BBC Studios' 'The Traitors' has made a killer transition from party game to reality TV. Things to consider as episodes 7 to 9 drop on OTT

- There's an element of storytelling in the game. The moderator tells the group when it's (fictional) nighttime and when it's day.

- The wolves are tasked with conspiring and coming out to kill a villager at night.

- During the day, it's the villagers' job to puzzle out who the wolves might be.

- Before nightfall, the moderator invites the villagers to vote out one player they think might be the killer. If their guess / gut feeling / surmise is wrong, they could vote out a fellow villager.

- It's the strain of identifying a killer / wolf in their midst—without very much to go on, except observing how people behave and who gets eliminated as the game goes on—that is both the source of stress and enjoyment in the game. There's much conjecture and even more arguing back and forth about who the killer might be.

- At the start of play, the villagers are in a clear majority. However, the wolves are tasked by the moderator to kill off a villager. If the villagers manage to identify all the killers and vote them out successfully, they win. If the killers manage to bring the population of villagers down to a tiny fraction of what they were at the beginning, the killers win.

- Different variations of the game can add more roles for the villagers, from doctors who can save innocents from being murdered to detectives whose job it is to ask questions no one else will. The moderator can also offer the killers the chance to recruit new killers - but in a party setting, this can prolong an already long game too much.

Coming back to the show that's now streaming on Amazon Prime Video, contestants in the Indian version of 'The Traitors' are mainly minor celebrities and major influencers. Here's a quick list of the 20 who were there at the top of the show:

- Social media influencer Uorfi Javed

- Actor Elnaaz Norouzi

- Businessman Raj Kundra

- Actor Karan Kundrra

- Comic Harsh Gujral

- Actor Jannat Zubair Rahmani

- Social media influencer Apoorva Mukhija

- Actor Sahil Salathia

- Actor Jasmine Bhasin

- Astrologer Janvi Gaur

- Poker player Nikita Luther

- Actor Sudhanshu Pandey

- YouTuber Purav Jha

- Social media fashion commentator Sufi Motiwala

- Entrepreneur Anshula Kapoor who is producer Boney Kapoor's daughter and actor Arjun Kapoor's sister

- Rapper Raftaar

- Bollywood actor Ashish Vidyarthi

- Fabulous Lives of Bollywood Wives participant Maheep Kapoor

- Casting director Mukesh Chhabra

- Actor, producer and TV presenter Lakshmi Manchu

By the end of episode 9, only seven remain. The process of removing the contestants—through murder by the traitors who give the show its title, and by voting around the so-called "Circle of Shaq" or round table where the contestants trade observations, cast allegations, seek explanations, try to sway others, and vote someone out—has been excruciating or exhilarating for contestants, depending on their position in the game.

Human condition

They say you learn a lot about people by how they behave in moments of crises. To be sure, 'The Traitors' is a game show. The crises are not real. The contestants know—and even say it out loud many time—that they're playing roles within a game. And yet reality TV shows, of multiple formats, typically create these pressure cooker moments where the contestants are pushed to the brink where some lash out, kick and scream, while others retreat, grow silent and get thrown out.

'The Traitors India' does not fall short on this metric—although the design and sets of the tasks or "missions" that the contestant are given, leave something to be desired. There are feelings of betrayal, backstabbing, backsliding, backbiting, back talk and the just plain bickering. Friends turn on each other. Seeds of doubt are planted in every direction, sometimes at the feet of the traitors. The audience know who the traitors are, and therefore we read the machinations, the arguments, the body language, the facial cues and the explanations of the contestants with different eyes than the players.

We see how players painted into a corner try to defend themselves, and wince when we see they're not being totally convincing. In episodes 6-9, we also see what happens when a player has to change tack mid-game and how tiny giveaways add up and threaten to blow the whole cover.

Cliques form and re-form as the contestants' survival in the game becomes threatened, and as the contestants spend days together in the same space. We see alliances forming, failing, reconstituting, falling apart again as the contestants throw up their hands and there are tears—of guilt or frustration at being wrong yet again. There's team play and self-serving behaviour in equal measure. There are (fleeting) pockets where we see ownership of villainy, but also moments of (unfettered) celebration when the game is played well.

True, we know that it's a show for fun and for a prize pot that's not quite huge but is also not insubstantial. The contestants know it, too. But to get caught up in the mind games and confabulations, to become invested in who goes and who stays another day, to nod when a contestant doubts a traitor - even if it is for the wrong reasons - that's part of the fun of watching reality TV too. It's a partial suspension of disbelief, a momentary feeling of being one with the players. There's catharsis and curiosity. The lovely clothes help, as do contestants who can reason well—even when (or perhaps more when) we as viewers know that their arguments and conclusions are all wrong.

To be sure, recent criticism of reality TV shows that drive contestants to breaking point—underfeed and over-inebriate them, and place them in unsafe situations or situations where they make suboptimal decisions for themselves—cannot be ignored. For now, though, 'The Traitors' seems to be striking that balance, where the contestants know what they signed up for but where it all feels a bit personal as they near the pointy end of the competition.

'The Traitors India', hosted by Karan Johar, is streaming on Amazon Prime Video. New episodes drop on Thursdays. The latest haul: episodes 7-9.