Summary

• The "True American" game in New Girl is mostly a drinking game with a Candyland-like structure, full of made-up rules and surprises.
• Each round of "True American" revolves around reaching The Castle, navigating lava floors, and using American history trivia to gain moves.
• While the show never fully explains the game, fans can create their own variations based on Fox's loose ruleset and vague premise.

The rules to Jess and Johnson's Nick eventually falling for one another.

One recurring element in the show's seven seasons is "True American," a drinking game the roommates play. The game was based on a similar game a New Girl writer played in college, though they had a fuzzy memory of the rules. This was played up in the game's first appearance, where it was hard to grasp exactly how "True American" was played. It's an excuse for players to get as drunk as possible, with new rules inevitably being invented while playing. Due to audience curiosity, Fox eventually released some official rules - though the game is still open to interpretation.

The Structure And Rules Of "True American" According To Fox

It's more 90% drinking game with a loose Candyland-like structure.

Once Jess has fully integrated into the loft, she becomes well-acquainted with the rules of "True American" and describes it as "50% drinking game, 50% life-size Candyland," referring to the children's board game. Jess is being generous, however, because Schmidt comments that it's, "75% drinking game, 25% Candy Land, and by the way, the floor is molten lava." If that isn't enough to get the audience interested, Winston takes it one step further: "It's more 90% drinking game with a loose Candyland-like structure." His assessment appears the most accurate.

Though the rules seem to change every time the game is introduced in one of New Girl's party episodes, these particular points for set-up were introduced by Fox for fans to play (responsibly) themselves:

The Castle

"True American" revolves around The Castle. This is the point the players are trying to reach, which is made up of assorted cans of beer - the number of which varies depending on the number of players - with a bottle of booze at the center. That bottle of alcohol is seemingly the game's prize. The cans represent pawns and the Soldiers of the Secret Order.

Zones

"True American" is divided into five zones the players have to navigate with The Castle in the center. New Girl established the floor is made of lava, so navigation means stepping on sofas, chairs, cushions, etc. There is typically plenty of furniture, boxes, buckets, whatever the characters have on hand, for them to stand on. Touching the floor means death, though players can re the game by drinking a whole beer.

Starting Off

Teams in "True American" are optional. Before gameplay starts, the players hold up a random number of fingers to their foreheads; a player with one finger less than you becomes a teammate. The game commences with someone shotgunning a beer, then somebody else chants a three-second countdown followed by "JFK!" Other players then shout "FDR!," grab a beer from the castle and jump off the floor. They must then remain off the floor and with a drink in order to keep playing.

The Rules

New Girl's "True American" has players move in a clockwise direction, with players having to win a move. They do this by completing a random American-history-related quote or guessing a common trait between two famous historical figures named by the player whose turn it is. Each player gets a turn, and on their turn, they always get to move one space. It's the player whose turn it is who gets to shout the quotes or historical figures, allowing other players to earn their movements in the game.

They can also play the random number to the forehead game. While teams are picked by seeing who places one finger less than another player on their forehead, this is different during the actual gameplay. Once the game is in motion, if an opponent places the same number of fingers on their forehead as the player in the middle of the game, they can move.

Winning

After all pawns and soldiers are removed from The Castle (meaning all beers are consumed during the clockwise gameplay), the first player to move to the center zone and take a drink from the bottle of alcohol that made up the center of the castle wins.

That's the basic setup to New Girl's "True American," but if the rules seem sketchy and ill-defined, that's because they intentionally are. At any time, a player can yell "JFK!" and the others must reply "FDR!" and down their current beer, and it's possible to lose if caught without a drink. Players can also invent random rules to make the game more challenging, as the gang did in Season 2 by employing "Clinton Rules" and in Season 5 by creating the "First Lady" version of the game.

How The New Girl Creator Explains True American

Fans have long wondered if the creator of the series, Elizabeth Meriwether, had more specific rules in mind when the writer’s room worked on scripts, or even while the episodes were being filmed since New Girl never fully explains it. Meriwether, however, explained her thoughts on “True American” when she and the cast participated in a discussion at the Paley Center for Media in 2014 simply as, “It’s like drink a lot and then don’t walk on the floor.”

Her explanation is exactly what “True American” boils down to, and it’s why fans of the show have created their own variations of the game. Of course, Meriwether’s vague premise for the game might also be because she isn’t the person who suggested the game in the writer’s room. Instead, writer Lesley Wake Webster was inspired by a game she played in college, but because it’s a drinking game, the details of her memory were a bit fuzzy. The game then evolved in the writer’s room and on set while filming.

At the 2014 Paley , Deschanel agreed with Meriwether’s assessment of how they approached the game. She explained that when they filmed “True American” gameplay for the first time, they made things up on the spot:

That first True American episode we were like making up things that sounded like the most cryptic game you could possibly come up with. And then after the fact people imposed rules.

With all of that in mind, if fans of the show use Fox’s rules as their own loose “Candy Land structure” for the game, they can easily create their own variations of New Girl’s “True American.”