ENNUI AS A
WEAPON OF CHOICE
ASSASSIN by CHRIS BAYLISS
from
AVALON HILL
16"
x 22" mounted board; 252 perforated cards; 6 plastic pawns; Rule folder.
Boxed. From TAHGC, 4517 Harford Rd, Baltimore MD 21214 c.$20
Reviewed
by RICHARD H. BERG
The origin
of the word "assassin" is one of etymology's better items. Seems that
back around the time of the Crusades, a sect of Muslim heretics, the Ismai'lis,
run by someone called The Old Man of the Mountains, ran a gang of
rent-a-killers. To get their hired hands into the proper mood, they plied them
with large doses of hash-hish. Pretty soon these Hired Knives became known as
Hashishin … or assassins.
I bring this
up not to raise your cultural awareness but to point out that the only way
anyone is ever going to enjoy Avalon Hill's Assassin will be to get an
invite to one of the Old Man's parties and head straight for the Controlled
Substance smorgasbord. Assassin is as vapid an exercise in inanity and
boredom as we've seen in quite a while.
Shows you how
misleading box cover blurbs can be. To judge from the back of the box, Assassin
sounds like its going to be a really neat card game, players running around
Europe, bumping off other players, hitting a few civilians … all in less than
90 minutes. Turns out that the description on the back of the box is about as
exciting as things ever get. And as for the box, itself …
I think its
time that we, as gamers, started sending telegrams, faxes, even ticking
packages to The Hill, letting them know that "purple" is NOT one of
the four major chromatic groups, nor is it a color one likes to see staring up
at him every time he or she looks at the AH section in the local store. Once
again, AH's art department seems to be under the aegis of someone immersed in a
purple haze. (Another hashishin?) It wouldn't be so bad if the cover didn't
also feature a full-face close-up of what appears to be a misguided effort at
what passes for "cool". Assassins are supposed to be faceless,
blending in so as to be invisible. The only place this ersatz greaseball would
be invisible is in a meeting of the
Trailor Park Troglodyte Association. Then again, it does bear an
uncomfortable resemblance to Jack Dott.
The rest of
the package isn't half bad, ignoring the Parker Brothers-style plastic pawns.
The map is unexciting but clear; it's also quite up to date, especially if you
want to know where all those new countries-on-the-block are, such as Slovenia,
Moldava, etc. The best thing about the recent rush to Balkanization is that I
now know where all those stamps I had as a kid were supposed to go in my stamp
book. There are also 252 cards, but they're of the 2nd Class Citizen,
perforated kind … and purple pervades yet again. Whoever is responsible for
this ought to be tied to a chair and forced to listen to Jane's Addiction
singing "Deep Purple" over and over again.
Then there's
the game. Remember break time in the grade school yard? You used to play a game
where one of you was it - sometimes you didn't know who - and "it"
went around tagging kids, most of whom spent the period running away? Well,
that's Assassin. It's Milles Borne with a tag game thrown in.
Except Milles Bornes was somewhat more exciting.
Players are
dealt 7 cards of the following possible types: Destination Cards, Transportation
Cards, Hit Cards and Hazard cards. The object is to travel from one city to
another using the first two. You play a Destination Card, on top of which you
play a Vehicle (Planes, Trains and Automobiles time), followed by mileage
cards. You can actually try to bicycle from Paris to Istanbul. If you happen to be in the same city as the
Assassin - who remains unknown only until his first attempt - he'll take a shot
at you, against which you play some "defense"-oriented cards, several
of which intimate our Cook's Tour Killer hits a kid instead. (And you said Plague
was tacky, Jack?)
That's it.
Fly to
Budapest … nothin' happenin', so get a few plates of veal paprikash and head to
Berlin. No one around, so fly to Madrid (where, unless you're careful, you're
stuck for umpteen turns). And so on, until either your eyes glaze over or
someone suggests you'd all be better amused watching a Susan Powter
info-mercial. (Now, there's a subject for a scary game.) Granted, the rules are
very clean, they're easy to learn, and you can get started in about 5-10
minutes. Unfortunately, you'll have more fun separating the perforated cards
then you will playing the game.
The game,
itself, also has some system cul-de-sacs that can create even more stagnancy
than the game itself. For example, each player has seven cards, of which 2 or 3
he's getting rid of/playing per turn. However, there are a fairly large number
of "May Not Discard" cards in the decks, which means you either have
to play them - which you often cannot because you don't have the other cards
needed to do so - or pass them to your opponent, which is most unadvisable, as
they're the few interesting cards in the game. This, effectively, reduces your
hand to 2 or 3 playable cards. (At one point I had a hand of seven Do Not
Discard cards.) Even worse, you can get
stuck in some out-of-the-way post, like the aforementioned Madrid, with only a
bicycle to get you out. That takes about 475 turns.
It's
somewhat of a mystery as to why Assassin was ever published. There's
just nothing happening here. The game is so random - which is not necessarily
as bad thing - that strategy seems to devolve to simply avoiding everyone else.
There's no joy, no humor, no tension … and no game. Someone ought to get a
contract out on this one.
CAPSULE
COMMENTS
Graphic
Presentation: Clean, crisp, purple and garish.
Playability:
Easy to learn, boring to play.
Replayability:
For those who like watching reruns of Safe Driving films.
Wristage: None
Creativity:
Interesting idea dies aborning.
Historicity: Not applicable.
Comparisons:
A stolid Milles Bornes. Like buying a Pet Rock.
Overall: The type of subject John Prados
usually handles with panache. Unfortunately, John is nowhere around. Even more unfortunately,
the game is.