6minutesA mere two days before the release of The Watchmen, the highly anticipated film version of the famous graphic novel, another viral web site has launched, and this time, participants are thrust into the middle of a narrated peek at the six main characters of the story. Six Minutes to Midnight is the latest in a long string of web-based buzz-generating campaigns promoting the film, and has the look and feel similar to Eagle Eye: Freefall, the enjoyable 10-minute experience first discovered in September 2008.

Upon arriving at the site, players are asked to provide their first name and, if they feel up to it, their phone number — so far, U.S. and Canadian numbers have been proven to work. For those that choose the web-only version, the experience kicks off with an introductory video and then jumps into the game, whereas those brave enough to enter their digits are treated to a phone call (complete with a Warner Brothers pre-amble about a do-not-call list, yuck) as the intro video kicks in. Either way, the end result is the same — the player’s job is to enter words into a text box based on what they see within a looping, changing ink blot image. Figure out the correct terms, earn a reward: a video clip montage of each of the six characters, narrated by Rorschach himself (we assume).

6minutes_argnetAs advertised, the entire experience takes approximately ten minutes of your time, and while it isn’t as interactive as I would have liked, it’s another piece in the hype machine working towards this Friday and the release of the film. As a recent fan of the graphic novel, I’ve enjoyed the multitude of viral thingamabobs that have satisfied my growing desire for the film to reach theaters — Minutemen Arcade is one of my favorites. However, this experience didn’t fill in as much of the background as The New Frontiersman has since launching in January, but people who are more interested in the characters than the back story will probably appreciate the effort here.

Update: It appears that this experience was available as early as Monday, March 2nd, according to an Unfiction forums post by Pie-ro. However, the phone number input did not appear until earlier today, based on my own observations.

Update #2: We have confirmation that this project was built by Fourth Wall Studios.