recess, any year
Two corners of a page. A few soldiers drawn in each. One ballpen, and a rule everybody knew: hold the pen upright, press, and flick. Pitikan is that game, kept exactly the way it felt.
"Pitikan" is Filipino for flicking — the schoolyard game some called Lead Wars.
The flick, the walls that pile up as you play, the ambushes nobody else can see, and how it ends.
The whole class knew this game, and nobody remembers who taught it to them.
Touch and hold. Pressure builds, the way it did when you pressed the pen tip into the paper and waited for the right moment.
Pull back like a slingshot. A dashed line shows where you mean to go. A long, hard hold goes far but bends and scatters.
Let go. The pen slides, the line stays on the page, and your soldier stands wherever it stopped. Cross an enemy and he's down.
Everything the paper version had, and a few things we hid in the margins.
Quick and light goes short and true. Long and hard goes far and wild, skidding sideways like a real ballpoint on a desk. You feel the difference.
Every line stays on the page. Your pen stops short of the enemy's fresh ink, so where you draw matters as much as where you land.
A soldier outside his base is fair game. Cross him and he goes down with an X, and the next one steps out. Win by reaching the enemy corner or taking every soldier they have.
When an enemy comes close, every soldier still at home can take the shot without leaving. Nobody rushes a corner for free.
Hide them anywhere on the page. Your opponent can't see them. A line that crosses a mine stops right there, a soldier who lands near a sniper doesn't get up, and a line that runs into wire pulls up short.
Play the Bot offline. Send a friend a six-letter code, or find a stranger, and pass turns all day with a nudge when it's your move. Every online game counts on the leaderboard.
your pencil case
Write in ballpoint, gel, pencil, felt-tip, fountain or crayon, in seven colours. Play on pad paper, the school yellow pad, graph, a notebook page, a torn sheet or kraft. Send out soldiers, stick figures, paper planes, ninjas, tanks or jeepneys, every one drawn by hand.
The other player sees your pen and your army on the page; the paper is yours alone. Try anything before you buy. The pencil is free after your first online win, and the rest come in three small packs, with everything we add to a pack later free to the people who have it.
