Learn to doubt every sound, every shadow, every person. It may keep you alive. 

With all the stress and work in high school, students need to blow off steam one way or another. Some students play sports; some join clubs, knit, paint or watch television, and some people become “assassins.”

But if you’re looking here for a gruesome, gory article, I would stop reading. Why don’t you try Breaking Dawn and watch the vampire baby claw its way out of its mother. Yuck.

Although not well known around Palo Alto High School, “The Game of the Assassins” has around 20 student participants. The games started with around seven students near the end of September. According to co-founder junior Jawwad Ahsan, the idea was inspired by the popular video game Assassin’s Creed, and the group was mainly organized by fellow junior Daniel Fischer.

Called “just glorified tag” by Fischer, the weekly game is similar to spoon tag, duly noted on the Assassin’s Facebook page: “Ludus de Sicariorum.”

Whatever You Do: Don’t Die

Think back to your childhood games – hot lava monster, tag, hide-and-seek. “Game of the Assassins” is a crazy mix of all those games plus a healthy dose of paranoia and school-life.

To put it simply, each person gets a target from the Master Assassin, usually Fischer, who is like a more benign version of “God” in the game Mafia, and the assassins can “kill” their targets with a ruler by tapping their victims with it. To introduce a paranoia factor into the game, no one knows who is following or is after whom, and the targets aren’t allowed to see their assassin when the assassin is trying to “kill” them.

At the end of the game, whoever has the most points wins, which is determined by how many people they’ve killed, saved or escaped from, wins. The game’s objective is simple: Don’t die.

“It’s a bit weird going around with a ruler in your pocket, but you just get a little more paranoid about people that you know,” Ahsan said.

Outside the Paly Assassins

Although Paly has played games like this before (Ahsan’s brother organized a similar game with spoons), the concept of a “killing” game is not uncommon outside of the Paly community.

Universities and websites have thriving networks of “Assassin” players, although the names and rules of the games vary from group to group.

Take Cambridge University’s Assassin’s Guild: their game is shockingly similar to Paly’s “The Game of Assassins,” although not exactly the same. Like the assassins at Paly, the Cambridge game’s players receive targets from an Umpire, not unlike the Master Assassin, and go after their target according to their “weapon rules.” Unlike Paly, however, the Cambridge University’s Assassin’s Guild can use weapons ranging from water guns to capped pens to “Death’s Robe,” according to the guild’s website. Yes, you can dress up as Death and touch a player to kill them.  

Some games have similar names and concepts but are completely different. For instance, Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Assassins’ Guild, whose bright red website and chilling slogan welcomes viewers immediately, is completely different from “The Game of Assassins.” A more role-playing, varying game, their LARP style game still features a Master Assassin and the fact that people will be “killing” other people. 

Websites, on the other hand, can be a little different. Sassins.com, for example, offers to host and save the history of any people who want to organize an assassins’ game for a fee of $1 per player. True to its word, the website seems to save the past games of other players. Surfing through the pages, one can see that past companies like Microsoft and schools like Blue Valley West High School have organized games on sassins.com.

After all of that “The Game of the Assassins” seems much simpler and less paranoia-inducing. Don’t you think?

Assassins Don’t Fill Out Applications

Anyone can be an assassin.

Junior Christina Chen got into the game when she saw her friend, junior Chia Ching Song, running around “being very suspicious” and wanted to try the game out.

Most of the assassins got into the game through friends, which would explain the overwhelming junior class majority in the game. And through “Game of the Assassins,” they’ve gotten more than just the thrill of making or escaping a kill.

From making new friends to relieving stress, the assassins seem to truly enjoy what they’re doing, despite some skepticism and unfriendly reactions they’ve gotten.

“It’s just for fun really,” Ahsan said. “We have a fun time ‘killing’ other people.”

Outside the group, some people look unfavorably on “Game of the Assassins” or similar killing games. The University of Texas at Dallas, for example, forbids assassin games in its student discipline and conduct rules. In fact, the dean is allowed to “initiate disciplinary proceedings” on a student who “participates in the game ‘assassin,’ ‘killer,’ or variations thereof on university owned or controlled property.’”

Even at Paly, negative opinions do come up time to time. Assassins player junior Edward Yeung remembers a Paly senior who insulted and belittled the game.

However, even though Yeung recalls the game being slighted, the other players, like Chen, Ahsan and junior Rebecca Ackroyd seem more optimistic about Assassin’s reception. Chen even mentioned how her friends outside of Paly received the game enthusiastically and wanted to join. That being impossible, due to the need for a physical presence on campus, Chen updates them daily on what’s happened in the game.

“They have fun reading it [her daily update],” she said.

Because his older brother played a similar game to “Game of Assassins” which garnered a lot of popularity, Ahsan is confident that the Paly community will accept the game.

Overall, however, Ackroyd doesn’t care what others think.

“Why shouldn’t you be allowed to just have fun?” she asked. “This game is a way of just being yourself and just having a little bit of fun time when you should be studying and stuff.”

After all this talk about assassins and the enthusiasm of the players, I started to wonder what it was like playing the game.

I Become a Ninja

I had been really curious about the actual game experience ever since Yeung and Chen were talking about whether they were dead during class. Besides, Ahsan had assured me that the game increased paranoia levels, which I thought would be an interesting experience.

So I became ninja — an assassin — albeit not a very good one.

My first round was rough: no kills, no saves, no escapes. I was basically an invisible person, not even worthy of the title “assassin.” I could have gotten my target several times; I had my ruler ready (although it was longer than the ones the other assassins used), and he walked by several times, but let’s just say I didn’t feel like sneaking up on him at that moment saying, “Bang.”

Based on pure luck and the fact that none of the assassins had figured out where I ate or hung out yet (one of them has the schedules of the players), I survived until the free-for-all round, where I was promptly “killed” twice by junior Khoa Nguyen and sophomore Marcus Edholm.

Perhaps my description doesn’t quite capture the excitement of the game, but I learned more than I ever thought I would. I found a new appreciation for players of a game that may seem childish or random o
r just weird. I respected that while I got tired of school work, these assassins found an escape from it through their game. While I shrank away from the possibility that people would look strangely at me, they let people judge them.

As the game continued, I realized that this was more than just a community of assassins. It’s a group of friends just doing something they enjoy doing; unlike being an assassin, that is something everyone can relate to.