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Starting in June of 2001,
10 brave Mac Guild members set off on a journey that they never possibly could have
imagined would conclude a year later! After 7 grueling challenges and 7 MacMole elimination
quizzes, the MacMole was uncovered and a winner emerged.
Unlike previous rounds,
the last Quiz asked only 15 questions related to the MacMole. The other 10 points
were earned by the Arena scores. Had Jim not turned in Tom's codes, he would have
won hands down. However, he went for maximizing the prize vault, and the quiz scores
ended up being a tie (both Jim and Tom had concluded correctly that Bob was the MacMole).
MacMole Contestants:
To catch all of the details and highlights of the MacMole contest, be sure to visit the official MacMole web site. |
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Jim Melton |
| Prior to my involvement in
the Mac Mole contest, I thought of the Mac Guild as just a mailing list -- a really
good mailing list where you can get just about any question about the Mac answered.
Now I think of the Guild as a full-fledged user's group; a community of people united
by their love of the Macintosh computer. We are truly a community without borders. From my house in Colorado, I got to know Moe in Florida, Tom in Louisiana, and Bob and Bill in San Jose. These are all great people, and fun to work/play with. I learned that there are a number of vendors who are very willing to send review copies of their software (and hardware) to users groups in exchange for our honest opinion. I was more successful than not in getting vendors to send software to the Guild. I also learned that it is easier to get software than to get reviewers. The contest itself was a blast. Bill is truly a demented person to come up with such intricate challenges and adventures. The kidnap adventure was at times extremely frustrating, but always challenging. I found myself eagerly checking my e-mail every day, anxious for any new clue as to the whereabouts of our hapless companions. At times, I wondered if the puzzle were, in fact, solvable, or if Bill was stringing us along to leave us in disappointment. The most fun was the final pursuit of the kidnapped teammates through the tunnels and pyramids of Egypt. The interaction was dynamic and intense; we all spent too many hours of what should have been sleep working to uncover treasures and rescuing poor Tom. Of course, Tom was suffering from both kidnapping AND Mardis Gras, so getting him out was more difficult than one might have expected. :-) The prizes were almost incidental to the fun of playing and the thrill of winning -- almost! There were GREAT prizes, just for playing a game! I'd like to encourage all the Guilders out there to participate in the next contest -- it should be a blast! |
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Tom Leahey |
| The game was fun overall,
with lots of interesting challenges and quizzes. MacMole provided me the opportunity
to get to know a few of my fellow MacGuild'ers a bit better (and some much better
- to the point I consider them more as distant friends now - like Moe and Jim). In
some respects - the longer a player was in the contest, and the more I interacted
with them, the better I got to know them. As you know, at times I found the contest
frustrating or confusing - but at others it was very exciting and very enjoyable.
Kudo's to Bill for the stamina and the creativity - they were the critical ingredients
which held it together over a span of almost a year. When I was joined-in at the beginning (through loss of another original player, due to some recent reviews I'd done) I never imagined a contest of that length or that required such involvement. My favorite challenge was the Rescue, where I was a hostage. I still laugh thinking of the final rescue, played out over Hotline when I was weary from my Mardi Gras festivities (tactfully stated). I worked the most on the Website challenge, which was really quite a workload. And while I'm not the best 1st-person-shooter game player - I also enjoyed the final personal game challenge (where Bill developed custom Marathon games for each player). And kudos to Jim Melton - the final MacMole champion, who inadvertently let me end up tying him in the final quiz, but who won through the tie-breaker. As far as most bizarre questions/clues we were asked - I thought the best was the one about that "Thorpy" guy - we spent a lot of search engine time on that one. All in all, it was one heck of a contest. Great job! |
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Moe Bradley |
| Wow - hard to believe, but
Bill did it again - got me involved in a Mac Guild contest that lasted almost a year!
Challenges like MacMole and MacSurvivor are such a paradox for me - the people who
were my teammates were also my opponents! This could have made game strategy a bit
tricky, had I not decided from the very beginning of each game to play with only
one goal in mind: to have fun! The prizes are great, but the game's the thing! Lest I get too sappy from the get-go, I will freely confess that all was not fun - there were some times that I was totally confused, frustrated, and even tired of playing, but somehow Gamemaster Bill always pulled a mole out of his hat and came up with something that was amusing, or interesting to do. Some of the events required that I pull some late-nighters (many of the players are on the west coast, while I am on the east) - game nights which began at 9 p.m. for the fortunate began at midnight for me! Well, I don't sleep much anyway, so this gave me something to do with my spare time, since there are no longer reruns of American Gladiators to entertain me until the wee hours. Will I do it again? Only time will tell. To be honest, I hadn't intended to do it again THIS time, but I am glad that I did. We have some terrific Mac enthusiasts affiliated with our Guild, and I am proud to be among 'em. Cheers to us, gents; may we all meet again in a future challenge. |