Unlock the Achievement Scavenger Hunt has begun!

www.unlocktheachievement.com

360Sync.com has teamed up with an astonishing 42 Xbox 360 community websites and magazines to launch the largest website scavenger hunt built strictly for the community. The concept – which has been in development for the past year – opens today and gives gamers a chance to win Xbox 360 games, and other prizes.

Players – the name referring to visitors involved in the Scavenger Hunt, which will give the illusion that they are playing a game of some sort – will start by visiting their favorite Xbox 360 themed website. From there, they’ll be asked to look for clues on how to find hidden “Achievements,” located on each of website involved. Each website will be given 5 of these achievements, ranging in difficulty from Paris Hilton Easy to Expert Guitar Hero III. As players “unlock” more of these Achievements, their progress will be tracked on leaderboards featuring Real-Time Position Changes™, in turn becoming eligible to win prizes. 

Among the participating websites and magazines, Official Xbox Magazine (OXM), Xbox360Fanboy.com and Evil Avatar headline the amazing list of websites that will be featured in the contest.

"If there's one thing video games have trained us all to do, it's find hidden stuff," said Dan Amrich, Senior Editor for OXM. "This scavenger hunt sounded like a logical extension of that, so when Devin invited us to participate, we couldn't say no. Gamers get free stuff, the sites get fresh visitors, and everybody goes away happy."

The hunt started on Monday, April 21, 2008 at 12PM EST. At the same time, a charity package arrived in Tennessee to support the St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. With the help of Gaming4Others, and the participating sites and sponsors, a donation of 100+ games was wrapped up and will be given away to children during a party at the hospital.

Unlock The Achievement has partnered with a number of corporate sponsors, including Microsoft, Electronic Arts, Activision, Popcap, Sierra Online, Capcom, Freeverse, Chair Entertainment, TOR Books, and Hollywood Collectibles. There are over 100 prize packages waiting to be given away, as well as a grand prize that includes an Xbox 360 120GB HDD, Project Gotham Racing 4, Soldier Of Fortune: Payback, Devil May Cry 4, Call of Duty schwag, a Live is 5ive limited edition T Shirt, the complete Halo soundtrack, Uno, and 200 Microsoft Points.

“This event gives many Xbox 360 websites and blogs a wonderful chance to hold a contest for its visitors that otherwise might not have the opportunity to give things away,” said Ziff Davis Media’s Chris Pereira, better known by his alias ‘TheSmokingManX.’