After attending a conference a few years ago, I was inspired to make my online classes more engaging and incorporate game components into my courses. The result was a simple ‘game’ that includes secret messages, random clues, video scenarios, widgets, sharing secret clues on wikis, MySpace, flash simulations and more. I expected increased student satisfaction with the course materials, but was shocked at the other positive effects of including the game. Student average grades improved by over 13% (C average to a B average) and the average time spent online increased up to 6.4 hours per student. This session will discuss other evidence for the effectiveness of this game as well as practical strategies for other faculty to incorporate game components in their courses.