Twisted Virgins, Beware.

There’s a reason the Twisted Hunt earned the title of ‘Hardest Hunt in SL’ – and we mean to live up to that title again this time around. We promise you a full month of box-hating, obscenity-shouting, desk-kicking, brain-melting fun… a bunch of other people commiserating and shouting obscenities right alongside you… and some of the best prizes some of the most Twisted designers on the grid can wrack their brains to come up with.

We think most Twisted Survivors (and yes, you DO earn the title ‘survivor’ when you complete the hunt) would agree that this is no place for the faint of heart… but, we also think they’d agree it’s about the most fun you can have in SL with your pants on. First off, you should know that there are rules that merchants need to follow for this hunt. Check them out when you get a minute. To help you know what to else to expect, here’s a little insider info:

Prepare to HUNT.

The boxes are hidden, and they are small. We’ve renamed random prims in the store the exact same thing as the hunt item, so the prize finder HUDs don’t work right. We’ve buried hundreds of empty prizes boxes in the walls and floor, so de-rendering the store will make it worse, not better… and wireframe is a mess. We move the hunt boxes around, so hints change all the time and the hint pages people try to publish are useless in a matter of days (sometimes hours). This is a game of hide and seek – and you will definitely be seeking. It won’t be easy. But we WILL be stuffing those boxes with as many awesome prizes as we can make between now and then… and some of us will add little side-games with more evil hunty fun with more prizes than just the main hunt prize. But as for thinking you won’t have to work to find the hunt items – you have been warned. :)

Hints – NOT published.

There’s a reason hints aren’t published on the website – and why we ask anyone who endeavors to collect and publish all the hints anywhere else include a disclaimer at the top. We move the boxes a LOT. So the hints change a lot. No blogger is going to keep up with keeping them all published when they’re changing daily(or sometimes hourly), and we wouldn’t have time to either. This is why the hints are shared in Twisted Hunt chat. You can often score a hint from a fellow hunter – but more than that, the Twisted Assistants – amazing creatures that they are – keep a running list of the current hints in chat. And they record it when a merchant sends out a new one… or a hunter reports a box has moved… you’ll have to see it to believe it, but trust us… it’s totally the way to go. ;)

You don’t HAVE to be in the group.

All the SLurls will be published to the website, in order. You can get to the starting point without the group, find the box without the group, and go on to the next store. If you get stuck on a store, you can come here and get the SLurl for the next store. You could do the whole hunt without ever chatting up the Twisted Citizens. We recommend you DO join the group – because that’s half the fun. Best friends have met on this hunt. People who are married have met on this hunt. That generally all happens in hunt chat – and these are a seriously fun bunch of people. This group is an amazing community, both during and between hunts! But – if you can’t stand the idea… you still have everything you need to do the hunt without it. You don’t need hints. ;)

Prepare to get to know your fellow freaks.

The merchants and hunters are all in the same group for this hunt (in fact – many who help with the hints all month long are merchants). The hunt chat usually starts rolling a day or two before the hunt starts – and stops again in October (maybe…). People who finish the hunt stick around and help others – with hints, or hard finds. You can meet some very awesome people, and find many fun things to do. The group chats about many things, alongside the hint sharing — and that’s exactly how it should be.

We go all out.

This is no simple store-to-store hunt. Some locations will have little hunts within hunts. Some will have evil puzzles. The merchants work very hard to make this as much fun as they can. So plan to do more than show up, find box, go on to next store. This will work your brain in more ways than one. We tend to go just as all out with the prizes, too. All the merchants? No – but enough to make it totally worth it. ;)

We play rough.

We LOVE the Twisted Citizens, and for the most part it’s like one big deliciously dysfunctional family. Occasionally, the party is crashed by trolls and cheaters. Cheaters should prepare for public ridicule – and trolls are typically eaten alive. We’re here to have fun – and people who come to ruin the party are rarely well received.

Hints aren’t directions and they won’t be easy.

Many hunters have forgotten why hints came into being, but we have not. Hints aren’t a road map to the gift, to be consulted before you start driving; they are a little extra help when your seeking skills have failed. That said, Twisted Hints are often as much a puzzle as the location of the prize itself — so you shouldn’t expect them to be easy to solve. And since we’re here, let us answer a few common questions up front:

“Can I get another hint for —-?” No, probably not.

“Can I get a better hint for —-?” Nope, sorry – you’ll just have to get smarter.

“The hint for —- sucks!” Then you should GTFO. No really, GTFO. And take your rudeness with you.

This doesn’t mean help isn’t available; it just means that you don’t get to casually insult people’s hints because they don’t work for you. Check out the next section. ;)

Help DOES exist.

We may be Twisted, we may even enjoy inflicting a little torture — but ultimately, this is supposed to fun. There comes a point when you’ve hunted a store high and low, racked your brain to solve the riddle that is the hint, even pasted the hint into Google – all to no avail – and you’re ready to throw in the towel and ask for some help. Don’t just announce that you’re having trouble in the chat group – people do this all month long, mostly just blowing off steam. People will not understand you’re asking for help. Instead, ask in the chat group for someone who has done the location you’re on to IM you privately to help you. Nine times out of ten, someone will IM you pretty quickly; sometimes you’ll have to ask a second time — either because it’s odd hours and there aren’t as many on, or because it’s easy for a single post to get missed in chat. People can’t help you in open group chat, because it spoils it for the people who want to find the boxes themselves – but we TOTALLY encourage helping in private IMs when folks get stuck.

Not scared off yet?

Awesome. We’ve published some hunting help here for you – check it out.