Shelby Logan's Run
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The Game is a non-stop 24- to 48-hour treasure hunt,
puzzlehunt A puzzle hunt (sometimes рuzzlehunt) is an event where teams compete to solve a series of puzzles, many of which are tied together via metapuzzles. Puzzlehunt puzzles are usually not accompanied by direct instructions for how to solve them; ...
or road rally that has run in the
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and
Seattle Seattle ( ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Washington and in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. With a population of 780,995 in 2024, it is the 18th-most populous city in the United States. The city is the cou ...
areas. Its teams use
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s rigged with power and
Internet The Internet (or internet) is the Global network, global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a internetworking, network of networks ...
access and drive hundreds of miles from puzzle site to puzzle site, overcoming often outrageous physical and mental challenges along the way, usually with no sleep. Teams in games have been required to walk around the roof of the
Space Needle The Space Needle is an observation tower in Seattle, Washington, United States. Considered to be an icon of the city, it has been designated a List of Seattle landmarks, Seattle landmark. Located in the Lower Queen Anne, Seattle, Lower Queen An ...
, find a puzzle hidden in a live rat, and circulate a petition to ban
dihydrogen monoxide The dihydrogen monoxide parody is a parody that involves referring to water by its unfamiliar systematic name#In chemistry, chemical systematic name "dihydrogen monoxide" (DHMO, or the chemical formula H2O) and describing some properties of w ...
from local ecosystems while dressed in superhero outfits. Game founder
Joe Belfiore Joe Belfiore is an American business executive who has held various roles at Microsoft since August 1990, mostly in the field of user experience. A frequent speaker, Belfiore has appeared at many Microsoft conferences, often giving demos on stag ...
has described the Game as "the ultimate test for Renaissance men and women."


History

The earliest roots of The Game can be found in games created in
Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...
in 1973 by a graphic designer named
Donald Luskin Donald Luskin (born April 1954) is Chief Investment Officer for Trend Macrolytics LLC, a consulting firm he founded in 2001, providing investment strategy and macroeconomics forecasting and research for institutional investors. Luskin contributes c ...
and longtime friend, Patrick Carlyle. Teams competed all night long solving puzzles across L.A. for a $100 first prize. The game was a mostly underground affair, but eventually drew the attention of the ''
Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...
''. and later the
Walt Disney Company The Walt Disney Company, commonly referred to as simply Disney, is an American multinational mass media and entertainment industry, entertainment conglomerate (company), conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios (Burbank), Walt Di ...
, who produced a movie, '' Midnight Madness'', based on Luskin's game. In 1985 Joe Belfiore (at that time a student at
Clearwater Central Catholic High School Clearwater Central Catholic High School is a private college preparatory school for grades 9 through 12 and located in Clearwater, Florida, in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Saint Petersburg. Founded in 1962, the school enrolls approximately 500 ...
) and his friends, inspired by '' Midnight Madness'', created a race like the one in the film. They played four more games before Joe moved to
Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...
to go to school. With Stanford classmates Eli Ben-Shoshan and Andrew Reisner, he created the Bay Area Race Fantastique (BARF) which occurred six times before changing its name to 'The Game'. There are some interesting notes about the initial BARFs and number of teams that actually completed them due to the hyper-competitive aspect of the BARF format. The term "Gentleman's Game" was used to describe the Stanford Game shortly after Joe Belfiore graduated, meaning there was no prize for winning, only bragging rights. Two more events were held in the Bay Area before Joe Belfiore moved to
Seattle Seattle ( ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Washington and in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. With a population of 780,995 in 2024, it is the 18th-most populous city in the United States. The city is the cou ...
to work for
Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...
, taking the official "The Game" with him (although the San Francisco Bay Area people still consider their games to also be "The Game"). Structurally, the two Games are identical, but the Seattle Games tend to be more competitive and require more technological gear. The post-Stanford Games were organized in Seattle, Napa/Sonoma, New York, Los Angeles and Las Vegas throughout 1995–2002. Currently, versions of The Game (both full-blown and abbreviated foot-transportation-only) are organized regularly by Stanford dorm staff members as a bonding activity for their residents. Similarly, Microsoft continues running the "Intern Game" for summer interns, organized by Stanford Alums employed at Microsoft.


Structure

The general structure of The Game is a series of puzzle challenges, often called "Clues". Each challenge solves to the location where the next challenge can be found. During the course of The Game, a team will often travel all around a metropolitan area. Usually there is an overall theme to the clues, or even a story that ties all the clues together.


Game communities

The next Game each year would typically be run by whatever team felt the ability, chutzpah and desire to do so. In the early days of BARF and in the subsequent Seattle Games, the first-right-of-refusal fell to the team who won the previous Game. Future Game Controls (GCs) in the Bay Area tended to rely on the expertise of previous GCs and the so-called legitimacy of owning the "Captain's List". In the Bay Area there is no "Central System" or "Central Ownership" per se, but rather an autonomous collective of Gamers (a group of teams that communicate with one another) and a group-moderated site. As the Game grew, it became increasingly more high-tech and more psychological in nature, a result of each Game trying to "outdo" the previous Games. For instance, a team member might find themselves stripped of all clothes and spectacles, be dressed in nothing but a hospital gown, have the next puzzle be written on the back of their neck in reverse lettering, and then be deposited at a strip club. Teams became increasingly competitive and would even break the rules and mislead other teams in order to gain an advantage, much to the fellow participants' and organizers' displeasure. Such teams can become
blacklist Blacklisting is the action of a group or authority compiling a blacklist of people, countries or other entities to be avoided or distrusted as being deemed unacceptable to those making the list; if people are on a blacklist, then they are considere ...
ed by the community at large and no longer find themselves invited to future Games. This nature of self-policing (decentralized control and word-of-mouth) prevents out-of-control teams from destroying the elaborate events. The Game culture has spawned several spinoffs in the Bay Area, including the Bay Area Treasure Hunt (BATH), Bay Area Night Game (BANG), Park Challenge, and The Iron Puzzler. There have been several spinoffs in other parts of North America as well. There are three yearly games in
New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
that are very similar to The Game: Midnight Madness, The Haystack, and The Great All Nighter. There is also a yearly game in
Hot Springs A hot spring, hydrothermal spring, or geothermal spring is a Spring (hydrology), spring produced by the emergence of Geothermal activity, geothermally heated groundwater onto the surface of the Earth. The groundwater is heated either by shallow ...
,
Arkansas Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the West South Central region of the Southern United States. It borders Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, Texas to the southwest, and Oklahoma ...
also called Midnight Madness. Midnight Madness Brevard also puts on events many times a year in
Brevard County, Florida Brevard County ( ) is a county in the U.S. state of Florida. It is on the Atlantic coast of eastern Central Florida. As of the 2020 census, the population was 606,612, making it the 10th-most populated county in Florida. The official county s ...
. Midnight Madness Vermont hosts MMVT events several times a year as well. In 2009, the first multicity Game was created, the brainchild of Deborah Goldstein. Different Area Same Hunt, or DASH, the Game featured puzzles created by teams in Boston, MA, Washington, DC, Houston, TX, Los Angeles, CA, Palo Alto and San Francisco, CA, Portland, OR, and Seattle, WA. DASH was played in all 8 cities simultaneously. Since 2009, DASH has occurred several times, and continues to create and unite game communities in collaborative, multicity, realtime games. Several new Games have appeared with modified formats, including the Black Letter Game (2012, 2015) in which the emphasis is on puzzles embedded in physical artifacts that are mailed to players on a monthly basis. No travel is required.


Notable events

During the 1999 Game, a bottle of bright green liquid was found at a game location in the New York City
World Trade Center World Trade Centers are the hundreds of sites recognized by the World Trade Centers Association. World Trade Center may also refer to: Buildings * World Trade Center (1973–2001), a building complex that was destroyed during the September 11 at ...
by a
Marriott Hotel Marriott Hotels & Resorts is Marriott International's brand of full-service hotels and resorts based in Bethesda, Maryland. As of June 30, 2020, there were 582 hotels and resorts with 205,053 rooms operating under the brand, in addition to 160 h ...
employee, prompting a partial evacuation of the hotel. In the 2002 Game, "Shelby Logan's Run", player Bob Lord was severely injured after misunderstanding a clue and falling thirty feet down a disused mineshaft. The players were sent into the desert outside Las Vegas with a clue containing the warning "1306 is clearly marked. Enter ONLY 1306. Do NOT enter others." Arriving at the site from an unexpected direction, Lord mistakenly entered mineshaft 1296, not realising that the mines were numbered, and ignored anonymous, spraypainted warnings assuming that they were part of the game. The fall crushed several vertebrae and left Lord a
quadriplegic Tetraplegia, also known as quadriplegia, is defined as the dysfunction or loss of Motor control, motor and/or Sense, sensory function in the Cervical vertebrae, cervical area of the spinal cord. A loss of motor function can present as either weak ...
, and a lawsuit was filed against the organisers of that year's Game, who were criticized for not mentioning the danger in the pre-game liability waiver.Martin, Jonathan
Game Over: For Seattle's brainy elite, the ultimate test of wits turns tragic
''Seattle Times'', 14 September 2008.
There was no Seattle-based Game for three years after the 2002 Game, although the Bay Area Game continued apace. The August 2005 "Mooncurser's Handbook" Game in Seattle, run by a group of twelve veteran Seattle Gamers, renewed the Seattle Game tradition, with a special emphasis on safety.


Specific instances and similar games

;San Francisco Bay Area games
Doctor When Game
San Francisco Bay Area, 2012
World Henchmen Organization (WHO)
San Francisco recast, 2011

2008
Pirate's BATH (BATH3)
2007
No More Secrets
2007 * , 2006
Paparazzi
2006
Griffiths Collection
2005
Justice Unlimited
2004
The Genome Game
2004
The Goonies Game
2003
FoBiK
2002
Shelby Logan's Run
€”The Official 'Seattle Game' 2002
Jackpot
Las Vegas, 2002 * Zelda: A Hidden Link, 2001
Homicide: Life on the Farm
2001
The 420 Game
2001 * MegaHard, 2000 * Wonka, 1999

1999 * Dragonhunt, 1998 * The Green Game, 1997 * Star Wars, 1997 * Indiana Jones, 1996 * Godfather, 1996 * SETI, 1996 * Magic: The Gaming, 1995 * Operation: The Plague, 1995 * The Most Dangerous Game, 1994 * King Arthur, 1994 * HELL, 1994 * R.A.T.R.A.C.E. 1993 * Alice in Wonderland, 1993 * Long Ride Home, 1992 * "Circle K" Game, 1992 * Mission Improbable, 1991 ;Shorter Bay Area games (less than 24 hours)
Clue: The Game
2008
SFMiniGame
(run simultaneously in Seattle), 2008

2008 * The Apprentice: Zorg, 2006
CRANEA
2005
BATH2
2003
BATH1
2001 * Overnightmare, 2003 * Magic 8-Ball, 2002

1998
The Quest for Ultimate Power
1997 ;Recurring Bay Area events (less than 24 hours)
Decathlon
- 12 hour events fro
ShintekiBANG
(Bay Area Night Game) ;Seattle games
Black Letter Labs
Seattle, 2012, 2015
World Henchmen Organization (WHO)
Seattle, 2011
The Mooncurser's Handbook
Seattle, 2005
Shelby Logan's Run
Las Vegas, 2002 * Blau Foundation, Seattle, 2001 * VQuest, Seattle, 2000

1999
ISETV
Los Angeles, 1998
Thanatos Society
Seattle, 1997 * Hope2Die, Seattle, 1996 * EnGenetics, Seattle, 1995 ;Portland games
WarTron
Portland, Oregon, 2012 ;Phoenix games * The Hun

annual event since 1950 ;Boston games
Miskatonic University Game
2019
WarTron
Greater Boston Area recast, 2013
BAPHL
(Boston Area Puzzle Hunt League) recurring event since 2010 ;Washington, D.C. games
The Famine Game
Washington D.C. Metro Area, 2013 ;National games and games outside the US * Cygnet LLP: Rebooting the UK Game - July 2011, London * Girls and Boys Come Out to Play - September 2014, London
DASH
(Different Area Same Hunt) - a day Game run in multiple cities simultaneously
Casino Royale: The Game
- April 2007, Singapore


External links


Joe Belfiore's 2004 TED talk on The Game
including discussion of the 2002 "Shelby Logan's Run" game
Puzzle Hunt Calendar
- schedule of various upcoming and ongoing events
Team Snout
- links to Bay Area games, past and future, and "Game Control HOWTO" information
Game Control
- Official website of The Seattle Game (currently defunct)
Shelby Logan's Run
- Website detailing the entire content of the 2002 Game
Seattle GC
- information source for The Game, focused around Seattle events and people (currently defunct)
Seattle Puzzling
- De facto home of SNAP, basically the Seattle equivalent of BANG
THE GAME
- A site of the Stanford Game
Midnight Madness AR
- Midnight Madness in Hot Springs, Arkansas
Midnight Madness Brevard
- Midnight Madness in Brevard County, Florida
Paregoric.org
- Midnight Madness 2006 in Hot Springs, Arkansas
Midnight Madness NYC
- Midnight Madness in New York City
Microsoft Intern Game
- The site for the incarnation of The Game run for Microsoft's Summer Interns
The Game Princeton
- A short Game run every September by graduate students at Princeton University
Encounter
- International network of Game-typed urban games
Black Letter Labs
- A site for the Black Letter game.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Game Road rallying
Game A game is a structured type of play usually undertaken for entertainment or fun, and sometimes used as an educational tool. Many games are also considered to be work (such as professional players of spectator sports or video games) or art ...
Stanford University