I just discovered QuizUp. Oh. My. Word.

I foresee losing countless hours of my life in the near future.

So Mr. Maven, who is an avid Star Wars g̶e̶e̶k̶  fan, heard about this awesome new (? I guess it's new. It's new to me!) trivia game app on one of the blogs he follows (Jedi News, if you're interested). He downloaded it onto his iPhone 4S and started playing. I think it took about 15 minutes of play time before he decided he'd better share his new discovery with me.

Now, I'm not a gamer. I actually detest most of the video games regular people love. The only kind of games I care about are word games, puzzles, Sudoku, brain teasers, etc. To give you an idea, my current favorite (and up until QuizUp, my ONLY favorite) was Scramble With Friends. Anything else just frustrates me. So I was really only half-listening to Mr. Maven. But then he got me at "Disney," and "Maybe there's an Outlander category; they've got lots of literature topics." So yeah, then I had to have a go. (And no, there is no Outlander category. Yet. See my last paragraph.)

I'm hooked. Seriously. I stayed up until 2am this morning, trying to become #1 in my state in Disney and/or Pixar trivia. Once I get there, I plan to conquer my state in either spelling or word definitions. After that, who knows!

Basically, you enter a game either with a random player or via a personal challenge with someone you know. Then you get a series of seven random questions, with 10 seconds to answer each one. The bonus round gives you 2x points, so it is possible to come from behind and win the match. You level up based on experience points you've earned (you still earn some even for losses), and the higher up in rank you are, the longer it takes to accrue experience points. Every ten levels you get a new title, based on whatever category you're playing, and you can choose to display that title or not. For example, in Disney trivia, at level 10 you earn The Sorcerer's Apprentice. In the General Literature topic, at level 10 you earn the title Pulp Fiction Writer. I love seeing everyone's titles when I play them (I'm still trying to figure out what category gives you the title Honey Badger  and Dough Boy).

The game has an excellent, clean interface. It's simple to navigate, even for non-gamers like me. The graphics are tight and flawless, with bright, primary colors. It's just pleasing to look at. The music is nice too; it's not annoying and it doesn't stress you out during the rounds. You can play with a world-wide opponent base or challenge your friends (sign in with Facebook to do this easily). For the most part, the questions are excellent - a good mix of easy to difficult in each category. There are a gazillion topics and categories. Lookie here:

That's 14 topics! And within all of those, there are even more topics broken down. Under Literature alone, there are 14 subtopics! Omg, how long will it take me to master all of those? Well, I know one I WON'T be mastering...Fifty Shades of C̶r̶a̶p̶ Grey! <shudder> There are Children's Lit, Classics, Harry Potter, Hitchhiker's Guide, The Hunger Games, Song of Ice and Fire, and Twilight, just to name a few off the top of my head. There are tons of questions in each category, and the developers seem to be adding more all day long, every day (there's a notification on the topics that have been recently updated). And what else is awesome is that you can contribute questions too. See that "Contribute Content" button up there? Click that and they ask you for 10 sample questions in a category. Mr. Maven got right on that, don'tcha know. (Sidenote: He's currently #2 in our state in Star Wars knowledge. @-@)

So after you've played a few games, you can do my favorite part....CHECK YOUR STATISTICS! Yes, I know. I'm a geek.

That's not me, by the way. That's Spencer Owen from the UK. I just grabbed his photo off a Google search. Thanks, Spence! And then there are achievements too. Woo hoo! It just gets better and better. One of my first achievements was Black Whole: "Congratulations...I guess. You just scored no points. This is the abscence [yes, I realize that's misspelled. So the developers aren't perfect. At least they got "you're" correct.] of points. Cheer up, at least you're not in the negative." In my defense, I was playing in the category of Kobe Bryant. I know nothing about Kobe Bryant. Well...now I do. Which, I guess, is the point. But anyway, there are about 100 achievements you can earn and they're all fun; I'm sure they'll add more.

So anyway, why am I still talking? Go to quizup.com and download your own game (it's FREE)! I promise you'll feel smarter and have fun doing it.You can play it on your iPhone or iPad. Maybe  Kindle too? I'm not sure. The last info I found said that they are currently developing the app for Android devices and it will be available soon. So hang on, Droid folks. Your fun is coming soon too!

If you try the game out, let me know how you like it. And maybe I'll see you there! (If you're playing Disney trivia, expect to be trounced. Muuuaaahaha!)

Oh oh oh! I almost forgot! I noticed the glaring omission in the Literature topic - OUTLANDER! WHAT?!! This fantastic game includes Fifty Shades of T̶r̶i̶p̶e̶ Grey but not Outlander? So you know I had to go and see what I could do about fixing THAT. Yeah, you can suggest new categories to the developers. So please, if you're an Outlander fan like me, blast out an email to topics@plainvanilla.is and (politely) ask them to add our favorite book to their Literature topic. And then, folks, we can start sending in our own trivia questions.... :)