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Masque of the Red Death – almost an Adventure Game
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2–3 minutes·
6 comments on Masque of the Red Death – almost an Adventure GameOver the course of history, scientists and philosophers (who, until recently, were essentially the same thing) tended to interpret the universe – and, interestingly, the human brain – through the lens of their era’s technology. During the Renaissance, the universe was thought to operate like a clock, mechanistically and predictably. Later, during the Victorian and…
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STT
The acronym TTS is well known among those who develop call centre software, GPS car navigation devices and software for the blind. It means ‘Text To Speech’, and is more commonly known as voice synthesis, such as the conversion of written text (e.g. ‘Take the first turn on the left into Coronation Street’) into a…
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Thoughts on the Amazon Kindle
I feel ambivalent about the Kindle. The Kindle is a new eBook reader from Amazon that can download books anywhere (without a computer) and surf the web. It costs $400 and the cost of books for it from Amazon are significantly cheaper than the new physical versions – which doesn’t mean that they’re cheap, though.…
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Sidestep Right Two Paces!
One of the most memorable children’s TV shows of my generation was Knightmare. Ah, Knightmare – a show that was about role-playing games, but oddly cool to be a fan of. In Knightmare, a team of four kids would try to get through a dungeon populated by all sorts of traps, baddies and dangers. Of…
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A Game by any other Name…
The term ‘Alternate Reality Game’ has been used to describe a vast variety of different games. These include traditional ARGs such as The Beast, to single-player games such as Jamie Kane, to immersive theatre productions such as Faust by Punchdrunk, to collaborative games without central narratives such as World Without Oil. I’ve also seen urban…
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Portal: The Way Forward
I’m not a fan of puzzles, and I don’t like first-person shooters like Halo or Doom, either. Despite this, I found myself irresistibly drawn to Valve’s new first-person puzzle game, Portal. The premise behind Portal is simple; you have a Portal gun that can create man-sized wormholes in walls, floors and ceilings that connect to…
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Rock Band Exclusive: All Sorts of Merchandise
Improbably enough, I was on stage this afternoon with Alex Rigopulos of Harmonix (creators of Guitar Hero 1 and 2, and Rock Band) talking about how ARGs and music games were similar. During the course of the conversation, Alex revealed a few details about Rock Band which I am fairly confident haven’t been announced elsewhere.…
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Free the Man Bookers!
I’m currently in Zurich at the GameHotel conference, so I don’t have much time to cover this, but The Times is reporting is talk of making all six shortlisted Man Booker prize novels available online for free. I say ‘talk’ because it’s not entirely clear what’s being discussed between the publishers, the Man Booker Prize…
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Barclays OnePulse: A Tale of Woe
The bottom line: Barclays hates its customers, and doesn’t even know how to run its business. A few months ago, I decided that I was finally going to move my current account away from Barclays to someone more sensible, like First Direct or Egg. Barclays is a big bank with a lot of branches, but…
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Let’s Change the Game
Achievement One of the most startling things about alternate reality games is what their players can achieve. When you have tens of thousands of highly motivated and tightly-knit players who urgently want to get to the next scene, even the most obscure puzzle can be solved, no matter what language it’s written in, or what…
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