LONDON.- This summer, the British Museum has an interactive Family Guide on offer to all its visitors. The Family Guide is an interactive game designed for exploring the Museum together as a family. Sponsored by Korean Air, the guide is a fun and interactive way to experience the British Museum’s permanent collection and get up close to objects. It is available to hire on site to the British Museum’s 6.9 million visitors each year. As a museum of the world, the Family Guide helps communicate and share knowledge with visitors from across the globe.

The Family Guide helps visitors discover, discuss and engage with some of the most interesting and important objects at the British Museum. The game is designed for the whole family to play together and every player takes a turn as the game master. The game covers a selection of 70 family-friendly objects from highlights, through treasures from the ancient world to objects from Africa, Oceania and the Americas, the Middle East, Asia and Europe. All the objects have been carefully chosen to engage children.

Unlike traditional audio guides, each family hires a single device rather than multiple devices for a shared learning experience.

Families can choose from a variety of challenges that appeal to different ages and learning styles. These action-based activities include: Imagine, Hunt, Pose, Sound off, Quiz, Memory. Throughout the game, players are encouraged to seek out objects from across the Museum, pose like Greek statues, roar like Assyrian lions, and guess answers to discover secrets across the British Museum. Suggested adventures to follow include ‘myths and legends’, ‘weird and wonderful’, and ‘best of Egypt’.

At the end of each challenge, the game master decides who wins the points. After a round of high fives, play passes to another member of the family and the game continues.

Following their visit, families will be able to enter their e-mail addresses into the device to receive a summary of their visit and awards earned by each player.

The Family Guide is available on Android smart phone devices in four languages: English, Korean, Spanish and Simplified Chinese.

The Family Guide project is an integral part of the British Museum’s Digital Strategy, which focuses on innovation through user research and testing. The Museum strives to create products that deliver the best value and user experience for those visiting our galleries. The family guide was tested continually with visitors during development and will continue to be evaluated and improved with visitor feedback, new research on the collection and the latest technology trends.

Exploring the collection with children and inspiring families to learn together about the world through objects is a key part of the British Museum’s work in London, across the UK and internationally.