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The Museum Game

 

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A collaborative adventure game of resemblance

Come for a group adventure in the Landmarks Gallery. Borrow an iPad, form a team and play The Museum Game. It's about exploring the world through similarity: the connections between objects on display. Be surprising; take a creative leap. Most importantly, be interesting to your competitors – that's how you win a place on the board.

How it works

It looks like a wood and metal box – an intriguing, beautiful device – and it works as a game, of resemblance. You enter your code, take a team photograph, turn the key, and enter the game.

Opening screen of the Museum's iPad game

The challenge is to think about an object’s attributes – composition, shape, colour, use, provenance, whatever! – and find a way in which it resembles another object on display at the Museum.

The aim is to occupy nodes on the gameboard by making meaningful – and appealing – connections. In each round, players photograph an object and describe how it relates to existing objects on the board. Each round has a time limit, but you need to take care to create connections that are interesting or delightful in some way – whichever team proposes the best object and relationship wins the place on the gameboard.

Gameboard seeded with an Aboriginal breastplate, Prototype Holden sedan, Mary Gilmore's typewriter and the spearhead removed from Governor Phillip in 1790 


After the game, all your data – images, descriptions, relationships and ratings – will be available to you. So you can reflect on the ideas your group created and extend the thinking beyond the Museum.

Below is a video introduction to the Game. It has some technical issues; please regard it as a first draft! We share it in the spirit of early release, perpetual beta and incrementality :)

Want to be involved? (Hint: yes!)

Find out all about the game as a program for visiting groups. Or proceed directly to make a booking.

If you fancy some background reading, you can catch up on The Museum Game by reading the game-related posts on our Education blog. You can also see various gameboards and other design and technical musings on our Labs blog.