All of Us spy game for Science Museum

All of Us has created an innovative, interactive game called BAOS – Be an On-line Spy – for The Science Museum’s forthcoming show The Science of Spying.

Launching in London next week, The Science of Spying aims to help children understand the skills and abilities required by real agents, while revealing the complex business of spying and privacy, control and security.

Visitors will ‘graduate’ from the Spymaker Training Base to the Spymaker Technology Centre, which is organised around an oversized computer installation by All of Us.

The consultancy has created eight 45cm-high interactive computer keys, which, when sat on, tap out Morse code. Fiona Romeo, exhibition project manager for the museum’s The Science of franchise, says, ‘We wanted All of Us to deliver a fun simulation of intelligent analysis in a giant computer, effectively creating a mission control centre for the exhibition.’

The installation acts as a visual attraction to younger visitors who might find the game too complex, as well as a taster of what lies inside – the BAOS role-play game.

As part of the game, which comprises three terminals and 3m of projection screens, players are led through a narrative journey to discover the identity of the individual masterminding the latest criminal activity from a fictional and shadowy corporation.

‘We watched methods on certain films or programmes such as Enemy of the State and Spooks’, says Mickey Stretton, design director at All of Us. ‘We did a lot of visual research and looked at a lot of actual databases, like the FBI database. It is interesting for kids to find out about hacking into screen databases.’

The game highlights how much personal information is held on computers and uses an intricate series of scenarios to enable visitors to sift through database networks and piece together clues.

The Science of Spying exhibition takes place from 10 February to 2 September.