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Games

Use Your GPS To Play A Real-Life Version Of Minesweeper

In this innovative game-performance, a Brazilian artist combines the Windows classic with GPS-enabled mobile devices.

We all know how a minefield works—it’s that lethal territorial domination tactic that kills and cripples. The concept originated Robert Donner's famous Minesweeper game, originally for Windows PC it was responsible for detonating our pre-internet afternoons and smashing productivity to smithereens. But much has changed since the game’s creation in 1989. Mobile devices have revolutionized the way we interact with computers and location-based, geotagging software has made everything mappable and hackable. In this context, the Brazilian artist Claudio Bueno created a game-performance version of Minesweeper, to be played on smartphones in public places.

It works like this: guided by a virtual map, the player attempts to navigate an area between two points in a given amount of time without stepping on hidden virtual mines. You have to make decisions about the directions to be followed and deciding on the wrong trajectory or running out of time means GAME OVER for you. You could save yourself by bargaining for one more minute, it you correctly answer questions about the physical space you're in. Unlike the Windows version, there are no cheat codes.

The artist explains the project: In times of collective excitement by the use of online mapping systems and purchase of GPS devices presented in many different forms (vehicle tracking, dogs and even golf balls), Minesweeper is not intended to indicate the right path, but to suggest an array of possible errors, uncertainties, exploration and experimentation of the traveled territory. Through the metaphor of the minefield, it suggests observations on invisible or imponderable layers of our daily routes.

Currently, the game has matches within predetermined sites, such as Parque Trianon, where the exhibition takes place as part of the Rumos exhibition at Itaú Cultural in São Paulo until September. Soon the software will be available for download and you will be able to play it anywhere.