Find the Future: explained. Sort of.

Remember when I said I was going to play a game at the New York Public Library overnight? Yep, that happened.

I arrived at the main branch of the NYPL at 7 PM on Friday and did not leave until 6 AM Saturday. The thought of trying to describe what those 11 hours were like is daunting, so I'm going to break it into a few blog posts so that one day I can look back and read about it in all the glorious detail that I may have forgotten by then. This post is going to be my best attempt at breaking down the mechanics of the game, called Find the Future (Find the Future is also the theme of the overall NYPL centennial celebration).

I'm also going to say that this post is long and probably dry, but if you go to the game's website you can a) look at the things I'm talking about and more importantly, b) play online. This game is some cool ish and if you're a nerd like me (you know who you are) I would HIGHLY HIGHLY recommend playing online sometime between now and the end of 2011.

When the game began, we were divided into 2 teams: Patience and Fortitude, which are the names of the big lions outside the library. Roar.

Photo credit

From our larger teams we self-divided into smaller squads of 2 to 8 people.

The crux of the game was locating and "unlocking" 100 different historical artifacts, all of which belonged to someone or represented an event that had significant impact, or changed the world in some way.

A few of the amazing things we got to see:
- A draft of the Declaration of Independence
- A map of Drake's voyage
- Mark Twain's birthday menu
- Virginia Woolf's walking stick
- Beatles trading cards
- Malcolm X's briefcase and notebook
- Original Wizard of Oz drawings

Artifacts were arranged by levels, so even if you passed an artifact that was part of the game, you couldn't necessarily unlock it if, for example, the artifact was in level 5 but you were still on level 2. You opened new levels by unlocking more and more items.

The way you unlocked an artifact was by locating it both in the library and in your handy Find the Future smartphone app. You used the phone to read about the item's historical significance and then scan a QR code located near the artifact. Once the phone recognized the code, it unlocked the artifact and also "transferred its power to you" (air quotes) via a legitimately cool process of placing your thumb on your touch screen, your phone making an awesome swirly pattern, and then the phone vibrating to show that you were done absorbing the object's power (yes, there is a cheese element here, I get it).

There were 10 total powers, with very nerdy gamer-sounding names like Midnight Ocean, Jar of 7 Secrets, Cloud Fortress, etc. Each power was supposed to represent one of the strengths needed in order to change the world (are we getting the futuristic focus of the game now?), and unlocking an object would give you a random number of points towards certain powers. So it would say "+7 Hero's Compass, +3 Conjuring Hand," etc. This was a fun layer to add to the game but really had no bearing on anything, and frankly I don't even remember what any of the powers actually mean. Doh.

Once you unlocked an artifact you could go back to your computer, log in to the game's website, and see the story - which was really a writing or drawing prompt - associated with it. Each prompt took the item's significance and used it to pose a challenge that was forward thinking. They were meant to inspire people to think about the future and what part they might have in changing it. For example, there is an inspirational Milton quote above the library's reading room, which was our home base for the night. Once that item was unlocked, you could access the "Writing on the Wall" story, which challenged you to write an equally inspirational quote that could in theory take the place of the Milton one and would inspire people for years to come.

Both the Patience and Fortitude teams were expected to complete all 100 tasks, and we kept track of this via several easels with checklists where the smaller squads could register the stories they were working on. You were allowed to duplicate efforts, however, so just because one team claimed a story didn't mean you were prevented from also submitting something - as long as it all got done, all was well.

As you submitted things, your level in certain achievements would go up - for example, you would become a writer level 3, or illustrator level 1, or what have you. Again, this was a fun thing to add to the game but didn't actually impact anything, which is probably good seeing as even after submitting 3 essays I was still a writer level 0 (technical difficulties, we had many).

By 6 AM, there was to be at minimum 100 stories from each of the 2 teams that would all be bound together in a book. And yes, there was an old school style book binder on location working through the night, binding by hand as the stories poured in.

Another element of the night were the library stacks tours - because the NYPL is a research library, their materials don't circulate and the stacks aren't open to the public. Only about 30 people are authorized to enter them on an average day, but the 500 of us were super lucky in that we got to go way down in the basement and take tours, which left every 10 minutes. While on the tour, we were instructed to pick up one of the postcards that were placed strategically throughout the stacks. Each participant had a postcard addressed to them with a handwritten note on it commending them on their future achievements.

I should mention at this point that the application for the game involved answering the prompt, "By the year 2021, I want to become the first person who..." and so each postcard assumed that you had accomplished whatever you set out to do, and thanked you for making the world a better place because of it.

When you picked up a random postcard on the stacks tour, it then became your mission to find the person whose note you had and hand it to them. More on this hilarity in a subsequent post.

AND FINALLY, there were also clues on the tour that would help you determine a secret phrase that we could all use in the future to identify fellow Find the Future participants.

Sound intense? It was. I am in nothing but awe of Jane McGonigal, the game's creative director (check out her TED talk, it's super interesting).

Sound fun? IT WAS. OBVIOUSLY.

More to come about what this whole crazy experience was actually like.