The Go Game

Medtronic Sales Conference in Dallas for 1000 Players (Finnspin)

7/1/2010 4:41:19 PM

The Go Game worked closely with Trademark Events and Medtronic to produce a fully customized game that was played on any phone at the conference. Our games are good on Blackberry, Andriod, old phones and new, so anyone could get in on the action. After completing a handful of missions, players could hop onstage and play the game show, squaring off with each other of the trivia quiz.

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How rich ARE you? (Andrew)

5/12/2010 2:09:05 PM

Did yesterday's post leave you feeling:

Perhaps this will cheer you up? Chances are if you have the time to surf through this blog here, you'll be in the upper echelons of all earners. Check it out!

I am, for the record, in the top 10% (or more - not polite to brag about one's compensation). Nice!

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Quick Aside (Andrew)

5/11/2010 11:12:21 AM

How much do you get paid to do what you do? How much should you? We all think we should get paid a little to a lot more (er, except here at The Go Game), and many of us are probably correct. I mean, my mom told me I was special, and I was pretty sure I'd retire by this point (28 years old!).

At least one dude got a pretty fair wage last year:

(Jamarcus Russell, formerly of the Oakland Raiders)

"...here's how JaMarcus was compensated for his production with the Oakland Raiders: Roughly $100,000 per completion and $5.6 million per win."

So yeah, the guy who bought one of these (sadly out of date now):

made more completing a pass - A PASS(I'd post you a video, but they're kinda hard to find) than you did all year last year. The rest of the article
if you can stomach it.

Raiders, you seem like you need some team building. Just let us know, we'll hook you up!

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Kayak (Andrew)

5/10/2010 3:48:48 PM

I love you, Kayak. I really, really love you. And for that, you are my #1 travel website.

You are easy to use and basic yet still extremely powerful. You don't make my eyes bleed with CHEAP RENTAL CARS IN TUCSON! and the like. And, I must not be crazy because we all consider you a reference... and the New York Times agrees so it must be true!(?) Allow me to present a nugget of GOLD from their travel blog:

"Still, however, there are a few more little things I do to game the system as much as possible. I try to fly on Tuesdays or Wednesdays, when fares tend to be a little lower (though not always) and fewer people mob the airports (though not always). I go to SeatExpert.com to find the best spot in the plane to park myself. (Sorry, SeatGuru.com!) And I try always to buy the ticket directly through the airline, partly to maximize frequent-flier miles, partly because the airlines sometimes have special deals that don�t show up on Kayak, but also so that if things go wrong at the airport (as I�ve heard happens on very rare occasions) the airline won�t be able to blame some third-party booker."

So, so, true.

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Tales from Go Game HQ (Andrew)

5/7/2010 4:35:13 PM

We produce hilarity in our patent pending (that's a total lie) Go Games, so it shouldn't come as a surprise that we produce hilarity in the office as well. Several years ago, an anonymous member of our office decided our space need a remodel. There were two rooms that desperately (apparently) needed the wall between them knocked down. Anonymous made the first practice cut in the wall, took a step back, thought "actually... maybe not my best idea" and promptly went to Despair to get one of these bad boys to cover up the hole:

Hilarious.

(The hole is repaired and now the poster hangs on our fridge - where hopefully no one tries remodeling).

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Write What You Know (Andrew)

4/20/2010 4:23:12 PM

"So, are you from here?" is probably the #2 most asked question of us Game Runners (right after "So - you just get out of jail?" [our jumpsuits are jail house orange]).

To be clear, we're from San Francisco, but in the last 7 days we've covered:
- Seattle, New Brunswick NJ,Miami, Boston, Scottsdale, Boulder, Dallas, The Bay Area

Perhaps it's not that surprising that pretty much all of our friends have asked us question #3: "Hey, have you seen Up In The Air? I think you might like it."

Presumably (hopefully)they connect us with the film for its depiction of business travel, and not for a main character living a comfortable life of distance. For the record, I very much enjoyed Up In The Air. And I think 10 Million Miles is an impressive goal. I'm pretty loyal to US Air, United, or Delta if I have a choice (free checked bags? priority check in, boarding, and security? sold) so I understand his feeling towards American/Hilton/etc. But I digress.

I'm back on the blog horse, and this week I'm writing about Travel. My top 5 websites (you didn't realize it was a list, did you) I use for travel:
#1: www.kayak.com
#2: www.priceline.com(name your own price, to be discussed later)
#3: www.flightstats.com
#4: www.wunderground.com
#5: www.seatguru.com

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Write What You Know (Andrew)

4/20/2010 4:22:00 PM

"So, are you from here?" is probably the #2 most asked question of us Game Runners (right after "So - you just get out of jail?").

To be clear, we're from San Francisco, but in the last 7 days we've covered:
- Seattle,
New Brunswick NJ,
Miami ,
Boston,
Scottsdale,
Boulder,
Dallas,
The Bay Area

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The Big Kid London Easter Egg Hunt! (Mark)

4/5/2010 12:23:17 PM

Sorry, we can't stop ourselves with the Easter puns. We know everyBUNNY is HOPing we'll stop, but we're just so EGGcited about how EGGstraordinarily fun the Big Kid London Easter Hunt was on Saturday! We're pretty EGGstatic about it.

Thanks to all the amazing folks who came down to the South Bank to chase down the Easter Bunny, eat hot cross buns off a fishing pole, show Jesus a magic trick, do an egg-and-spoon race with a very large chicken, reenact Noah's Ark through interpretive dance and so much more. We raised a ton of money for MIND, a very worthy mental health charity, and had ridiculous amounts of fun along the way.

We've picked some of our favourite photos from the game to showcase the creative brilliance of our many players. Almost 200 people showed up to partake in the holiday adventures, decked out in all types of Easter fancy dress. Here's the Very Happy Eggs in some Very Awesome Bunny Masks.

There were all kinds of HARE-brained antics with the Easter Bunny. She got a piggy-back ride from team Eggnostics...

...but got attacked by the Free Rangers...

...and got nibbled on by team Joy Division!

But she got her revenge by eating the entire team of Highland Lovers Make Better Snorers!

Los Sombreros prayed to Jesus, who was having a bit of trouble working his miracles...

...but his day vastly improved when he showed some leg to the aptly named Playboys and Bunnygirls.

The Bunnygirls also got a piece of the Chicken...

...who also butted up against the Nameless Bunnies.

We loved the fabulously facial-haired 6 Chocolateers posing for a photo with the Cardinal, who was bestowing all kinds of blessings during this holiday adventure.

A bunch of you went fishing for hot cross buns, like this brave soul from Norfolk in Chance (one of our favourite team names!)

And a group meal for team ROAR!

Here's team Tourch with the salty sea dog fisherman who was testing out his new religious fish bait and leading the hot cross buns game.

We don't know exactly what Fans of Mankini Man (another awesome team name) were getting up to in this picture, but we like it. Fire! Synchronized moves! Balls flying at your face! Brilliant.

We enjoyed this fab photo from the Nameless Bunnies who went sailing away...

and we were quite impressed with 'Cassie Doing The Knowledge' from the Shortbus Shooters...

...but blown away by the dedication of Highland Lovers Make Better Snorers. We love you too. We're going to get your team name tattooed on our foreheads...we promise.

Congrats to the winners, the Wanstead Sox!

And the runners-up, the Mini Eggs!

Lastly, a special shout-out to team Gadzooks! They may not have completed the most missions, but certainly brought some well-lubricated happiness to the Big Kid London Easter Hunt.

An EGGSTRAORDINARY THANK YOU to everyone who came out and played the Big Kid Easter Hunt! Thanks also to all our performers and the Mad Hatter on Stamford Street for hosting our adventure. Bearded Kitten and The Go Game will be back with an even bigger and better game this summer, so sign up for our newsletter to get all the info and stay tuned for all the fun to come.

How excited are we to do this all over again? THIS EXCITED.

We'll see you then!

Mei and Chris

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Street Food Scavenger hunt at SXSW (Ian)

3/3/2010 4:05:54 PM

IF you're heading to SXSW, peep this!!! Sounds like fun.
Check it

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Amazing Talk by Jesse Schell (Ian)

2/23/2010 2:02:18 PM

PS3 Games - E3 2010 - Guitar Hero 5

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Scavenger hunt for Loopt (Ian)

1/7/2010 4:30:38 PM

Late this fall we were charged with creating a fun, easy-to-use scavenger hunt to be run entirely on the Loopt Platform. Loopt is fun, functional 'Social Mapping' service that lets you know where your friends are at any given moment. It also aims to educate its users about goings-on in various neighborhoods. It's like Gowalla and Foursquare (without the scoring/points), and many consider it the most robust location-based social networking tool out there. We were obviously more than happy to help them inject some game-play into their service in the form of 3 large city-wide, holiday-themed scavenger hunts. They went down in LA, NYC and SF during Dec. and Jan,and the whole bi-coastal shin-dig bore the name: Holiday from the Holidays.

Designing the game was a significant challenge as we couldn't use our trusty Go Game web app called MazeMaker, which allows players to enter answers which are verified and scored online. What we came up with was a game design that used Loopt to drive players to actors or 'Plants' sprinkled liberally throughout the gamezone. The solutions to the location-based puzzles resulted in phone numbers which represented new friends that the players would add. They would then go find these new friends, do some crazy interactions and earn drink tickets to be redeemed at the final party. Each actor represented a different holiday (Frida Kahlo for Cinco de Mayo, a giant Turkey for T-giving, etc), and they were simply AWESOME. Ultimately the games led everyone back to an ending venue where the beer did flow and men chundered.

What proved to be the MOST challenging hurdles were things that, to date, we've found no technical work-around for: Massive Storms! The first game in LA corresponded (to the minute) with THIS particular doozy of a storm . Understandably, attendance was well fell short of the 500 people who'd signed up (but Angelinos are known to melt in rain so we'll give them a pass). Not to worry, though, because a mere week away lay the NYC version of the Game. Finn jetted east to administer this game to the hardy New Yorkers who certainly wouldn't be deterred by a little rain. It turned out that, again -- to the minute, the game collided with what shall most likely be known as #FREAKINGSNOWPOCALYPSE2009-OMG-WEREALLGONNADIE!!!!!!!!!!!!! Turns out that many of the players who'd signed up opted for PJs and hot cocoa over a city-wide scavenger hunt. Or, they just wanted to make snow angels and not listen to odd directions from a phone.

Once we made a ritual sacrifice of a half a dozen iPhones, the rainclouds cleared and the tables were set for the 3rd and final game in our hometown of SF. Several hundred players braved the partly-cloudy skies and 62-degree weather and our game-design was finally put to the test. It worked like a charm!!! One particular gps watch-wearing super geek called it 'The funnest urban event I've ever participated in!!!' He sent us this little track of his day.

It was gratifying to finally see the game in action, being played by tons of people and, of course, being well-received. We put a ton of work into these games. It was a good exercise in design for us as we tend to use our one web tool exclusively. Location-based gaming seems like it's here to stay, and whomever can make the stickiest game will win the most tumb-balls. Right now Foursquare (and Gowalla) are rocking it because, imho, they're fun, easy and pretty addictive. Bottom line: they are games, and people love to play. We'd love to bring a little more of The Go Game's interactivity to these game platforms, wherein players can run/hide/tag/hi5 and otherwise get silly with one another (in the flesh), all in the name of amassing points or reputation, without being too stalker-y. We'll get on that project next week (after we sew a new turkey suit).

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Sims3 Marketing Game -- Sim to Win (Ian)

12/9/2009 12:19:42 PM

Over the month of November we created and ran a nation-wide, college campus-based promotional game for the launch of Electronic Arts' Sims3 Expansion pack, called Sim to Win. We were fortunate enough to work again with an energetic and trusting marketing team from Electronic Arts, led by the lovely Summer Bradley.

20 universities fielded a grand total of 412 teams, who jostled for position over several weeks, staging CRAZY creative video missions, sleuthing for online clues, and generally procrastinating on the mid-term front. The relatively small teams (mostly1-3 players) actively completed missions for 2 weeks, and followed that up with 2 additional weeks of online voting that kept the scores fluctuating. Teams shared links to their missions via Facebook and Twitter -- to the tune of over 25,000 votes cast. In the end, 20 lucky collegians claimed their rightful spoils -- shiny new laptops!

Our writers came up with top-notch Sims3-related mission content, and used a host of on-line tools (Google Earth, Streetview, Facebook, Twitter, etc) to enhance the overall web scavenger hunt experience. As with any product we create, there was a health dose of real-life play, and that's where the wheat got separated from the chaff, talent-wise. One submission we really like was this:

The challenge below asked teams to create their own Sims avatar, but give the game controller to their disgruntled ex-bf/gf.

Sim to Win was a success on many fronts. It delivered numbers/eyeballs/impressions to the tune of:

50K pageviews
27K votes
Average of 2.5 minutes spent on the 'best of' gallery

The goal of the game was to drum up excitement about Sims3 and to encourage active Sims devotees and non-gamers alike to experience and revel in Sims3. We got a nice mix of hardcore Simmers and newbies and we're quite certain the game gave a fresh perspective on a first-person pc game. The game content was shared far past the 1,000 or so players, and what got communicated was pretty simple: people having a ton of fun with a game about a game.

The game engine that Finn built worked like a Swiss watch. Alli, Ian W and yours truly spent untold hours creating fake Facebook profiles, scouring photos of campuses and concocting hugely entertaining challenges that the teams digested at a 67% success rate.

For any ongoing game (longer than a few hours) you run the risk of disincentivizing (if that is indeed a word) the late-comers. When you see that you're already 500 points behind, you're more likely to click away. With this in mind, we designed the game so that 'late' teams could complete all the prior missions retroactively. This helped a lot with retention over the course of the 2 weeks.

Participating schools were:

University of Arizona
University of Arkansas
University of Colorado
University of Connecticut
University of Florida
Florida State University
University of Georgia
University of Iowa
University of Kansas
University of Kentucky
University of Maryland
Michigan State
University of Nebraska
University of Oklahoma
Penn State
Purdue University
Syracuse University
UNC
Utah
Virginia Tech

Don't you want to know which school was the most creative/smartest? Maybe it's something they put in the swampwater, or the rubbing-of-elbows with all the national champion athletes, but in our humble opinion, the University of Florida earned the distinction of OVERALL-SCHOOL-THAT-ROCKED-OUR-WORLD-THE-MOST.

Thanks to everyone who helped make this game a big success!

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A Blog About A Blog! (Michelle)

12/4/2009 11:53:38 AM

Check it out! We've been blogged about!

In city where we travel, we hire local actors to plant in our games. Just last week, we ran an awesome Undercover Game at the Mall of America, and one of our actors was the charming Michael Venske. Unbeknownst to us, he blogged about us after the game! Here's what he said!

...an open letter to corporate america

Dear Head Honchos:

Are you looking for a way to bring unity and increased performance to a group of your employees that may be fearful about their employment due to America�s tough economic state? Do you want more options for �corporate entertainment� than just an afternoon of skits in the boardroom making fun of Bob from accounting? Do you want to get involved and be apart of your team again?

If you answered �yes� to ANY of the questions above, then The Go Game is your alternative to corporate entertainment that won�t just waste an hour after lunch!

As an actor, I�ve worked with The Go Game on missions for Target and Best Buy. In addiction to character work (acting), part of my job is to ensure all members of the team are participating. Using my skills as an educator and improviser, I�m able to quickly note which team members aren�t participating, get them involved immediately, and continue to unite your employees as being members of the same team.

The best part of The Go Game, in addition to genuinely bringing you and your employees together, is that the game�s entertaining, educational, and fun! You�re winning in multiple ways with The Go Game!

Sincerely,

Michael Venske
http://michaelvenske.com/blog/?p=677

Thanks Michael!!

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Sweet Creativity Training! (Michelle)

10/29/2009 4:21:59 PM

This week The Go Game went to beautiful Boulder, CO to run a creativity training for the first-year attorneys at a large, international law firm. Led by Michelle (Game Producer) and Lisa (Improvisation Guru), we spent the day making movies, doing improvisation exercises and discussing how to take the creative process back to the law firm to create a more successful and supportive work environment.

We divided everyone into teams, which were comprised of the learning groups that these first-year lawyers will work intimately with over the next year. At the end of the day, we were thrilled to hear that our Creativity Training really helped the players develop stronger relationships with their team members and coworkers. In our final debrief, one guy said:

�It�s amazing how often these �team building� activities just show you how un-trustworthy your coworkers are. You know, you do a trust fall and no one catches you� that sort of thing. But I actually feel much closer to my coworkers after today! I feel confident that we can trust each other and will support each other this year. This was definitely the best team building I�ve ever done!

You can see just how close the teams became with this eloquently-written love note written from one team to another�

In all seriousness though, the training was an amazing event, and it was really fulfilling to see the players so engaged in learning about themselves and their teams. It seems that we helped them create a work environment that will contribute greatly to their success in their first year at the firm.

Here�s what our client said about the game�

"Hi Michelle,
Thank you (and Lisa) for running a very successful program� the associates certainly had some fun videos and good learning that came out of the process. I think the combination of improv and videos made the program engaging and the afternoon flew by.
I hope to work with you and Lisa again in the future."

Creativity Rocks!

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PICNIC - Best. Conference. Ever. (chris)

10/15/2009 7:02:09 AM

***Cross-posted from The Go Game UK blog***

The Go Game has done quite a few conferences in our time. There was the 3200 person extravaganza in Dallas and the crazy 72-hour free for all at SXSWi this past March. But no conference we've been a part of compares to PICNIC, held just a few weeks ago in Amsterdam.

The organisers of PICNIC have tagged the event as 'Not Your Ordinary Picnic,' which is true, but doesn't give you the full scope of the event. In reality it's not your ordinary ANYTHING. PICNIC is a mash up of the finest tech and design minds in Europe that produced spectacular results. Life size Etch-A-Sketch? Check. RFID tags and games? Check. A DJ? Check. A twitter tree? Check. Free coffee? Check.

The conference took place at the Westergasfabriek, a converted gasworks on the edge of downtown Amsterdam. The hub of activity for the event was the Picnic Club which you can tour in 360 degrees to get a full scope of the crazy things going on.

We played The Go Game in the Picnic Club and integrated things like the Etch-a-Sketch and make your own collaborative music video booth into the game. Of course there were ample opportunities for teams to explore PICNIC's dining options and interact with the local wildlife:

If you are in the tech, arts, design or interactivity sector here in the UK or Europe I hope to see you at PICNIC 2010. For now, we recommend viewing the PICNIC Flickr photostream below:

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