Tag: Narrative Design

Cyberpunk Thriller “X Marks the Spot” First Premium Release for Story Worlds Platform

by Chris Tihor, posted in Press Releases

Premium game available on innovative new platform that brings story based games to the casual gamer.

March 9, 2016 – Victoria, BC, Canada – Ironic Iconic Studios’ first game, “Mandatory Upgrade – X Marks the Spot” is an exciting new story-based game that allows the player to assume the role of a government agent investigating a death by a suit of cybernetic armour run amok. Starting today, it’s available on Facebook and the web through the Story Worlds platform.

Story Worlds was devised by One More Story Games as a way to create narrative-focused storytelling games and deliver them to a wide audience through traditional casual game platforms, such as smartphones and tablets. Ironic Iconic Studios saw Story Worlds as the perfect venue to release X Marks the Spot as the game addresses both the rising demand for story-based games while being playable within a few hours time to reflect the trend towards shorter, more compact experiences.

You’re Rachel Varley, fresh out of re-entry training and eager to get back to work as a NASIA Agent. But before you get a chance to get your feet under you, you find yourself tasked with discovering how a fellow agent managed to get carved up by a mechanized SWAT suit. Sure, everyone at the West Harbour Complex seems happy to help out and answer your questions, but you can’t forget that one or more of them may have been involved in plotting someone’s death. At least you’re not alone, you’ve got your trusty drone Osprey and your Virtual Personal Assistant, the always sassy Brigid. Will you be able to get to the heart of the mystery and still manage to escape in one piece?

Mandatory Upgrade – X Marks the Spot is now available on the Story Worlds games portal, with a free demo version available prior to full game purchase ($3.99 CAD). Play it on Facebook and the One More Story Games website. For more information, please visit www.mandatoryupgrade.com/x-marks-the-spot.

About Ironic Iconic Studios

Ironic Iconic Studios has been making games since 2003 in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. Their clients include Harebrained Schemes, Tap Tap Tap, Paper Machete Games and GameHouse Canada. This is the launch of their first in-house game.

Direct Game Link: Mandatory Upgrade – X Marks the Spot

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GottaCon? Why Yes. Yes We Do.

by Chris Tihor, posted in Appearances
So many colours!
So many colours! Double rainbow across the sky!

Just a quick note out that this weekend, from Feb 28th – March 2nd, I will be living large at GottaCon, Victoria’s premiere game convention. Not only will I be running an information booth for the LevelUp – IGDA Victoria group, but I’ll be participating in not one, but two video game themed panels. The first panel “Creating DIY Video Games – Indie Style!” is on Saturday at 10 am, and the second “Storytelling in Video Games: Telling Tales Around the Digital Campfire” will be on Sunday at 12:30 pm. Information on both can be found here.

GottaCon has been steadily growing over the past six years and this year it should be bigger and better than ever, with a new downtown venue and a lot more participation from the exploding local video game scene. Why not come and check it out? If you do, be sure to drop by the IGDA Victoria booth and say hi. And maybe even ask about the upcoming Video Game Start-Up Boot Camp while you’re at it. See you there!

Sweet Validation (And I Don’t Mean Parking)

by Chris Tihor, posted in blah blah blah

I was reading over an excellent interview on Gamasutra with game designer Chris Avellone (he of Fallout 2, Icewind Dale and Planescape: Torment fame), when one particular question caught my eye:

“What about in terms of the differences between narrative in film or books, versus narrative in games? It seems like there’s some key differences that a lot of games don’t really seem to pick up on.

CA: I think that people [in the industry] are appreciating scriptwriting talents more, especially as games become more voice-acted and cinematic. I [think that for] anyone pursuing narrative design, scriptwriting is the best way to hone your craft, because it’s a lot of what you’re going to be doing. It teaches you all the brevity; using the environment to communicate a situation, as opposed to just the flat-line vomit of text, like Torment had. Which we had to do at the time, but that’s more of a novelistic approach to writing, which isn’t necessarily the best fit for games.

Also I think comic book writing lends itself to training you to write dialogue for games, just because you have to think so visually about what’s happening in the environment. I really enjoy writing comics. For Star Wars [Knights of the Old Republic II], for example, I found myself thinking about the process a lot differently. About how the shot was framed, what was being shown, and how that reinforced what the characters were saying and [their interactions].”

Those of you who have seen my talk, Rummaging in the Geek Culture Toolbox, may have noticed that I made some of the same points in that presentation, particularly in the section on writing for comic books. I’d like to take this opportunity to say: it’s a pretty great feeling to see your theories confirmed by an industry professional whose work you respect and admire.

Walking on clouds will now commence for the foreseeable future.

A Skedaddle to Seattle

by Chris Tihor, posted in blah blah blah, Presentations

Last week, I participated in the second annual IGDA Summit in Seattle, Washington hosted by the International Game Developers Association. I’d made it out to the inaugural Summit last year, but this year was my first as a speaker. My talk, “Rummaging in the Geek Culture Toolbox“, was a look at all of the great things that came out of  the workshop with the same title that I ran during the International Conference on Interactive Digital Storytelling (ICIDS) last November in Vancouver, BC. The main goal of both was to explore the potential of using different forms of geek culture (in this case Role-Playing Games and Comics) to help in creating games, with a focus on writing and narrative design.

The talk went really well, I thought. Following the talk was a really interesting panel discussion of the subject with Wendy Despain, Richard Dansky, and myself. It was great to get the perspective of game writing veterans, and it gave me a few new ideas to pursue. The questions from the audience were also thought-provoking. Overall, very inspiring for me and hopefully entertaining and useful for the audience. I’m already considering doing another talk/workshop that would expand on the themes from the last one, maybe even looking at a couple new forms of geek culture to explore.

If you missed the talk, it was recorded and will be posted on to YouTube in the near future by Casual Connect. I’ll pop a link up here when that happens, unless I watch it first and find it too embarrassing. In that case, I may never mention it again. 😉

The rest of the Summit was terrific. I got to meet up with a ton of other game creators, old friends and new, exchange ideas and stories, and generally have a great time. I’ll be giving a brief talk summarizing my Summit experience and giving reasons why you should come out to Seattle for the next one. It’ll be happening during the August Level Up/IGDA Victoria monthly meeting next Monday evening. So if you have any questions come by and ask away.