Macs and ARGs

Last year, a group of marketers decided to try to sell a package of Mac shareware by means of an alternate reality game (ARG). To that end, they launched MacHeist, and for every mission you went on (puzzle you solved) you received a discount on the package. (Wikipedia has a good article on it, including the criticisms of the concept as well.)

The game part of MacHeist 2 is over, but the package is now for sale. I didn’t have time to play through most of the missions, but I stopped by to watch how the community of players tackled the intricate puzzles together to solve them as a group. This reminded me a lot of how Cloudmakers.org formed to solve the riddles in the first ARG on which I worked: the Beast.

No matter whether you play the game or not, the package is an insanely good deal–assuming you have a Mac and don’t already own much of the software. For myself, the cost of CSSEdit and Pixelmator alone is worth it. (I already have and use 1password, which rocks.)

Plus a quarter of your purchase price goes to a charity of your choice. If you buy through this link, they’ll toss me a couple more apps as a referral bonus, but don’t let that sway you either way. I’m just intrigued by how a small group can successfully use an ARG to help make them a lot of money. The deal’s only been going on for just over a week, and they’ve already sold over $800,000 worth of packages on the site.

I wonder, of course, if you could manage the same sort of promotion to sell games, perhaps in conjunction with a site like Tanga.com (which is like Woot.com, but with a heavy board game rotation). Any takers?

Birdman Reviews

Darrel Hardy kindly pointed me to a Gamasutra.com roundup of the major online reviews for the Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law video game. Overall, they’re positive, especially about the writing, for which I’m grateful. They all say roughly the same thing: Funny game, but don’t expect dozens of hours of deep, involved gameplay (as you get in the Phoenix Wright games on which the Birdman mechanics are based).

I think that’s a fair call, as it’s what the team at High Voltage set out to do. In that sense, we hit the target dead center. The reviewers’ scores seem to depend entirely on how much the reviewer wanted Phoenix Wright rather than Birdman.

As a short, snappy comedy, Birdman demands less involved gameplay. While I love the Phoenix Wright games (I’m playing through the third in the series with my son Marty right now), the convoluted mysteries of that game wouldn’t play well with Birdman, each episode of which is only 15 minutes long. I’m biased, of course, but I think the game hits the sweet spot. As the reviews show, though, that’s a matter of personal taste.

“Getting Your Game Published” via Podcast

The fine folks at Pulp Gamer recently posted a podcast featuring Aldo Ghiozzi of Impressions and myself blathering on about games publishing at last year’s GAMA Trade Show. I had a great time working with Aldo, especially since he and I come at the question of “Getting Your Game Published” from different angles. I often handle seminars like this on my own, and working with Aldo was refreshing.

Be sure to check it out if you get the chance, and you can listen to the sound of my voice changing in timbre as I move the mike around all over the place. (Man, I talk fast. I run on adrenaline at these things, and it shows in my pace, I think.)

The New Novel Deal

Just today, I signed a contract for my next fantasy novel with Wizards of the Coast. This will be my 12th mass-market novel, and it should hit shelves sometime in 2009. That’s all I’m at liberty to share right now, but I had to share the good news.

Get Thee to a Gamery!

Birdman-WiiAccording to the marketing mavens at Amazon.com, the Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law game on which I worked should be in stores today. Be sure to get yourself down to just such a store soon and pick up a copy for your Wii, PSP, and/or PS2.

I had a fantastic time working on the game. The Birdman show is hilarious, and I got a special kick out of knowing I was writing dialog for stars including Gary Cole, John Michael Higgins, Peter MacNicol, Paget Brewster, Michael McKean, and Lewis Black. As a writer, you can sometimes hear a character’s voice in your head, but having DVDs featuring those characters already talking really helps you get inside them and make their words ring true (and funny!).

I’d like to especially thank the game’s producer, Kevin Sheller, as well as my co-writer, Micah Skaritka, who wrote more chunks of the game than I did. We spent a number of days locked in a writers’ room together, spitballing ideas back and forth. I couldn’t have asked for a funnier, more talented crew to work with. Also, many thanks to Matt Corso, Eric Nofsinger, John Kopecky, and the rest of the management team at High Voltage Software, who helped make the whole experience so much fun.

Happy 2008!

We’re going to have a houseful of kids (over and beyond the five who live with us) to help us ring in the New Year tonight. Some of them might not be able to stay awake until the event actually hits our time zone, but they’ll manage to celebrate the event when it happens somewhere farther to the east, I’m sure.

Wherever you are and whoever you’re with, here’s to an enchanted evening, a memorable morning, and a better year beyond.

One More Plug

I forgot one:

My pal Jason Blair just had his first comic book hit stores this month: The Long Count. Jason wrote the words, Leanne Buckley drew the pictures, and Mark Smiley of Archaia Studios Press presented it to the world.

I gotta get me to a comic store fast.

Plugging Away

A few of my friends have bits in the works that might interest you.

First up, Rich Dansky‘s first creator-owned novel, Firefly Rain, is due out January 8. This is the debut novel for Wizards of the Coast Discoveries, the new all-original imprint from Wizards, and knowing Rich it’s bound to be great. I don’t know any more about it than what’s online and a few private hints from Rich, but I’ve already pre-ordered my copy.

Next, fellow Alliterate, Open Design for RPGs originator, and former Dragon Magazine editor Wolfgang Baur is running a special promotion for his young but fantastic magazine of d20 gaming goodness, Kobold Quarterly. Those who subscribe soon can pick up a free set of Q-Workshop dice along with their first issue.

Finally, another fellow Alliterate and author Steve Sullivan has a new book of Blue Kingdom novellas out from his Walkabout Publishing. Blue Kingdoms: Zombies, Werewolves & Unicorns covers an unusual range of topics in a pair of dark fantasy tales guaranteed to keep you flipping pages.

The Birdman Cometh

Birdman-WiiCapcom now has an official site up for the Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law game on which I worked. It’s a snazzy introduction to the game, with all sorts of screenshots and cool Flash bits, so stop by and check it out.
Oddly, the synopsis still lists the game as due November 13, which was the original ship date. The latest information I have says it should be out January 8 instead, a week from Tuesday.

Capcom is running a sweepstakes with prizes for the first 500 pre-orders through their site, although as with most such contests, the details reveal that no purchase is actually necessary to enter and win.

Still, why wouldn’t you want to pick up such a fun and handsome game? It’s available for the Wii, PSP, and PS2. I plan on cracking my copies open as soon as they arrive. I had a hoot working on this game, and I cannot wait to see and play the final results.

Smaller World Every Day

My son Marty has a good friend Thomas who now only lives three doors down from us in our new place. They’re both in third grade and Cub Scouts together, and Thomas often comes over to play games after school. Thomas calls today and says that he’s just found out that his cousin–actually his cousin’s husband–is a friend of mine, someone I’ve known for almost 20 years. He also mentions that his cousin’s family is on their way to his house right now and would like to stop over and say hi.

“Who’s your cousin?”

“Jordan Weisman.”

Could have knocked me flying with a feather.

Sure enough, a few hours later, Thomas and his family bring over Jordan, Dawn, and their three boys for a short, fun visit. The Weismans live in Seattle, of course, but they started out in Chicago and are back this way to visit relatives, including Thomas’s dad, a.k.a. Dawn’s uncle Rick. To cap it all off, it turns out that Rick works at the next desk over from Monica Valentinelli of Colonial Gothic and FlamesRising.com fame (among many other things).

It’s a nanoworld after all.