Award-winning actress eyes new audience as 'damsel in distress' star of online game

Award-winning actress Shu Qi recently took on perhaps her most unusual role yet - as the lead character in an online game. Featured on GoYeah.com, a new website offering free movies and games, Ki-Track requires players to rescue the actress after she is kidnapped while shooting the sequel to one of her movies.

'I like playing computer games, but never thought I'd be the leading character in one,' she said in Harbour City on Monday to celebrate the launch of the game.

Shu, 34, who won Taiwan's Golden Horse Award as Best Actress in 2005 and the Hong Kong Film Awards' Best Supporting Actress in 1999, admitted she had been a big fan of Nintendo and Sony PlayStation games as a child. '[Mainland actor] Huang Xiaoming and [local singer] Miriam Yeung Chin-wah will also participate in [the website],' she said. 'We hope we can give fans another way to get to know more about us.'

Some people might be surprised that the actress, who served on the jury at last year's Cannes Film Festival in France, would want to be involved in an online game. But GoYeah's executive director Sharon Cheung Po-wah explained: 'Shu Qi is a big star in Hong Kong, Taiwan and the mainland, but her fan base is a bit more mature. The online game helps her target a new audience ... like school and university students.'