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Compete in Treasure Hunts

Treasure Hunt Basics

In this game mode players have to use their block explorer to jump accros the map in order to find a treasure that spawns on a random minted property. It is a winner-takes-it-all game mode and you can earn a lot of UPX depending on the type of treasure. Some treasure hunts are competitive, meaning you will compete versus other players, while in other hunting modes your are only playing against the clock. There are three types of treasure hunts. In standard hunts you compete versus the clock while whereas you have to compete versus other players in limited and exclusive hunts.

Be careful: some treasure hunts have become very competitive and thus are only recommended to advanced players with a good amount of properties spread through a city. The gameplay is easy to understand but hard to master and a bit of luck to find the best starting position is also needed.

Check out EmGi’s tutorial below to find out how to play treasure hunts competitively.

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    Treasure Hunt basics:

    • Treasures will only spawn on minted properties
    • Higher probability of treasures spawning in a populated area of a city
    • All treasures are winner-takes-it-all, there is no UPX price for second place and beyond
    • Winner has to face a cooldown of three hours (doesn’t see any hints during cooldown)
    • UPX amount varies depending on type of treasure
    • Competitive treasures are announced via a 5 min countdown before each start
    • Competitive treasures have a Pinata mini-game at the end
    • If enough players are hunting riot mode will be activated (bonus UPX)
    • Uplander status and higher is required to have access to all treasure hunts

    Treasure hunts can be started in the quick menu by clicking on the TREASURES button. Afterwards you will see the treasures menu which also gives you some valuable information.

    In the top part you will see how many players are currently hunting (in this example 5) and if the riot mode is active (progress par needs to be filled). Below you will see the standard treasure mode where you can spawn one treasure for free each day. The following treasures (e.g. limited and exclusive) are called competitive treasure hunts because you will compete versus other players. Competitive treasure hunts only start within certain intervals. In the screenshot to the right you can see that the limited treasure hunt will start in 20 seconds.

    How to find a Treasure

    In order to find a spawned treasure, you can activate hints to show the direction and the distance relative to your current position of your block explorer. To activate the hints, press on any property within the discovery radius of your block explorer and click on the TREASURE button in the property window.

    The hint will now show you in which direction and how far you have to travel to locate the treasure.

    Treasure Hunt Menu

    There are five different hints that are displayed to you depending on how far away you are to the treasure. The player EmGi found out, that these zones equal to the following ranges:

    • <50m
    • 50 – 200m
    • 200 – 500m
    • 500m – 1km
    • 1km – 3km
    • 3km – 10km
    • >10km

    EmGi also created a tutorial video that you can find in the resources section of this chapter.

    Distances to treasure (credit: EmGi)

    Cooldown for Winners of competitive Treasure Hunts

    The main goal is to find the treasure before anybody else and only the winner will be awarded with an UPX price. To avoid that always the same people win a treasure, each winner of a competitive treasure hunt will face a cooldown. It lasts for about three hours after the previous win and removes all indicators from the treasure hunts making it very difficult to find the location of a treasure. It is still possible to win a treasure hunt while being under cooldown but the chances are pretty low since you have search the treasure without any hints.

    Riot Mode

    Whenever a certain number of players is actively hunting for treasures, riot mode will kick in. Once activated it will boost the amount of UPX in form of a multiplicator. The threshold of players needed to activate riot mode is not published and may be subject to change during Upland’s development. Make sure to not miss a treasure hunt while riot mode is activated.

    Pinata Minigame

    Each competitive treasure has a minigame for the winner where you have to click a Pinata as fast as possible to receive bonus UPX. The Pinata always turns from side to side and spins around, making it difficult to click on it. The trick is that there are some spots where gain bonus UPX. Luckily, this minigame can be trained. If you scroll down to the bottom of the treasure hunt menu you will notice a PRACTICE button. You should try it out a couple of times to make yourself familiar with the gameplay. Try to click at various spots and find the sweet spots for maximum UPX.

    Pinata Practice Menu

    First Steps before starting to hunt

    1. Practice with the standard tier
    2. Practice the pinata
    3. Own properties across the map

    Step 1: Practice with the standard tier

    The best thing to train the treasure hunt game mode is to play against the clock in the standard tier. You can spawn one standard treasure for free each day which gives you an opportunity to make yourself familiar with the basic gameplay while not being under the pressure of competition. You can use the complete three minutes to try things out and will not lose any UPX other than the visitor fees you might pay.

    Step 2: Practice the pinata

    Train at least a couple of times with the practice pinata to find out how it works and where you need to click to receive the highest amount of bonus UPX.

    Step 3: Own properties across the map

    Since you can travel to your own properties for free, it is suggested to buy some cheap properties across a city in order to have properties for free jumps.

    Basic Strategy

    Goal number one is to be fast. Competitive treasures are usually found within one to two minutes after they appear. Sometimes even faster. Don’t waste any time at all and make sure you know the basic gameplay of treasure hunts before you start competing.

    • If you can figure out where the hot spots of a city are, try to start nearby. A hot spot is an area with lots of minted properties meaning a highly populated area. Otherwise it is recommended to start in the center of the city.
    • Use your own properties to jump close to the approximate area of a treasure and then only use properties of other players to finetune your last jumps.
    • Cancel all zoom animations with the mouse wheel or zoom yourself. The normal zoom-in and zoom-out takes too many seconds to complete. You can zoom yourself in order to save these precious seconds.
    • If you are using two-factor authentication force a code before you start competing. This can be done in the QUICK MENU, then SETTINGS, then MANUAL AUTHENTICATION. Don’t lose any time within a hunt because of entering the activation code.
    • Practice, practice, practice. The best treasure hunters in Upland have invested a lot of hours to improve their speed and reactions. Once you come to the point at which the clicking becomes muscle memory you will be able to win more treasure hunts.