#8: Big Brother Alias
2008

Winner: Hope
Runner-Up: Toni
Third: Kelley
Fourth: Gabe

The Cast:

Aiden / Sandros (5th/Quit)
Belle / Blake (6th)
Bethany / Colton (8th)
Charity / Brandon (10th)
Gabe / Peter (4th)
Hope / Mike (Winner)
Jax / Tyler (9th)
Kelley / Jeffrey (3rd)
Kymbah / John (12th)
PB / Monika (11th)
Toni / Stony (Runner-Up)
Troy / Dennis (7th)

Description:

Several years after I stopped playing games as aliases, I decided it would be fun to go "back to my roots" and host a game that invited everyone to live out one more game through their favorite aliases from the past. To host, I resurrected Dean, and I also asked Steph to cohost as "Rachael," her alias from Survivor Tanzania, the game in which we got back in touch after our long hiatus (where, ironically, I was playing as my actual self and she was the alias.)

The entire cast of this game was recruited. Either Steph or I had played with the alias, or we knew the player and had heard good things about the alias. The only person who didn't meet the criteria to enter the game was Mike / Mcree, who wanted to play but had never actually completed a game as a non-Survivor alias before. But, because we knew Mike was a great player, we asked him if he could "borrow" an alias from someone else. He somehow obtained consent to use "Hope" (the alias of Kevin/KPM in the Survivor Destination Series). It's funny in retrospect because the only person who hadn't successfully played an alias before ended up winning the Alias game.

Truth be told, I don't remember a lot of what happened strategically in the game. It was pretty fast-paced (hosted in less than a month), and very few people actually wrote confessionals or told me what was going on with them strategically. From what I remember, it was the Hope and Toni show, and everyone else was just fodder. They manipulated their way to the top and didn't look back. In the end, though, it was clear that Toni had been too aggressive when it came to her vicious backstabbing and personal attacks, and Hope's smoother style won the jury over. I never got the impression Toni was really trying to win the game - it seemed like she was just doing her best to replicate her awesome, stone-cold bitch of an alias from many games in the past, and it was great to watch. However, Hope actually played this game to win it, and once she put her mind to it - there was no stopping her.

The game went smoothly with a few exceptions. First, Aiden - who was actually in a decent spot to make the final four - decided he didn't like our hosting anymore and quit the game. I banned him from the forum because he was spreading crap about us to people, and started harassing me on AIM for the next few weeks until I finally blocked him. Dangerously imbalanced fellow, that one. But it taught me a valuable lesson: Some people, like me, play aliases because they are fun, and it's an interesting mental challenge. Other people, like Aiden, play aliases because their true personalities suck, and they'd never succeed at anything in life if people knew what arrogant stalkerish jerks they really are. It also taught me that no matter how good of a host you are, some asshole will always quit your game. I was also disappointed to see Kucha John's Kymbah fall so early, because she promised lots of ghetto drama. Unfortunately, it was never meant to be, and she was the first evicted.

I thought the final four was a nice balance of strong characters and strong players. Jeff's Kelley was as odd and quirky as Jeff himself, and Peter's original alias Gabe (the one who created Julia) didn't disappoint either, providing several funny diva-ish moments.

Ultimately, it was a fun game, a good experience, and a good winner. I hold BB Alias in a special place in my heart, but it was edged out by other games for reasons to be explained later. For that reason, it comes in on the countdown in eighth place.