Channel 4 announced they were spending a whole pile of cash on interactive education a while back. The first fruits of that are ripe; you can go try Bow Street Runner, a history adventure game. It’s classic adventure game in style – that is, more interactive film than the sort of game we’re used to […]
Read more "Remember Channel 4?"Interesting article in Gamasutra a couple of days ago. (I know, I know, I’m late with this – but I’ve been working on other stuff lately.) Jim Preston wades hip deep into the “Are video games art?” debate. Rather than concluding yes or no, he suggests (correctly, I’d say) that the point is moot: As […]
Read more "Games as Art? . . . Who cares?"Used to be, journalists were like information sprinkler systems. They pulled information up from unfathomable, inaccessible depths, and spread it out to the waiting masses. Not any more. We all swim in an ocean of data now. And everyone has the ability to broadcast to millions. So journalists have to be pumps and filters – […]
Read more "Careful Dude . . . Citizen Journalists at Work"Running a guild or pack of players in an online game is good practise for running a real corporation – or any other leadership position. That’s the message from a report from IBM (specifically their Global Innovation Outlook). Online games, and specifically massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs), offer a glimpse at how leaders develop […]
Read more "Video Games: Training the Leaders of Tomorrow"Earlier I posted a conceptual model for thinking about viral video. The short version is that people link viral video because it makes ’em look cool. So the upshot for vid producers is: give them vids that will make the sender look cool if they ping it out to all their friends. Video (or any […]
Read more "The Internet is About Making Connections"Any of you who are online/wired journalists might find this interesting. Ning.com has a social network just for us newfangled online journo types. Yes, I know – another social network. But it’s specific to theme. Social network speciation, you might call it. The specialization means it’s better at what it’s supposed to do, in this […]
Read more "Ning.com – Give it a Go?"You know Nintendo’s Wii Fit? Get in shape by waving the baton, right? There’s a balance board, too which allows you to actually practise a bunch of physical skills. And now, mental skills. You can also sit on the balance board in a lotus position and engage in Zazen metitation. Remember to keep your mind […]
Read more "Wii Fit – Now with soul excercise"Games as editorial cartoons: Molleindustria, makers of the amusing (and clever!) Macdonald’s Video Game, have scored a below-the-belt hit with Faith Fighter. It uses comedy and gameplay to convey a rhetorical point. I won’t spoil the fun by telling you what it is – though you might get an idea from their game description: “Faith […]
Read more "Isn’t Blasphemy a Laugh?"You’ve heard about the Japanese whaling research expeditions in Antarctic waters. As a journalist, I naturally have no opinion about this, but there are at least three aussies who do, and they’ve just made an editorial game expressing them – Harpooned. Voila le traileur: Download and play the game for free at their website. UPDATE: […]
Read more "Harpooned – an editorial point"America’s Army must have been a success, because now NASA is getting in on the game. They’re launching a massively multiplayer online game about – what else? – space exploration. Way cool. They’ve got this idea that a vast online space simulator could be a great way to get kids interested in space exploration. They’ve […]
Read more "Games. The final frontier."
Philip Trippenbach 