Among Us 101
By: Sarah Schneebaum
Tags: Mobile Apps, Among Us, Gaming

*originally published 9/18/2020

There’s a Hot New Game circling around the interwebs, and if you’re not your team’s resident gamer, you’re probably confused why little rainbow egg people are running around on a spaceship calling emergency meetings.

Marketers, brand managers, and those of you trying to break into gaming: prepare to be informed.

THE GIST

The game is called Among Us. It’s a free app available on desktop and mobile, across Apple and Android OS. If anyone has ever played Mafia, Werewolf, or Secret Hitler the idea is relatively similar. Groups can play with everyone in the same room via local play, or can play online with people who are farther away, making it prime for social distancing.

GAMEPLAY

Basically, everyone is a very cute crew member on a spaceship. There are one or two Imposters, or traitors, and the goal is to figure out who the Imposter is and vote them off the ship or finish the crew’s tasks.

Every crew member, the non-Imposters, have lil tasks around the ship like clearing the oxygen filter or charting the navigation course. While crew members are going around checking off their to-do list, the Imposter is going around murdering the crew members. They leave their bodies to be discovered by another crew member.

me watching the person who killed me in among us say it wasn’t him pic.twitter.com/fWM6V0SHRk — aaron ⎷ (@freeaarxn) September 17, 2020

When a crew member reports a body, gameplay completely stops and debate begins. Crew members then discuss where they were, who was being suspicious, and why they may think a certain person is an Imposter. There’s a limited time for discussion, then the group votes (or skips voting, if they can’t make a decision) on who to vote off the ship. Whoever loses gets launched into space. If it’s not an imposter, gameplay resumes as more people get killed and/or voted off the ship.

The Imposter wins if he kills everyone (either individually or by sabotaging the ship by cutting the lights or the oxygen, etc) and the crew members win if they launch the Imposter off the ship or everyone completes their tasks.

WHY IT’S POPULAR

The game was originally released back in 2018, but snowballed recently with popular Twitch streamers and Youtubers discovering and streaming the game. Twitch streamer Sodapoppin, with 2.8 million followers, was the first major streamer to introduce the game, leading to its snowballing popularity. The game has had as many as 1.5 million simultaneous players.

For starters, the characters are very cute and look just like the characters in Fall Guys, the other Hot Game in the gaming community. It’s familiar, cute, and easy to pick up by gamers and non-gamers alike.

The game is also maximum quarantine-friendly. Most gamers are on Discord, which lends itself to gameplay — players aren’t allowed to talk until the discussion/voting portion, so going on and off mute is essential. The fact that you can argue, discuss, and debate long distance lends itself to these ~circumstances.~

There is also the “emergency meeting” aspect, which is a button your guy can press to hold an emergency vote, even if a body wasn’t discovered. It has since become a meme because every social media meeting feels like an emergency meeting these days.

The intensity of this image tells you everything you need to know.

COMING UP

So far, brands have not really hopped on the trend. Given it’s exponential rise to fame, we can expect to see some gamer-relevant brands getting in on their own Imposters and debate memes in the next few weeks. Brands should try to get involved by taking a self-aware and introspective look at imposters and debate related to the brand. Gamers are notorious for “silence, brand”-ing try-hard attempts to relate to fellow kids, so make sure there’s a clear reference and tie to both the brand and the game.

A sequel to the game was originally announced, but their astronomical rise to prominence in gaming has lead InnerSloth, the game’s creator, to focus on upgrading the original game that everyone has grown to know and love.

Highly recommend this game as a team-builder since it’s free, fun, and long-distance. Up to 10 people can play at a time (and there can be more than one Imposter) so get your team, friends, even family together for a little lying fun.