A Player’s Perspective

High Alert was brought to my attention a couple of months ago with the semester already underway.  I thought it sounded cool at first, but the idea of using only my imagination within the story struck me as a little strange (What would other people on campus think?), plus I was already playing a Dungeons and Dragons campaign.  I didn’t really think I had time for this.  However, I rode home for break with a good friend who was playing and she explained the finer points of the game, getting me really interested.  By the time that trip was over, I had  “created” a Teleporter named Altair (I know, obvious Assassins’s Creed reference, but its pronounced differently) and had an idea of his personality and weapons.  This character I refined over break and started playing as once school resumed.

The new teleporting Altair gets around much faster than this one...

In the end, this game ended up being one of the best things I’d taken part of all semester.  D&D is good, but High Alert is better, because there are no turns, all the action and thought takes place at once, as a group.  I’m a self-proclaimed fantasy/medieval nut, especially for anything Lord of the Rings, and love putting myself in the shoes of a hero.  Being able to create and play a hero who was entirely of my creation and is, in a sense, me was an amazing experience.  Also, the imagination part I thought would be weird wasn’t.  It’s one thing to be a teenager and play imagination by yourself (awkward…), but it’s another thing entirely to do it with a group of people united by an overarching story and quest, creating as you go within the confines of that story.  Every time is different, exciting, and creative and it’s these aspects that keep me coming back.

--Altair