Yesterday, my efforts to attend new games brought me to a little place called Destiny's for a DJed event with dancing, sploding, and trivia hosted by Loraine Alter. What made the strongest impression on me there was the warmth and friendliness of the group. There were few familiar faces there and none who stayed from beginning to end, but the club's staff and regulars were very inviting and amiable. I had a nice time dancing and talking and will probably return sometime for that reason alone.
The event took place on a little "pirate bar" pier (if you've been to an event on Marine Park's Big Sky Bay sim -- the northern sim -- it's the same structure). DJ Mudge Ashbourne fed the stream, guests fed the sploder, we all clicked the dance kitty to boogie, and eventually the trivia kicked in. There were twenty questions with no particular theme, and for a correct answer, you had your choice of either L$20 or the opportunity to ask a staff member to remove one item of clothing. Since I didn't know any of the staff, it was an easy choice.
As for the questions... here's where I confess that I felt a little overexperienced there. There are some trivia events that attract a lot of very good players, and since we're a social group, too, we sort of gravitate toward each other and to those games. There are other events that seem to be more "grassroots," in a sense. A host at a club or a cafe decides to incorporate some trivia into the normal event. The regulars have fun with it, maybe one or two stand out and have a knack for it, but there's still a big difference between what this type of game is like compared to one in which a number of the players rely on trivia winnings as their primary (or only) source of income in SL.
When I go to those sorts of events, I find myself sitting on my hands a lot (to borrow a friend's favorite phrase). At this one, most of the trivia were questions I'd heard before, probably a couple of times each, a few of them word-for-word. I made it a point not to answer two in a row, and still I took enough of the questions that others at the event began commenting (though not enough to attract serious plinking). But like I said, they were very friendly people, and several invited me to come back and bring friends. Earlier today, I received a notecard from the host about the next event because it was to be at a different location and I didn't join the group for announcements. That kind of effort to reach out is impressive.
Sample questions:
[2009/06/15 13:25] Loraine Alter: What organization elects the 15 judges of the World Court?
[2009/06/15 13:35] Loraine Alter: What socialist writer's last words were: "Last words are for fools who haven't said enough"?
[2009/06/15 13:43] Loraine Alter: Who did Henry VIII have beheaded for witchcraft and adultery, along with her wolfhound?
The club was filled not with trivia sharks answering these questions but with people who just wanted to have a good time and one guy who evidently located Loraine's resource on the web and was copy/pasting the answers (correct spelling, everything capitalized, just the right amount of time between the question and his answer). I would be curious as to how the place would change if more hardcore trivia players came to take advantage of the friendly atmosphere and familiar question topics. Most of the regulars would likely get shut out of the running on the questions as the competition picked up, but I'm not certain whether the increase in attendance would make up for that, where the club is concerned. Are more people always a good thing if they change the whole vibe?
Of course, my profiling the event makes that more likely, though I'm not expecting a mass exodus, since other trivia events take place at that time of day. But if you're looking for a new crowd or a new setting, even just for a day, or if you would rather have a staff member (males and females were present) remove an article of clothing over taking lindens, check in with Loraine and all of Destiny's babes. You probably won't be humming the Jeopardy! theme song in your head on any of the questions, but the social atmosphere is as friendly as could be.
The Specs:
=> Time/Day: Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays, 12:00 to 2:00pm, though the trivia didn't start until nearly 40 minutes after the hour when I attended.
=> Location: Destiny's Lounge, http://slurl.com/secondlife/Darling/114/79/22 ... different events take place in different parts of the sim, so check your mini-map when you arrive and follow the green dots
=> Host: Loraine Alter
=> Prizes: L$20 per question for 20 questions, though you can elect to have a staff member remove an article of his or her clothing instead of the money
Answers to questions in the article:
=> United Nations
=> Karl Marx
=> Anne Boleyn
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