What are jiu-jitsu games, and how can they help you get better at BJJ faster?

Think of jiu-jitsu games as “mini-games” in BJJ.

For example, I was at the beach a few weekends ago with my girlfriend.

I laid on my back, and put my hands behind my head. I told her to get past my legs and to secure my torso. And I was trying to keep her in front of me — and sweep her — using just my legs.

This is an example of a BJJ game: a narrowly constrained part of BJJ designed to improve a specific, targeted skill.

This “No Hands Guard” game helped me strengthen my guard retention, and it helped my girlfriend work on her guard passing.

With the rise of ecological jiu-jitsu, it’s obvious that BJJ players are looking for better ways to train than mindless, repetitive drilling.

BJJ Games by Stephan Kesting and Rob Biernacki provides a complete list of these different games and training approaches (including “F*** Your Jiu Jitsu” [FYJJ] and Specific Sparring) — approaches Rob used to win a gold medal in an ADCC US Open against opponents 20lbs heavier than him.

In this article, I’ll share my thoughts on this instructional, how I’ve used it in my training, and who should buy it (and who shouldn’t).

BJJ Games Instructional Review: Table Of Contents

• BJJ Games: Review Summary
• Who Should Buy BJJ Games?
• Who Should Skip This One?
• BJJ Games Course Content Overview
• Price Breakdown
• BJJ Games: Final Thoughts & Discussion

BJJ Games: Review Summary

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (5/5 Stars)

Who Should Buy BJJ Games?

There are three specific scenarios where you’ll benefit the most from BJJ Games. These are also the reasons why it was useful for me.

1. You want to get better at BJJ faster. If you’re a hobbyist who trains 2-4 times a week and has a normal job like me, you won’t get better training like the pros do. FYJJ, Specific Sparring, and BJJ Hames will help you implement a fun form of specific training. And specific training — training specific positions or techniques to improve them — is how you can get better faster without training more.

2. You’re bored with drilling and want a more fun way to train. Warm-up, drill, roll, repeat. If this is all you do, then you’ll end up skipping warm-up and drilling. You’ll just show up to open mat (like a true purple belt). BJJ Games offers a new way to train where you get to learn specific skills without the fear of losing. I’m not advocating getting rid of drilling completely. But integrating BJJ games into your training will help you with your skill development if you only drill and roll.

3. You teach beginners or want to introduce friends to BJJ. As someone who teaches beginners, it’s difficult to teach them how to roll in their first few months. They haven’t seen enough material in class to build a complete game. So during open mat, I’ll grab a white belt and play one of these games with them: like No Hands Guard or Specific Sparring from Mount. This helps them get acclimated to important parts of jiu-jitsu so that they can improve and get started with full sparring sooner.

Who Should Skip This One?

Even though it’s a 5-star instructional, there are two scenarios where you won’t get much value out of BJJ Games.

1. You only want to do open rolling after class. If you don’t implement the material in BJJ Games, you won’t benefit from it. To practice this material, you’ll have to use some of your open mat time to play these games. And if you only want to use your open mat time for unconstrained rolls, then this instructional isn’t for you.

2. You are looking for a traditional instructional focused on one particular technique. This is not your typical BJJ Fanatics instructional that teaches you how to get better at a single position or technique. You won’t walk away from this instructional with a killer half guard. You can build a killer half guard by practicing what’s in this instructional, but it doesn’t go into the deep nuances of the half guard game. That’s not what it’s designed for. It’s more of a meta-instructional: teaching you how to train so you can improve.

BJJ Games Course Content Overview

If you purchase BJJ Games, what can you expect to find inside and learn?

The instructional is broken down into 3 primary sections, with each describing a novel training format with a plethora of examples for each.

1. FYJJ

FYJJ (“F*** Your Jiu-Jitsu) is a form of BJJ training with heavy constraints.

It’s called “FYJJ” from Rob’s training with Ryan Hall. Ryan would walk into a bottom player’s guard, and act like he didn’t care about their bottom game. He would find a way to pass their guard regardless.

So, Rob has created a game around replicating that circumstance.

An example is FYJJ Sweeping:

This game is designed to help the bottom player only improve their sweeping or taking the back.

And it’s designed to help the bottom player get better at maintaining their balance only.

In this game, the constraints are primarily placed on the top player. FYJJ Sweeping is designed to help the bottom player improve.

FYJJ, like all other training methods in the instructional, are games. They’re meant to be played, not won or lost. This ego-free form of training will help you and your training partner improve.

So, when you’re playing FYJJ — or any other form of jiu-jitsu games — don’t try to win.

Try to get as good as possible within the confines of the game. That’s how you improve.

2. Specific Sparring

Specific Sparring is similar to your classic positional sparring.

With Specific Sparring, you subdivide positions into what you can and can’t do to train that specific position.

It helps you develop your skills in certain positions and submissions.

An example of Specific Sparring would be Triangle Control:

This game is designed to help the attacking player get better with their triangle position.

And it’s designed to help the defending player get better at defending and escaping the triangle position.

There are variations of this game where the attacking player is not allowed to submit their training partner, and can only hold the submission.

The logic here is that if you can’t control a submission, you can’t finish it.

3. BJJ Games

BJJ games are more narrowly constrained games than FYJJ and Specific Sparring. They are designed to help grapplers improve very specific, targeted skills.

You can think of them like task-based games where both players benefit.

An example of a BJJ game is No Hands Guard:

In this game, there are artificial constraints that aren’t realistic to BJJ. That’s what makes them games.

So, the top player will get better at passing the guard without the option to stack — a common pass for the top player.

And the bottom player will get better at guard retention by ONLY using their legs.

Obviously, in a free rolling situation, you would use your hands to help retain your guard.

But when you practice only using your legs, your leg movements will become much more dynamic and harder to pass.

These BJJ Games are great for helping white belts and complete beginners learn the skills that make up BJJ. They reduce complexity so novices can practice singular techniques and movements.

For a full list of all the games and videos included in the instructional, check out the BJJ Games landing page.

Price Breakdown

There are three pricing options for BJJ Games:

1. Online Version – ON SALE $127 ($147): The online version of the instructional only, instantly accessible on your computer, tablet, or smartphone.
2. Physical DVDs – ON SALE $147 ($177): The physical version of the instructional only, with free shipping worldwide.
3. Online Version – ON SALE $147 (Regular $324): Get both instant access to online version and the physical DVDs.

You can use the code “EDISON” to get an additional 40% off of BJJ games.

The instructional also comes with a 365 “No Reason Required” guarantee.

If for any reason you don’t like the instructional, then you have a full year to let Stephan know and get a full refund.

The online version is definitely worth the price if you fit my criteria listed above.

Again, the instructional isn’t about improving one particular position or submission.

It’s about helping you gamify your training so you can improve ALL positions and submissions.

BJJ Games: Final Thoughts & Discussion

BJJ Games provides you with an exciting and new way to train.

And most importantly, these games will help you get better at BJJ faster.

As someone who teaches white belts and blue belts at my gym, these games have been fantastic for both my own skill development and the development of our new students.

Heck, I was able to introduce my girlfriend — who does not like grappling — to BJJ by introducing her to games like FYJJ sweeping and No Hands Guard.

They’re akin to a rough-and-tumble play: playful wrestling without the complexities of full-on rolling.

This instructional is a must if you want to level up your skills and have more fun doing so.

Did you buy BJJ Games? What did you think?

And if there’s a particular jiu-jitsu game that helped you level up your skills, leave a comment below and let me know.

Happy rolling. 🤙

---

Tsavo Neal

Tsavo is the founder of BJJ Equipment, author of BJJ For Beginners, creator of the BJJ Missions app, and a brown belt instructor at InFighting. He launched BJJ Equipment to help grapplers at every belt level train smarter, make faster progress, and find the best gear for their game.