfolds, so they won’t be able to see what they’re doing. They’ll be relying solely on the instructions of the leader to set up the tent.
Harder Than You Think
With everyone except the leader being blindfolded, teams won’t be able to see anything. They’ll have to listen to find out where to put their hands, how to connect the poles, and every other aspect of setting up the tent. The leader will have to choose their words carefully, since they can’t lift a finger to help the team.
The first team to set up their tent successfully wins the game. Because time is of the essence, the atmosphere can get frenzied. Bearing this in mind, don’t set yourself up for failure or stress. For best results, it’s a good idea to play this one when you still have plenty of daylight left, so reserve it for when you first arrive on-site.
Unexpected Benefits
Not only is this a fun challenge, but it’s also a great team-building activity. The game serves to enhance communication skills for all, because instructions need to be crystal-clear. The leader must quickly ascertain if they are being understood.
If the team members don’t comprehend the instructions, the leader has to abandon their current communication strategy. Meanwhile, team members must listen closely to get things right and move tent setup forward. If they make a move in the wrong direction, they rely on the leader to tell them. This one can easily take a long time!
7. Psychiatrist
Required Players: 4+ | Difficulty: Easy | Special Equipment: None
Psychiatrist is the perfect game for a lazy afternoon or an evening of relaxed fun. Requiring little movement or deep thinking, it’s the perfect game to play while indulging in some campfire cocktails as you wait for dinner to finish cooking. To begin, everyone must sit in a circle.
In this game, one person is chosen as the “Psychiatrist” and the rest act as “Patients.” The Psychiatrist must leave the group for a little while and must remain out of earshot while the other players all think up an imaginary illness to have. This can be anything from “I think I’m the president” to “I have a phobia of sandwiches.”
Once the group decides on their fake disease, the psychiatrist is invited back into the fold. They enter the circle and sit in the middle. Then, the psychiatrist has to guess the illness by asking a series of questions. The patients convey their disease by answering the questions and with acting skills. This can get pretty entertaining as the night progresses and people get wilder.
The Catch
Psychiatrist comes with a special catch that makes it even more entertaining. The catch is that the patients can lie. However, if a patient lies, another patient can yell “Psychiatrist!” The two patients then must switch places in the circle.
This shakes things up a bit, as it distracts the psychiatrist and confuses them. It also makes it more fun for the patients, but you shouldn’t get too crazy with the lies because if the psychiatrist gets frustrated or overly confused, the game can lose its luster pretty fast.
8. Ghosts
Required Players: 8+ | Difficulty: Hard | Special Equipment: Sleeping Bags
Ghosts combines the best of all worlds to bring you the perfect camping game for those dark nights in the great outdoors. Requiring a certain level of inquisitiveness and all your powers of deduction, Ghosts can be played with groups of six, but it works better with eight or more people.
For this one, you’ll divide the group into two teams. Each team will retreat into a separate tent and choose a single “Ghost” from among its members. The Ghost then wraps themselves in a sleeping bag, draping it over their head and obscuring their eyes so they can’t see anything.
The two teams then send their Ghosts out to greet each other. The object of the game is for each Ghost to discover who the other team’s Ghost is without seeing their face. Ghosts must interact while under the blankets, asking questions, making statements, and talking while trying to figure out the other’s identity.
A Thrilling Ride
Because this game is played with a group of friends who know each other already, players will have better luck if they disguise their voices and lie to each other. This is part of what makes the game so fun, as lies can get outrageous and the voices can sound ridiculous.
Once one Ghost figures out who the other one is, the losing Ghost must accompany the winning Ghost back to their tent to be absorbed by the winning team. Then new Ghosts are chosen, and the process repeats itself. The game ends once one team absorbs all the Ghosts.
For the best atmosphere, play Ghosts at night. Besides nighttime being the perfect time for ghostly adventures, the darkness helps to obscure the Ghosts further and make the game that much more interesting. Since Ghosts often ends up with multiple people piled into the same tent for giggles, it’s best suited for groups of friends who are already close and comfortable with one another.
3 Things To Consider When Choosing Your Camping Game
1. Time Of Day
The time of day will affect gameplay. Games like Enemy Lines should be played during daylight hours, when there’s plenty of sunlight. You don’t want to risk running around all confused during the nighttime, potentially tripping and getting hurt. Always put safety first when you’re playing these camping games.
With games like Frostbite, playing in the dark just wouldn’t make sense. It would become too hard, and you wouldn’t have any fun at all. However, adding the extra challenge of darkness would work well with games like Sardines. It’s important to think of just how difficult your game should actually be. Make it engaging and fun, not stressful.
Other games like Who Am I or Psychiatrist can be played at any time during the day or night. Generally, more active games are better for daylight hours. People will have more energy and feel more up for a friendly competition at this time. More passive games are better played when everyone is winding down for the evening.
2. Group Dynamics
Your definition of fun might vary a lot from someone else’s. That’s why it’s important to read the room to discern what kind of activities the others would enjoy. When you have your own dedicated friend group, this is like second nature. You know what they like, and you’ll be able to identify instantly which games on this list will have them in stitches.
Things get trickier when you’re joining a new group. When you’re camping with new friends, always go with the flow. Make an effort to try their favorite games and see if you like them. Chances are, you’ll have a great time. And if you don’t, you could introduce them to a few of your tried-and-true favorites.
If a newbie is joining you and your long-time parade of pals, take the time and effort to teach them your games. When dealing with people who don’t know each other that well, choose games like Two Truths and a Lie that will help them get to know each other. That way, you’ll be on the fast track to friendship in no time.
3. Game Setup
Game setup is especially important when picking your game, as more complicated setups require a deeper level of commitment to the activity. For some groups, this is ideal. If you’re with a squad of high-energy friends who like to get competitive with one another, you can bring along the tools for more complicated games.
However, some people don’t want to dedicate an entire day to a single game. They want to have fun and relax, playing simple thinking games that can be stopped and picked up again at any time. They don’t want to take the time to organize themselves for a more in-depth activity on their vacation, and this is perfectly fine.
With game setup, you should always choose a game that is compatible with the space you’ll occupy. Your campsite might be too small for a game of Sardines, or too close to another campsite to play a louder game like Ghosts. Think about the area, and ensure your game is appropriate. That way, everyone will feel comfortable, and you won’t disturb other campers around you.
Final Thoughts
Playing group camping games is a great way to have fun. Now that you know the best camping games to play, your next camping trip will be an opportunity for bonding, connection, and fun. Whether you want heavy competition or you’re just looking for laughs, there’s a game on this list for you!