Gaming for the young birders!

When the weather doesn't co-operate with your interests, the fun for birders doesn't have to necessarily end there!. I was happy to find that that there is a fantastic online game made available just aimed at birdwatchers, bird photographers and birders that can be played from the comfort of your home, right from your computer.

'Snapshot Adventures: Secret of Bird Island' is the finalist for the 2008 Independent Games Festival Design Innovation Award.

The description of this game on their website reads,

"Snapshot Adventures: Secret of Bird Island is a bird photography game in which the player travels the country, unraveling the mystery of their grandfather's disappearance and collecting photos of both real and fantastical birds. Special camera attachments are collected along the way, and can be used to influence the birds in order to capture the best possible photos. In the bird creation mode of the game, players can design their own bird and release it into the wilds of the internet, where other players can download and photograph it within their game. Over 250,000 birds have been created by players since the game was released."

Wade Tinney, from Large Animal Games who developed this game has more to say about this.

"Players can design birds, upload them, and then get information back about how many times their bird has been been spotted by other players.

The second thing is the residual learning that comes from the game. There are over a hundred real-world bird species represented in the game, with accurate field markings and real field recordings of their song (we worked closely with the Cornell Lab of Ornithology to achieve this level of accuracy). While we did not design Snapshot Adventures as an “educational game”, many players have told us that after playing the game, they now notice the birds around them more, and are able to identify many of them."

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