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Resident promotes hi-tech scavenger hunt
Staff photo - A munzee, which is a QR barcode, is a game piece that uses geocacheing to gain players points once scanned.
By Jessica Rush and Emily Hill, Staff writers
LITTLE ELM - Hunting for hidden treasures used to involve unscrolling an antique map and looking for where X marks the spot.
These days, scavengers only need access to a smart phone to search for concealed items that earn points, rankings, badges and a level of respect among the people who participate in the 21st century hunt, and Little Elm is right behind a new, quickly spreading game.
Little Elm resident Josh Terkelsen is one of the four creators of Munzee, a real life scavenger game that incorporates technology to make tracking easier. It is based off the fundamentals of geocaching, where players hide containers with a logbook for people to sign in and verify they found the "cache."
Little Elm, Frisco and the Prosper area are considered by Terkelsen to be the epicenter of the game. He estimates there are about 200 to 300 munzees deployed in total across five different countries. He said the point is to hide the munzees not just for the sake of hiding them but to take someone to a place that is unique.
"I really like taking them to a part of Little Elm that they might not have seen before," Terkelsen said, who is instrumental in hiding the munzees.
In just a week of going live, Munzee has 320 players throughout those five countries, including Germany, Sweden, France and the United Kingdom. Terkelsen, said international users were something he and the others didn't even consider.
Aaron Benzick, who lives in Prosper and works in Plano, came up with the idea for the game in 2008, but he had to wait for the technology to catch up. He, along with Terkelsen, Chris Pick and Scott Foster, wrote the software and created the companion website for Munzee, which incorporates QR barcodes.
"When I was first coming up with the idea I was planning on using poker chips with serial numbers on them that would get hidden," Benzick said. "After spending a night thinking of catchy names, I came across 'munze,' which means coin in German, so I just expanded that into munzee as a clever name that people wouldn't forget ...."
The Munzee app for smart phones shows a map and clues for all the nearby hiding spots. The app can read the QR barcodes on the munzees and gives points for each one found. Players leave the munzee behind for others to locate, and they are usually stored in waterproof containers or laminated to protect against rain.
Terkelsen has deployed 59 munzees with 32 more ready to be deployed. He has placed some in Austin near his favorite restaurants, one near the Inner Space Cavern, a few in Arlington and several in the Little Elm area. He keeps a stack of the QR barcodes in his truck in case he sees a cool place where he can deploy them.
"One is to have fun with it," Terkelsen said. "Get out there and try to find a couple that are out there and get a feel of the game. Print a couple of them off and hide your own."
Players may deploy their own munzees using the website, www.munzee.com. The creator earns additional points when other players find their active munzees. The app is available for both iPhones and Androids.
"There's definitely a big incentive to put your own out there and get more points," Terkelsen said.
Erin Hauser, her husband and two young daughters have been playing the game since it launched in June. Although they live in Wylie, the family ended up at The Shops at Legacy and finished a night of treasure hunting by eating at a restaurant they had never tried before.
"It was a lot of fun, because it gets you out and seeing different places," Hauser said.
She recommended bringing a flashlight and some comfortable shoes, because some of the munzees are hidden off the beaten path. Clever players have used zip ties or magnets to conceal the codes underneath objects, along fences or inside containers.
Hauser said in the future she would like to see an orienteering aspect added to the app to make it more competitive.
"You could make a timer challenge to compete in races," she said.
The game is free to play, and Benzick is considering adding perks for certain accomplishments.
"One of the things we're going to be working on is allowing businesses to put like a window cling or sticker in their front window," he said. "When they go to that business to get points for that munzee, it will show them a pop-up or discount for that business."
Those munzees would be easier to find, but the majority of hiding spots are not very obvious.
"The future of munzee is whatever the players want it to be," Terkelsen said. "The opportunities are really only limited by the players' imaginations."
To contact The Little Elm Journal Editor Emily Hill, send emails to ehill@acnpapers.com.
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