You guys rock. Some of these games you make me aware of are FREAKING AWESOME.
Check these out, new types of gameplay:
Ingress.
Ingress is an augmented reality massively multiplayer online role playing GPS-dependent game.
Developed by a division of Google, this real life massively multiplayer, GPS-enabled mobile game is a competition between two ever-changing teams, the Enlightened and theResistance. Here’s the basic setup: the Enlightened believe that exotic matter, or XM, being collected will benefit the human race, while the Resistance think that XM can be used to control people.
The purpose of the game is to support either the Enlightened or the Resistance by collecting XM to perform tasks and capture portals. Portals are created by the players and are physical objects outside of the game. Portals can be murals, statues, historical sites, or approved locations. it’s like geocaching, but instead of digging something up, you find a cool landmark and digitally mark it for your team. Mark enough your team gets that section of town. People working together possess better marking power then individuals.
https://www.ingress.com/
Cloud Chamber
An online game. Cloud Chamber is a video game that attempts to cleanse itself of nearly every design element typically associated with video games. In it, players assume the role of investigator, poring through video footage and scanned evidence to piece together the exact nature of the Petersen Institute’s research into the enigmatic signal, and to figure out what happened to Kathleen. Stripped of traditional methods of interaction, players unlock a branching spiderweb of evidence by selecting a piece of evidence represented by a node, exploring it, and discussing the new information’s implications with fellow players.
The evidence in Cloud Chamber is presented with minimal context, organizing the evidence thematically rather than chronologically. For example, in Part I, where the focus is on Kathleen’s disappearance, players are thrust into the experience through a computer-generated island and presented with a single question, “What is the Signal?” Selecting that question pulls up a video that begins the faux documentary in media res, as the game’s three protagonists break into the Petersen Institute’s roof. While there, the three tap into a massive antenna to listen to a signal without ever properly introducing who they are, why they are interested in the signal, or even what it sounds like. Watching that video unlocks a winding path along the island to “Her Decision”, a series of short, unordered snippets showing a frazzled Kathleen’s emotional deterioration before finally unlocking the video “You are Entering”, where Max and Thomas explain that they plan on releasing everything they’ve learned and appeal for the player’s help in finding out what happened to Kathleen.
The game engine delivers a surreal context that takes players from the initial island into increasingly surreal dreamscapes that resemble everything from outer space to neural networks.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9XmLNWyr_I#t=85
Dark Detour
Dark Detour was an interactive comedy-horror, ghost story told last Halloween through social media. It centered around a musician Talbot Griffin as he ends up…. in a f***** up situation.
You can recap it at http://www.darkdetour.com/ It’s not a game but i mention it because it’s a clever method of storytelling that could be applied by some smart person into some new, interesting type of live gaming experience. And by the way, if you are an entrepreneuring game developing looking to create interesting next gen gaming experiences, i am an experienced, professional musician who would love to do some of this stuff.
Lastly,
I’ve got an outline of the Slender Man plot pretty far along. I’ll send it to a person or two to review and see if it has big holes, shit i’m missing, it’s maybe not good and i don’t see it… if you are very into storytelling and might be interested in giving it a read through so i get another pair of eyes on it, let me know. I’m going to send it to two people. I don’t want to bug my usual folks as they had to slug through the New Albion stuff and they could use a break.
Please let me be clear, don’t volunteer if you just want to read it out of curiosity. First of all, it will ruin the finished opera for you since you’ll know everything that’s happening. There’s already too much information on it out there. Secondly, what i WANT is to sit down and have a few beers with another writer who’s used to trying to think in plot puzzle pieces. Or if i WAS a writer, this is where i’d meet with my editor. But i don’t have any of those things. I don’t even live around people who can speak english. I can brainstorm with nobody. And i always worry that the road i am marching is one that will lead to sucking massively. So, if this is your thing an you want to give it a spin, let me know. (And fyi, i will likely ignore almost everything you say. That’s kind of my MO, i ask for help than almost utterly ignore every piece of advice given. It’s a thankless task and it may not make sense, but it DOES help my process, even if it just helps confirm why i’m making the decisions i’m making, or it DOES show that ONE thing i did not see or think through enough. Without Mark Swetz’s off the cuff comment on how he thought the 3rd Act of the SO dragged and ran out of steam, i would never have redone it, invented the Voodoopunks, and made a far better album. Extra set of eyes just does not hurt.)
