The game is called the Glass Ceiling, and it is played outside. It involves blindfolding a person and placing a heavy item on his back. He has to navigate to someone who is calling for him, and as he makes his way, others try to tackle him.

Now law enforcement officials in Pennsylvania say they are trying to find out how Chun Hsien Deng, a 19-year-old Baruch College freshman, died on Monday after suffering “major brain trauma” while taking part in the game during a fraternity ritual in the Poconos over the weekend.

Mr. Deng, who also went by the name Michael, was staying at a home in Tunkhannock Township, Pa., near Stroudsburg, as part of a retreat with 30 or so members of the Pi Delta Psi fraternity, the Monroe County district attorney’s office said in a statement. Mr. Deng was one of four pledges on the retreat.

He suffered the injury early Sunday, according to the statement. He proved unresponsive, and “after some time” fraternity members took him to the emergency room of a hospital in Wilkes-Barre. He was placed on life support and died on Monday. The police and the district attorney are investigating the death, as well as the lapse of time between the injury and when Mr. Deng was taken to the hospital, Geisinger Wyoming Valley Medical Center.