UPDATE: The event has been cancelled. Anyone who registered will be getting refunded. The Supreme Commander of the Shadow Government has told me that this is the first time a Streetwars hasn't happened because of a lack of interest, in any city. In other words, we suck. They're looking forward to trying again as soon as possible. In the meantime, give yourself a kick in the 'nads if you thought "Damn, this would be cool," and never bothered to register. Make sure that when they come back you damn well register for the war! End Update

It had been a long day at the office. I was tired. The boss had been ragging my ass all day about a situation I allowed to develop a day earlier. As if I didn't understand the consequences of my actions, or lack thereof.

I'd missed my mark. I had a poor excuse, but not a good reason. You see, my mark saw me first. One thing they don't teach you in Mission Impossible is that sometimes the assassin can be in someone else's cross hairs, not because it's personal, but because of the prize. I should've paid more attention during Mr. and Mrs. Smith.

She got the drop on me. Chalk it up to years of training, or maybe dumb luck, but someone else walked into the line of fire and took the hit for me. He never saw it coming. Innocents can get caught in the line of fire, but that's something I've learned to live with. This isn't Spy vs Spy. This isn't some game. This is war.

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StreetWars is an urban game where the goal is to "kill" your intended target. The thing is that everyone involved is both a killer and a target, so when you nail the poor sucker, they give you the information on their intended kill and the game continues like this until there's only one person/team left standing.

There are various rules to the game but the main thing is that in order to finish you assignment, so to speak, you have to intentionally hit them with a water gun, water balloon, or something else water oriented. If a few drops hit their shoe, they're just as dead as if you squirted them in the eye.

This game definitely isn't for everyone though. Ya see, you're given lots of info on the would be target; name, address for home and work, their photo as well as their contact information. Privacy be damned, this is war!

You can fly solo or work in teams. The rules aren't all clearly stated, with the FAQ stating that the rules are a "trade secret", so they're only for active players. You get'em when you pay up and pick up your first kill's info.

Pay up? Say whaaa? Well there's a cash prize involved, dependent on the number of players, and that prize doesn't appear from thin air. Entry is $45 CAD, and that's the price per player, not per team. From what I can tell (without having an official copy of the rules in my hands) either the entire team need to be killed in order to be eliminated, or the designated team leader must be killed which effectively kills the whole team. I imagine the leader is singled out in the info that's handed out.

The deadline for registration in this real life version of Hitman/Splinter Cell is September 1st, and the game run from September 10th at 1am, ending on October 1st at 1am, with one week of "sudden death" happening up until October 7th if required. All the details you can get without actually registering are available on the StreetWars Toronto site. Donuts and beer motherfuckers.