Serious Game May Help Track Missing Kids

GameSpot reports on a title announced at this year's Women Games conference. A University of East London project called Lost and Found may bring some sense of social responsibility to gamers when it is eventually rolled out to cell phones. Much like PeaceBomb , the game envisioned by Harvey Smith at the 2006 Game Designer's Challenge, Lost and Found will try to assist gamers in finding missing people via smart-mob activities. "Users can, for example, sign up for alerts when someone goes missing in their area, and if they see someone who resembles a photo of a missing child, take a photo, which will alert authorities to the possibility that an abducted child is nearby. The game will also present people with a series of objectives and mobilize groups to block roads and search fields."

Comments

what?

[TinBromide]

Now this seems kind of strange to me because i don't stand in front of government buildings waving signs with slogans that people read then disregard, but how is this a "game"? Do you get points for finding people? "I'm a level 12 findomancer!"

While I appreciate the idea, i don't see many people dropping what they're doing to trek across town look for someone.

Now there could be a downside with the kidnapper getting the "game" and then avoiding the areas spotlighted by the search area and knowing precisely how fast it took authorities to realize that the kid was missing.

Who comes up with this stuff?

[Lurker2288]

I'm all for social consciousness, but take a look at any internet message board and get a sense of how many people post stupid crap just for the sake of a laugh. Combine that with a system for tracking lost kids and you get, oh, probably about a million pictures sent in of people's asses, or similar nonsense. And do we really want to empower mobs of people to block roads, or swarm public places on the chance that maybe somebody actually spotted a snatched kid? This sounds like a lawsuit waiting to happen.