What I'm playing: August

Outside of Kol (of course) and Chore Wars my recent obsession is the Discovery Channel's Sharkrunners. It's a tie-in with Shark Week and the premise is that a player captains a shark research vessel and tools around the coast of California encountering sharks and launching expeditions. Pretty cool idea, but here's the hook. The sharks in the game are controlled by actual sharks: half a dozen sharks in the Pacific tagged with GPS locaters that send their positions into the game. I'm fascinated by positional data.

The Equinox there is my boat (though I wish I had named it the Belafonte or at least the Sharkteaser). I'm headed up to Monterey because it looks like a couple of sharks are hanging out there. Where it says ETA four hours - that's four real hours. I'm hoping the sharks are still there when I wake up tomorrow. Once a player's boat crosses paths with a shark they are notified by email or text message to their phone and are given three hours to log on and resolve the encounter. Each encounter yields opportunities to virtually research the shark, which earns money to upgrade the boat and hire additional crew. Sharkrunners isn't a MMORPG, but there are leaderboards and a player can designate a "rival" researcher.

If anyone needs a rival (and isn't a rare and vicious jaguar shark) let me know!