“Among Us” is the mobile game taking everyone by storm–an online game in which you either play as a little astronaut trying to navigate the ship and complete tasks, or as the Imposter. A being which looks like a docile Crewmate, the Imposter really has the ability to kill other players. 

The goal? Survive. Unless, of course, you’re randomly chosen as the secret saboteur among the crew, in which case your goal is to wipe out the Crewmates at all costs.

Seemingly simplistic, “Among Us” actually requires much strategy and critical thinking. As a Crewmate, you don’t know who the Imposter is, but you can vote another player off the ship if you suspect someone. A wrong guess can end in an innocent Crewmate being launched into space, leaving you a key suspect as the Imposter.

Still in the midst of a pandemic, with significant health and safety regulations in place, people don’t have much to do but stay at home and play games, which makes “Among Us” stand out among the crowd for people right now.

As an online game, “Among Us” gives players the option to let their friends join with a code. This is a great feature considering how hard it is to safely spend time with your friends in the real world right now. People will get on voice calls to communicate with their teammates and play for hours on end. 

The game allows for safe, distanced fun when we need it most, which is why so many people are flocking to servers every day.

“Among Us” also gives people the satisfaction of completing small tasks. While this may seem like an inconsequential attribute for a game, completing your list of simple tasks around the ship is a very rewarding activity, especially when the completion of everyone’s tasks results in a victory for the Crewmates.

If you’ve never played “Among Us,” you may be speculating as to why the game is receiving so much hype lately considering how juvenile it may seem, but between the current political climate of America, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the return of school (online or otherwise), many people have found the game to be a great release from stress.

Many people see “Among Us” as it is, a mobile game, albeit a fun one. Many others, however, have taken the internet’s current obsession a few steps further. People have been making Instagram and Twitter pages dedicated specifically to “Among Us.” Artists have also been partaking in the fun, drawing the different colored avatars as characters.

Artists aren’t the only ones bringing the game to life lately. Cosplayers have been putting together their own brightly colored spacesuits to personify the little characters in “Among Us,” while many also dressed as said astronauts for Halloween in October.

It’s rare to see such an uproarious reaction to a mobile game. While the obsession only rooted itself recently throughout the course of 2020, “Among Us” was initially released in 2018. The game, produced by InnerSloth, has been surrounded recently by rumors of a sequel. While a second installment to the ever popular game was set to be produced, the developers have cancelled the sequel, and have instead decided to redirect their efforts to the original.

The crew at InnerSloth has released several statements saying that with all the new traffic on the game, they will be focusing on fixing bugs and adding new features, rather than crafting a whole new program. Recently, they released a software update to catch hackers in public servers, and added symbols to color-coded tasks, making the game easier for people with color blindness.

The developers have also released plans for features that they’ll add in the future. This includes an account feature, which allows people to report unruly players, and eventually will lead to a friends-list feature, which “Among Us” fans have been begging for for some time. The team is also in the process of making a new map for gameplay, which will be bigger than Polus, the largest map that the game features now.

While “Among Us” has seen the spotlight for quite some time already, it’s sure to become inundated with even more fans as the game receives fresh updates and new features.