Spring MA

[katiesue]

Anyone else playing? Madz wants to play with her pal so I'm the token grown up.

(yes I know it's too expensive blah blah blah)

[Alex]

If anybody does, act quickly. Advanced has sold out and basic doesn't have many slots left.

The non-competitive running of it on March 25 has plenty of room, though.

(yes I know it's too expensive, doesn't have the magic of Alex writing it (oh wait, it does), and it was better when we were all young and beautiful blah blah blah).

[BarTopDancer]

you forgot better when we converged in the picnic area ;)

[Alex]

I've made arrangements.

[Stan4dSteph]

I will be out helping staff. Hope to see some familiar faces even if you aren't playing. Look forward to seeing you, katiesue! :)

[RStar]

I wish I had the time and energy to join in. It's been too many years since I've done it. While it was fun, it was also a bit too difficult to enjoy completely. I always thought Kevin moved to the East coast because of the death threats ;)

[Cadaverous Pallor]

Hey Alex, sorry I haven't gotten back to you and now I'm lazy enough to just post publicly - we'd like to help out at MA. Please only count us as one person since we'll have to switch off taking care of Theo.

I'm excited to be there!

[Alex]

Ok, Greg had replied by PM that you couldn't. Will add you to the list for communications.

[Cadaverous Pallor]

Ok, Greg had replied by PM that you couldn't. Will add you to the list for communications.We had a bit of a windfall so APs are in our future.

[Stan4dSteph]

If anyone is still interested, the competitive event is sold out, but there are still spots available for the non-competitive Day at the Park event. Mostly the same quests, with more time and more instruction up front to help new people. Price is $75/team. Date is March 25.

[Disneyphile]

Ken and I will be helping out once again too. Once we went to the dark side, there's never been talk of going back. :)

[BarTopDancer]

Ken and I will be helping out once again too. Once we went to the dark side, there's never been talk of going back. :)

I thought once you went to the dark side you couldn't go back. That's one reason I never* worked during the non-Alex years - I always wanted the option to play again.



*except for one winter MA staffing emergency a few years ago.

[Disneyphile]

I thought once you went to the dark side you couldn't go back. That's one reason I never* worked during the non-Alex years - I always wanted the option to play again.



*except for one winter MA staffing emergency a few years ago.I believe you can now. Just can't have anything to do with the dark side of the game in which you play. (I don't think anyone's ever switched back though.) However, helping out on the dark side is actually preferable to playing for us now - I think we have even more fun. (And, Ken and I still kill each other during testing. ;) )

[BarTopDancer]

I wouldn't know anything about testing, that is one area I would suck at.

[Kevy Baby]

What does one need to do to volunteer?

[Disneyphile]

Usually, MA is pretty well-staffed by now. Although, you could always check with AVP - she's usually the head person in charge of the staff.

However, I highly suggest trying out the game again, if you haven't played in awhile. A lot has evolved, and it gets even better each season. :)

There have been quests involving legos, MP3 players, digital media, black-light embroidery, and a lot of other fun surprises. :cool:

[Cadaverous Pallor]

As soon as we can teach our son the advantages of being angrily competitive we'll be back in the mix....but probably only the ones we can play for free.

[BarTopDancer]

As soon as we can teach our son the advantages of being angrily competitive we'll be back in the mix....but probably only the ones we can play for free.

Ooo! I can't wait to hear him say "read the whole fvcking question!"

[katiesue]

Yay will be happy to see all of you. Not sure what else is going on in Anaheim that weekend but hotels are insane. We ended up booking on hotwire by SNA. Sheesh.

[Cadaverous Pallor]

Yay will be happy to see all of you. Not sure what else is going on in Anaheim that weekend but hotels are insane. We ended up booking on hotwire by SNA. Sheesh.Is this (http://www.anaheimconventioncenter.com/eventsOpen.cfm?id=2407)a big deal? I have no idea.

[katiesue]

It must be - I can't think of what else but honest most are sold out and the ones remaining are at inflated rates.

[CoasterMatt]

Considering that that event takes ALL of the exhibit halls, ballrooms and many of the rooms- attendance in the 58,000 range, I'd say it probably is pretty big.

[Isaac]

I've converted from Mouse Adventure to Minnie's Moonlit Madness.
Last September my team came in 17th place out of 340 teams.
This year Michael, Malcolm, Ben and I are gonna win it!

:D

[katiesue]

I'm loving the description of Sunday's format. It seems like you can make the game as hard or as easy as you want and still feel like you're accomplishing things.

Game Structure

As the name of the event suggests, this MouseAdventure takes its inspiration from a deck of cards. Once the game offficially starts and you are released from the Paradise Pier Hotel ballroom, head to your designated starting station in order to obtain two key items:

A MouseAdventure custom deck of cards. Like a normal deck of cards, it will have 52 individual cards, each of which is a specific puzzle or task for you to complete.
A book of card game rules to help explain the puzzle on each card.

Right now, you’re probably thinking, "52 quests!? You'll kill us!" Yes, there are 52 cards—but they aren't all full-scale MouseAdventure puzzles. Each of the four suits in the deck represents a geographical area of the resort in which you solve those puzzles. Cards A through 10 in each suit are much simpler than normal MouseAdventure quests, from simply asking a question to relatively simple puzzles.

Successfully solve the A – 10 cards to receive your Jack, Queen, and King quests. For example, write your answers for the Ace, Two, and Three of Bears (which covers Critter Country) on the Jack of Bears card, then show this card to the event crew at the Bears station to get your Jack quest. The process is similar for the Queen and King cards.

Jack quests – are full-scale MouseAdventure puzzles of the type you’re likely familiar with. Solve these in the same area as the suit.
Queen quests – are physical challenges you complete for credit.
King quests – are also full-scale MouseAdventure puzzles, but unlike the Jack quests, are not restricted to the boundaries of the same geographical area.

So while there are 52 "quests" in the game, having so many different scoring opportunities opens up a lot of potential for strategy. Maybe you focus on doing all of the easier low level cards before looping back to the more difficult face cards, or focus on an entire suit at a time. Do you get the Jack quest as soon as you qualify or wait until you've qualified for all three face cards in a suit?

Time management, route management, and thinking through risk vs. reward will be key to a top finishing team.

We do not expect many, if any, teams to actually finish every task. But we do expect that everybody will be able to do a lot of them. Oh, and did we mention that trivia and EyeSpy are also involved? We'll explain those at game time.

[Ghoulish Delight]

I can't give details, but the 3 of us will be working as staff in some capacity. Hope to see folks there!

[SzczerbiakManiac]

You're already putting Disquieting Metamorphosis to work?

[Gn2Dlnd]

They needed a printer for all those cards.

[Alex]

We put the fine people of Hong Kong to work on those cards.

[Gn2Dlnd]

Oooh, Hong Kong! How upscale!

[katiesue]

Anyone going just FYI Disney just put out a traffic warning for the weekend due to a large group at the convention center. So you may want to give yourselves a little extra time. And don't forget the time change as well.

[Gn2Dlnd]

Best to avoid the Toy Story lot on convention center days.

[Cadaverous Pallor]

Best to avoid the Toy Story lot on convention center days.I didn't even think of that - thanks for the tip.

[katiesue]

We survived. Massive kudos to Alex this one was - wow - above and beyond. Slightly overwhelming and a ton of walking but I'm crossing fingers that in the final breakdown we're middle of the pack I know already we blew one Jack. We finished 3 Queen quests and they were awesome!

So glad we found CP and GD for some points (and got to see cutest kid ever). FP and DP gave us quite a pickup when we thought we were doomed. So hard to tell if you were doing ok or complete failures on this one. And Lani for giving us a bit of a nudge when we were close on time at the end.

Plus the kiddo and I (her friend S sleeps like the dead) were doing it on no sleep thanks to the peeps next door who started getting lucky about 2 AM. And man oh man oh man the park was crowded.

As always, a wonderful experience. And we look forward to figuring out the massive amount of material we either tanked or never even looked at in the future.

Huge thank you to all the staff who were super helpful without giving anything away and encouraging when we were just about to give up on the whole shebang!

[Not Afraid]

I was hoping we would get to take a fun over to the park in the late afternoon to say Hi to Steph and everyone else. Instead, I (plus Keith and my business co-horts) wrote copy all day long. ALL. DAY. LONG.

[Cadaverous Pallor]

Oof. Recovering. Had tons of fun. More later.

[Ghoulish Delight]

I'm so glad we were able to be a part of this yesterday. Being on staff was a new and totally different experience and I loved it (though a part of me is bummed we missed the chance to compete in an Alex-written game).

800 people is a lot of people, I had fun in the morning playing crowd control (and even got a complement from Disney security on the job I was doing :) ). The best part was that where I was, controlling the end of the photo line, meant I got to see and say hi to literally every single team that came in. I found that a really fun and invigorating start to the day.

Meanwhile, I think my favorite moment of the day came at the end while we were handing out game materials to people who wanted to take them home. To that point I had only really looked at the stuff dealing with the station we were assigned to. So while sitting there I was reading some of the other quests...and came across one where Alex had clearly taken inspiration from this thread (http://loungeoftomorrow.com/LoT/showthread.php?t=11310). That gave me a good laugh.

Anyway, I was not disappointed in this first glimpse of the other side. I'm not ready to hang up the iron-on transfers yet, I do see us playing again sometime in the future. But I'd be happy to help staff again too.

[Stan4dSteph]

I had fun, but it's always too short. Back to regular life...

[Kevy Baby]

I had fun, but it's always too short.

Man, if I had a nickel for every time I heard that...

[Not Afraid]

Man, if I had a nickel for every time I heard that...

.....you's have enough to have that extension surgery?:evil:

[Kevy Baby]

There aren't enough nickels in the world :(

[Alex]

Just remembered, there was a LoT inspired part of the game. I hadn't thought of it while writing it, but when Greg pointed it out I realized it was the case.

[innerSpaceman]

I was just explaining MouseAdventure to my boyfriend yesterday, and how they had to invent a category of non-competitors just to give someone else a chance to win. :D

- but mostly how, once non-competitive, we started to do badly and more badly and still more badly. I believe it was a combination of other teams getting better -and- lack of competitive oomph on our part. I don't miss playing, but it would sure be fun to help behind the scenes. I kinda miss taking part in some way. Playing was never the same once we were never really playing.

[€uroMeinke]

No motivation to cheat ;)

[Cadaverous Pallor]

I kinda miss taking part in some way. Playing was never the same once we were never really playing.You should totally help out. It was a whole new way to take part and in many ways, MUCH more fun than playing it ourselves, as we had also gotten so pathetic that our squabbling was even more intense and less worth the stress. Plus, behind the scenes, how awesome is that?

[Stan4dSteph]

One team wore a GoPro camera while playing. The time lapse video is broken up into 4 sections. Here's the YouTube playlist (http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL32E696C6DD0446C6&feature=plcp).

[Cadaverous Pallor]

One team wore a GoPro camera while playing. The time lapse video is broken up into 4 sections. Here's the YouTube playlist (http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL32E696C6DD0446C6&feature=plcp).If you watch the Rockets quest and skip to 2:45 you can briefly see me talking to them at the top of Main Street Station. Then they go looking for AK's son who is wearing the same thing I am and catch him getting off the Omnibus.

[Stan4dSteph]

If you watch the Rockets quest and skip to 2:45 you can briefly see me talking to them at the top of Main Street Station. Then they go looking for AK's son who is wearing the same thing I am and catch him getting off the Omnibus.My back makes a brief appearance in the Bears video.

We have a great compilation video of the charades. I'll post the link once it's public.

[katiesue]

The charades were an awesome idea. So much fun!

[Alex]

Definitely glad it worked. I did that one by thinking "what would I hate?" and then assumed others would enjoy it. There was some serious concern we'd get kicked off the island though.

[Alex]

And as my first writing job in many years, I must admit I miss having Steve bemoaning the decline of a once great institution afterward.

[Stan4dSteph]

And as my first writing job in many years, I must admit I miss having Steve bemoaning the decline of a once great institution afterward.Do a survey and you'll get plenty of bemoaning.

[Prudence]

We were so sad to miss the spring event for the first time in many years. I'm hoping we'll get to WDW in November, but there's no guarantee. I think I'd rather do the fall DL event, just to see Cars Land and the new DCA entrance stuff, but we've been to all the WDW events so far so I'll probably try to keep to that. Plus, no time zone change.

[Stan4dSteph]

MouseAdventure Card Games charades highlights (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ps4AeMwpnJ0)

[katiesue]

The charades were an awesomely fun break in the day. As were all the queens quests we did (we didn't get to DTD).

[Stan4dSteph]

The charades were an awesomely fun break in the day. As were all the queens quests we did (we didn't get to DTD).
Which characters did you get?

[katiesue]

I think - Mary Poppins, Alice and can't remember the last, Pluto?