If you own a mobile phone and you have internet access, you are qualified to play the Nokia Game. The three-week multimedia puzzle adventure starts on November 4 (players can sign up now at www.nokiagame.com). Participants have to attempt to solve the mystery by following clues hidden in SMS text messages, websites, TV ads, radio announcements and newspapers. Players can use any make of phone, although the 50 to 100 winners in each country will win new Nokia mobiles.

Last year's Nokia game started with a text message before leading on to challenges such as deciphering maps and playing arcade-style Flash games. This year promises more of the same.

Nokia Game was launched in Holland in 1999. Last year, 500,000 people took part in the global game. Participation should be even higher this time round, with 28 countries across Europe and the Middle East now involved. The main reason for this growth has been the huge web community that has sprung up around the game. There are numerous forums and websites, with players swapping tips and theories.

Nokia has benefited from heavy viral marketing as players have told their friends about the game.

Phil Thain, designer of the fansite NGForum.net, organised the unofficial UK launch party and is excited by the competition. "I played last year and it took over my life for a month. I think it will be bigger this year," he said. He agrees that the other players are vital to the experience. "The community added a whole dimension to the game, especially as the Flash games themselves are quite simple."

Fellow player Ian Rendall agrees but feels competition is as enjoyable as co-operation: "It is the multiplayer element that makes this more interesting than playing on your own on the PlayStation." He adds that SMS usage is also important. " You feel that the text message is coming to you personally and it really gets you involved."

Few of the players at the event usually played games on consoles or PCs, and Rendall feels that the problem-solving elements and fixed duration could appeal to both grannies and teenagers. "Unlike console games like Tomb Raider, which you can play for months, the time limit here means people are psyched up for three intense weeks," he says.

However, there were problems last year with confusing rules and players finding themselves thrown off the game for missing a day. Fionada is aware of the problems: "We have made Nokia Game three weeks long instead of four, following feedback from last years' players. We have also tried to appeal more to different levels of gamers and players can, in most cases, choose the level of difficulty at which they play some of the online games."

Of course, it is easy to see the benefits to Nokia of running the contest. Players need to give their mobile numbers and emails, making it a cheap way of gaining marketing data.

Motorola, Ericsson and the other mobile phone companies have yet to announce their own versions of the Nokia Game but the lure of cheap account acquisition may be too hard to resist. But for now Nokia has the monopoly and the loyalty of players such as Thain. "The game is unique and makes good use of technology. But the main appeal is obvious - we all want to be better than the next guy."