
First team: |
Pink (first
player) |
Arrival: |
3:23am PDT
(2:23am PST) |
Second team: |
Black
(first player) |
Arrival: |
3:39am PDT
(2:39am PST) |
Soundtrack: |
On the Wild
Side, Motley Crue |
A#83947 |
Shelby's
Message |
Left abandoned and alone at separate casinos, players were
forced to problem-solve as individuals. As each player completed their test,
they individually began to show up at the Wild Side tattoo and piercing parlor,
where they faced a unique dilemma... will I take one for the team right now? Or
wait for more people to show up?
Wild Side -- The Setup
Upon arrival, the players had their belongings returned (their vans had been
moved to that parking lot) and then were directed by the staff to "The Menu". The menu offered the following
choice:
1) Get one ear pierced -- you receive the next
clue. (an 8-track tape)
2) Get two ears pierced, or get one piercing anywhere else on your body
-- you receive the next clue (8-track) and a
puzzle you can solve which will grant you permission to use the
8-track tape player here in the store. This puzzle is
shown on the "Clue"
page for this location.
3) Get a tattoo -- we'll play you the tape.
A real dilemma, particularly if you are the first player to
arrive.
When the tape is finally played, it simply repeats the following simple message:
Go to the Southern Nevada Correctional Facility, east of Jean, Nevada.
Player Stories
Many players aggressively volunteered for self-mutilation to get their team
moving. Hadi P., Pink team, quickly got in line to get TWO ears pierced. This
was particularly ironic, though, because the Pink team actually already had an
8-track player, but didn't realize that the term "player" in the menu referred
to a tape player and not to a "missing team player". Oops.
Behind the Scenes
We thought an 8-track clue would be a good and effectively challenging (but
possible!) puzzle... however, on some of our scout trips we tried finding a
player somewhere in Vegas (after midnight) and failed miserably. That led us to
use the broad range of possibilities we did:
- there was a bonus clue before the game that revealed
that a player would be needed
(if you called the satellite scanner often
enough, you would have found this)
- allowing for various options on the mutilation menu
Surprisingly, two-weeks before the game during the beta game,
we showed up at Wild Side with our 8-track player and were SHOCKED when one of
the staff guys pulled his own out from behind the counter! It didn't seem to
actually work that well, so we stuck with ours, but we thought it was damn funny
that they did actually have one there!
Finally, it turns out a lot of teams managed to successfully
bribe the staff. Our
instructions allowed for bribery (hey, it's the game... anything goes), but
encouraged them to make the price high and to at least be very hard core for the
first few teams.
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