[arg_discuss] ToW: Idea Graveyard

[John Evans]

I don't think of it as a "graveyard", more as an area of cold storage, ideas waiting for the right opportunity to be used.  I suppose there is one I can share, though, because I think it's pretty cool but at the same time possibly unworkable.

Let's imagine that, in the storyline of this particular experience, there are competing factions doing secretive things over the internet.  They have constructed a sort of "under-net" that piggybacks over the regular internet.  If you have the right software (perhaps a browser toolbar) you can find the secret "installations" on various websites.  So, for example, you could see secret links, bits of text or mini-chatrooms with NPCs saying stuff, all interspersed into the normal content of, say, a Google search.

The way I envision this working is that going to a URL would prompt the toolbar to query the game server and see if it was approved for in-game content; weird stuff showing up on the Google home page would probably be okay (as long as we make sure people realize that it comes from the game and not Google, and we also make sure they know how to turn it off).  Then another thing you could do would be to "scan" a page, and that would look for special in-game markup tags, maybe a secret hacker (NPC) chatroom or file dump.  The really cool possibility here is that the players could figure out the markup tags and create a webpage that became part of the in-game universe; perhaps that would be the only way to find some of the content (as the "real" in-game webpages would never use certain tags or values).  I know there are probably privacy concerns with this idea, but I figure this whole conversation is just brainstorming, so...

Of course, there's already a nifty site called "The Nethernet" that does about 75-80% of what I describe, and they've worked it up into a slick game experience.  (Basically, the idea of The Nethernet is: When you go to a webpage, your toolbar sends the URL to the Nethernet server to see if there is any content for that page.  I believe the URL is the *only* thing that is ever transmitted and that the webpages are not "scanned" in any way.)  Check it out: http://thenethernet.com

--
John Evans
Chaoseed Software - http://chaoseed.com
http://thenethernet.com/join/chaoseed

-----Original Message-----

>From: Andrea Phillips <andrhia at gmail.com>

>Sent: Jul 6, 2009 8:54 AM

>To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG <arg_discuss at igda.org>

>Subject: [arg_discuss] ToW: Idea Graveyard

>

>As I'm sure many of you are, I've grown quite a graveyard of ideas I

>absolutely love, but that didn't ultimately fit into the project at

>the time. (Budget, schedule, theme -- you know how it is.)

>

>What do you all do with these ideas? How many do you have? Have you

>ever had the opportunity to recycle one, or do you prefer to just keep

>coming up with new ones? How many do you have floating around, anyway?

>And: Any that were so niche they'd only have fit into that one

>project, but you're bursting to talk about it because it would have

>been so much fun? :)

>

>-- 

>Andrea Phillips

>http://www.deusexmachinatio.com

>Words * Culture * Interaction

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