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In
the nineteen eighties Tony Harmsworth designed the Nessie Hunt board game
with the assistance of Loch Ness Project leader Adrian Shine. The game won a
number of awards, but never made any money. Other game manufacturers were
not interested in taking the project on so after the first ten thousand were
sold there was no further production. The last few of that print run can be
purchased here.
Tony
always felt that the game would translate well to be played on a computer,
but designers wanted to change it into a "shoot-em-up" with Nessie being
pursued by fleets of yellow submarines.
The game has been highly praised for its unobtrusive educational nature and a violent computer game was the worst way to deal with the subject matter. The designers were sacked and the game languished undeveloped until Second Life® offered a way to take it forward in a virtual Loch Ness environment.
The
game is played in stages.
Firstly you have to register for the game by visiting the virtual Loch Ness Project headquarters on the lochside. Here you speak to a robotic representation of Adrian Shine who sets you up on the database and gives you instructions on how to play.
Now you set off on a short learning curve experience where you wander around the Virtual Scottish Highlands looking for people who may have seen the Loch Ness Monster. When you find them (robots we have hidden in various locations) you ask for their evidence and you receive this as a collectable notecard. Each piece of evidence adds to your points tally.
There is also a Nessie currency and this allows you to rent equipment later in the game. This plays its part as hazards add to or reduce your funds.
After
eye-witnesses you have to find cameras, then underwater cameras, sonar
machines, nets, water chemistry devices and other biological equipment
before finally deploying your cage. Will you catch Nessie, or just a few
journalists?
During the game you have your evidence assessed by experts, computer enhanced by NASA, you have to visit overseas sponsors and suffer various penalties.
Click this link to see the current Nessie Hunt Leader Board. Games start during the first week of each month. This is the Nessie Hunt Hall of Fame.
THE
CRYSTAL MAZEWith in-world physics allowing some objects to be "phantom" we were able to create a maze of glass sheets of which some can be walked through. The maze costs a few pennies to enter and we are looking for a sponsor at £50 per month in order to make it free of charge. Would you like your company or product featured as sponsors of the Crystal Maze? Any double-glazing companies out there?
SCOTTISH HERITAGE GAME
Work is underway on a heritage game for people interested in Scotland's
history. Questions are hidden in various monuments and historic places in
the Virtual Scottish Highlands. Get one wrong and you are sent off to other
locations to carry out forfeits, all the time learning more about our
colourful history.
During the game you visit stone circles, Glengarry, Urquhart, Inverness and Aldourie castles, historic buildings like Balnain House and spooky Boleskine.
It is hoped that the game will be complete early in 2011.
Click to open the map in a separate window.