Anyone up for a game of Wikiracing?
A Wikirace (IPA: /ˈwɪ.ki.rɛɪs/) is a race by as many people as you wish, using wikilinks to travel from one Wikipedia page to another. The first person to reach the destination page, or the person that reaches the destination using the fewest number of links, wins the race.
Obviously I grew up in the wrong decade.
Wikiraces are common in classroom environments in which kids are bored.
If you want some examples, you can visit http://www.wikirace.org/. Or just start with these:
A race from Jesus Christ to Subway (restaurant) would be more of a challenge, however. For a true test of skill, attempt Roman Colosseum to Orthographic projection.
If that gets boring, you can try some variations (man, I love the internet):
- '5-Clicks-to-Jesus': A form of Wikiracing that mimics golf, the challenge in this version is to get from a Random Article to the Jesus entry in as few clicks as possible. Reaching the article in 5 clicks is considered 'par', with clicks over or under five being referred to as 'bogeys' and 'birdies' respectively. Players can either play the course (aiming for 'par' or better) or as a competition. In the latter case, players start from the same Random Articles and add their score between rounds. Lowest score wins!
- 'One-Can't-Go' rule: Essentially, if you find yourself in a doomed-scenario (i.e. stumbled into a stub with no wiki-links) you are allowed to use one of the Category links at the bottom of an entry (e.g. 1904 deaths or Philosophy). Each player can only use this option once though, so use it wisely.
- 'Find Hitler!' Believed to be the original form of 'The Wikipedia Game,' The objective is to begin by selecting the 'Random Article' link. From there you look at the selected article and click the links in the main body of the article that are believed to lead to the Adolf Hitler article. Two players or more can play and they count the number of articles it takes to get to Adolf Hitler. The person who gets there with the least number of articles wins.
