Jack Goldfisher ’14 assassinated six students in the two weeks leading up to winter break, winning the schoolwide game of Assassin sponsored by the Happiness Club. Club leader Kenneth Kim ’13 presented Goldfisher with a marshmallow bow-and-arrow set and a bag of marshmallows to celebrate his victory.
Beginning at 12 a.m. on Thursday, Dec. 6, 39 seniors, 29 juniors and 11 sophomores hunted down a classmate in the game. Kim and fellow Happiness Club heads Mariel Brunman ’13 and Maddie Lear ’13 each managed one team of assassins.
Students had a week to sign up for the game before club leader Kim emailed each participant with the name, grade and picture of their target.
To ‘kill’ his or her target, the assassin had to touch the target’s back without the target seeing and say “bang,” according to the Happiness Club’s official guidelines. After a successful kill, the assassin assumed his victim’s original target and began the hunt once more. The game continued until only one student, the ultimate assassin, is left alive.
Kim updates the players nightly using a twitter account, @HWAssassin, with the number of deaths that day and any changes to the official rules. He also gives video game-style Special Achievement awards to particularly creative or speedy assassins.
“I think it’ll last for a couple of weeks, but I’m not sure because we haven’t done anything like this yet, so it’s still new,” he said before the game started. “Who knows, it could be over in a couple of days.”
Mane Williams ’14 was the first to assassinate his target, Taylor Lee ’13, before school began Friday Dec. 7. Another assassin killed his target at the Winter Jazz Concert the night of Saturday Dec. 8.
Junior prefect Oliver Goodman-Waters ’14 ‘killed’ his friend and fellow prefect Henry Hahn ’14 during a Prefect Council meeting Friday morning.
“He said that once I got that assignment, there was no way he would be alive for long since we’re such good friends and both prefects,” Goodman-Waters said.
The club will sponsor a second, larger game of Assassin after semester break.
Read the latest updates on Happiness Club’s game of Assassin from their Twitter @HWAssassin
