[arg_discuss] Topic of the Week Aug. 3: Show and Tell

[Naomi Alderman]

Heh. Well, as we're having Perplex City celebration day... Actually, I was
going to nominate the setup for the Monica Grand thing. I was very pleased
with the Salk logs: a set of correspondence between Monica and Pietro, the
journalist she was hoping would help her turn herself in to the authorities:
http://perplexcitywiki.com/wiki/Salklogs.doc

This was one of those things which was conceived to fill a hole: we had an
idea for a cool puzzle (locate a person in a huge apartment complex) and
needed some way to give clues about when Monica was entering and leaving her
apartment. I started out thinking it'd be 1,000 words, tops, but it turned
out closer to 6,000 because the characters had a lot to say! I feel like
it's a successful story with good character development as well as a piece
of writing that did a puzzle job - people have told me since that they found
it moving and memorable - that's really the sweet spot for me.

And then this, from the We Tell Stories project last year:
http://www.coveritlive.com/index2.php?option=com_altcaster&task=viewaltcast&altcast_code=e8b78cbab5.
Which was silly and fun - I love opportunities to do live improvisational
writing above almost any other element of games work. It was a small
live-online event, where we really took everything the software would do -
polls, comments, images... - and found a way to fit them in!

I guess that's what I love - when you can find a way to make the technology,
the puzzles and the story work together so that none takes precedence and no
one's left going "they just did this to give us a clue/introduce us to this
tech". Sometimes there's no way around it, but if you can find that spot,
it's great.

- Naomi


On Mon, Aug 3, 2009 at 8:33 PM, David Varela <davidvarela at gmail.com> wrote:


> I'll jump in, also with a highlight from Perplex City. The murder of Monica

> Grand was my first real piece of ARG work, so it will always have a place

> in

> my heart. As a piece of audio drama, it's still pretty powerful - players

> stumbled across this recording not realising what it was, and the sound

> effects are really quite graphic. It gave me enormous satisfaction when the

> players started reporting it had given them nightmares:

>

> http://perplexcitywiki.com/wiki/Track_3.mp3

>

> And I suppose the audience reaction is what I'm really looking for. At the

> end of Xi, there were a few forum posts that got me a little choked up.

> Here's one:

>

>

> http://community.eu.playstation.com/playstationeu/board/message?board.id=bEN_PS3_Xi&thread.id=31074

> So it's not just about the craft, it's about how it moves people. That's

> what really makes me proud.

>

> David Varela

>

> Producer

> www.nDreams.com

>

>

>

> On Mon, Aug 3, 2009 at 7:53 PM, Andrea Phillips <andrhia at gmail.com> wrote:

>

> >

> > With that in mind, this week's topic is Show and Tell: In your body of

> > work, what are the couple of things you've done that you're the

> > absolute most proud of? I'm not talking an entire project, mind --

> > just small, individual pieces of the larger whole. A video clip, a

> > puzzle design, a spectacular venue find for an event... what have you

> > got? I know it's a hard question, and could be akin to "which one was

> > your favorite chocolate chip in the cookie," but see what you can come

> > up with. ^_^

> >

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