Month: February 2010 (Page 2 of 3)

Saving the World, One EVOKE at a Time

February 15, 2010 / Celina Beach

evoke Wouldn’t it be great if, during times of crisis, there was a way to access a network of experts ready and able to help avert the crisis? Starting March 3rd, the Evoke Network goes live and available for all your crisis-averting needs!

EVOKEÂ was developed by the World Bank Institute, the educational branch of the World Bank Group, and directed by Jane McGonigal, the creative mind behind Superstruct and World Without Oil (among many others) and most recently an invited speaker at TED2010. TheÂ alternate reality game’s mission is to help the world help itself, by empowering young people to tackle the world’s toughest problems. In the first episode, the year is 2020 and Japan is facing a nation-wide famine. The Governor of Tokyo sends an “EVOKE” to the mysterious Alchemy, who then activates the Evoke Network by contacting individuals with the necessary skills and ideas needed to help Tokyo avert her food crisis, and teach her people how to avoid it in the future.

During the 10 week course of the game, players will be presented with 10 different challenges involving topics like hunger, poverty, and education – one challenge per week. Players who participate in all 10 challenges will be honored as a “Certified World Bank Institute Social Innovator â€“ Class of 2010.” On top of that, the top 10 Social Innovators will alsoÂ have the opportunity to be mentored by noted social innovators and business leaders, along withÂ scholarships to the EVOKE Summit in Washington, DC to share their innovative ideas with the world.

The goal of the game? Fun of course! But the main goal is to teach the young people of the world skills such as networking, resourcefulness, creativity, and vision; empowering them to start solving the world’s problems. Teach the people, save the world!

EVOKE launches on March 3rd and is accepting membership reservations now, and discussion is brewing over in Unfiction. Also, the first graphic novel episode can be read in its entirety on the EVOKE homepage, including links to articles for additional information on the topics discussed in the episode and a videoÂ trailer with clues about the nature of the EVOKE Network.

Centian Is Looking Forward to Playing with Humans Again

February 14, 2010 / Jane Doh

centian Centian misses playing games with humans…wonâ€™t you oblige? By playing with Centian, you could win a registration badge for the 2011 Interactive festival at SXSW. Run by the folks at Sweb Development, the points-based contest ends March 15, and the central hub for the game is the Centian Games Ning site. Centian Games incorporates multiple platforms, including Twitter, SMS, and GPS-based smartphone apps. Right now, contestants can compete by using the #centiangames hashtag when Twittering their check-ins on Gowalla and/or Foursquare. Another way to win theÂ SXSW badge is to answer internet search trivia questions over an SMS subscription service. It remains to be seen what other challenges and fun human games Centian will devise in the lead-up to Sweb Developmentâ€™s exhibit at the free and open-to-the-public ScreenBurn Arcade at SXSW from March 12-14 in Austin, Texas. But, thereâ€™s something undeniably ARG-ish about Centian.

The twitter accountÂ responded to my Gowalla check-ins, and we started a conversation about playing games, which moved from Twitter into e-mails (I’ve posted the e-mail correspondenceÂ over at Unfiction). There, I got the chance to learn more about Centian the non-human. Centian certainly has a distinct personality: chipper, bubbly, and fun-loving. It reminds me of Eddie, the Heart of Goldâ€™s onboard computer in the Hitchhikerâ€™s Guide, butÂ less nauseating. The contest itself is an ancient game called Malkut, which means Royalty in the language of its people.

Wait… what? Centian has a people? At first I thought it was some kind of HAL-like electronic entity, just a superficial net-presence to run the contest. I was wrong. According to Centianâ€™s e-mail responses, it is a â€œKrateran,â€ an extinct people that apparently had human interactions in the past. Now, Centian seems to be alone, the last of its kind. I wonder what happened, and why we humans have forgotten the Kraterans.

Lekhaâ€™s Journey: An Interactive Experience Battles Political Oppression

February 12, 2010 / Jane Doh

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Free speech, a fundamental human right? Yes, of course, you’d say. A universally granted human right? Absolutely not, even in the 21st century. Confronting 5,000 years of reading, writing, and the politics of censorship, Lekha’s Journey is a fictional interactive experience tied to the four-part documentary series, Empire of the Word, which aired in November-December 2009 on TVO, a publicly funded, educational media organization in Ontario, Canada.

In Lekha’s Journey, author I.P. Burroughsâ€™ writings sparked international controversy and violent rioting that forced the mysterious writer into hiding 20 years ago. Aspiring Canadian writer Lekha Sharma forged an online friendship with the fugitive author, who is about to release a translation of the Bhava Sutra manuscript. The Bhava Sutra is believed to be a politically dangerous (anti-patriarchal) tract, written by a woman in Dehradun, India, in the 5th century BCE. The last people who tried to study the Bhava Sutra died or disappeared in unusual circumstances.

I.P. BurroughsÂ convinced Lekha to meet her in Egypt, but the Bhava Sutra manuscriptÂ was stolen from the modern Library of AlexandriaÂ before the two couldÂ meet.Â Instead, I.P. Burroughs has laid a puzzle trail for Lekha, as she looks for missing pieces of the manuscript around the world. As she travels, Lekha is being followed, but she cannot allow the hidden message of the Bhava Sutra to be suppressed. Beautifully filmed on location in Canada, Egypt, Italy, Turkey, Germany, India, and England, Lehka is plucky and approachable as the protagonist,Â albeit a little naive.Â I.P. Burroughs’ supportersÂ Lekha meets alongÂ her travelsÂ can beÂ entertaining and sometimes cryptic as they help guide Lekha’s journey.

Cathy’s Book App Contest: Win an iPod Touch

February 9, 2010 / The ARGNet Staff

cathysbookapp On September 12, 2006, authors Sean Stewart and Jordan Weisman released Cathy’s Book, an experiment in transmedia publishing, under the Running Press imprint. The book and its accompanying evidence packet provided a window into the life of Cathy Vickers, a fashion-conscious teenage girl with a penchant for daydreaming and doodling. Readers could follow a series of clues contained within the novel to birth certificates, news clippings, telephone numbers, and websites. Cathy’s Book was a New York Times Best Seller. The subsequent books in the trilogy, Cathy’s Key and Cathy’s Ring, wrapped up Cathy’s story.

Last month, the Cathy trilogy was re-released as an iPhone app, at $0.99 per novel. The app integrates the interactivity of the original novels, and adds animations throughout the story that make the illustrations liberally peppered throughout the book come alive. To celebrate the app’s launch, Running Press Books is giving ARGNet readers the chance to win an iPod Touch and iTunes gift cards. To enter, follow the instructions below.
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Interview with Cathy’s Book Co-Author Sean Stewart

February 8, 2010 / Michael Andersen

Below is an interview that Michael Andersen conducted with Sean Stewart regarding the release of the Cathy’s Book app for the iPhone.Â In addition to co-authoring the transmedia storytelling experiment Cathy’s Book, Stewart worked on ARGs including The Beast, i love bees, Last Call Poker and Year Zero.

MA: How did you and Jordan come up with the idea for Cathy’s Book?

SS: It was Jordan’s idea (things often are).Â After the Beast we were talking about how fun it was, but how frustrating it was, too, that it was over: even if someone heard about how cool it was, they couldn’t DO it.Â “Hey!Â You’re a book guy,” Jordan said.Â “We should do a book using the same kind of techniques!”

So we did.

We came up with the broad outlines of the story together.Â We figured YA was a good place to start, and, to be honest, having written a fair number of somewhat dark sf/f novels, I wanted to write a book I thought my teenage daughters might like.Â (They have a cameo in the first novel which Sharp Eyed Readers may spot…)

MA: How would you compare the writing process you used for Cathy’s Book, as opposed to what you used for traditional novels like Perfect Circle or full-blown ARGs like The Beast?

SS: We determined that the thing HAD to work as a book, first and foremost; if you never did any of the ancillary material, you still had to have an enjoyable, satisfying experience.Â So I wrote Cathy’s story, if you will, much as I would a regular book.

We used the extra material to fill out the life of Cathy’s love-interest, Victor.Â Readers looking through the extra evidence can eventually work out almost every detail of the Many Lives of Victor, from gold camp ragamuffin to WWI flying ace to mobster, and so forth.

Trying to fit together the various pieces of evidence was much more like the storytelling method of The Beast.Â Over time, we also changed how we did that.Â Cathy’s Book, like the Beast, has a ton of little pieces of stuff for players to link together.Â In Cathy’s Key and Cathy’s Ring we moved increasingly to building “interactive arcs,” so that a reader might, for instance, send an email and go through a 3 or 4-step investigation to arrive at a satisfying endpoint.
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Bank Run: Climbing the Corporate Ladder Can Be Fatal

February 7, 2010 / Jane Doh

bankrun SilkTricky, a Portland-based digital agency, will preview Bank Run: Someone Has to Pay, their soon-to-be-released interactive movie and iPhone game app, on Tuesday, February 16, at The Living Room Theaters in Portland, OR at 7:00 pm and 8:15 pm. In the completely live-action Bank Run experience, you control the choices and actions of Evan Sharpe, a collared-shirt office cog who stumbles into a deadly conspiracy. Ski-masked guys will come at you with unnecessary force–are you sharp enough to evade death? Hot babes may try to influence you–do you trust them? Will you and Evan make it out alive?

Bank Run will be presented in two parts. The first part is a choose-your-own-adventure video experience, which will be available for free online. The iPhone app continues the plot and features additional games–such as a third-person shooter–that, when beaten, unlock further scenes. The iPhone games can be played in infinite arcade mode, available to replay without going through the narrative experience.

Bank Run is inspired by the popularity of SilkTrickyâ€™s 2008 interactive zombie movie, The Outbreak. Puppeting the protagonist James, The Outbreak progresses in short chapters, and the transitions from scene to scene require viewers to make choices. With a horrifying line of zombies amassing in the yard outside, I had to make some hard choices. In the process, I learned something about myself: I am really ill-prepared for the coming zombocalypse.

Bank Run goes way beyond The Outbreak by introducing the iPhone app to the overall narrative experience. With the game/movie release coming very soon, weâ€™ll soon see how the two components come together. But, the interactivity already inscribed in The Outbreak seems a pretty good preview of whatâ€™s to come.

Bank Run previews at The Living Room Theaters (341 SW 10th Ave., Portland, OR) will include Q&As with the Director and Producer of the project. Space is limited, so RSVP through Bank Run‘s Facebook Fan Page, or via e-mail to [email protected].