A friend recently referred me to the Flash game Facade. Facade was released in 2005, and is a story-based interactive game. So far, so Miniclip.com.
The game was written by two artificial intelligence researchers, Michael Mateas and Andrew Stern, who work at the University of Georgia. It took five years to create. So what's so special about it?
Facade is completely interactive. You're in a 3D room that you can walk about in, and just like in real life, you can speak, and your words influence the actions of the people in the game.
The basic premise is as follows; you're a long-time friend of a married couple, and they've invited you over for dinner. As the evening progresses however, they start arguing about their marriage, and your objective is to make them understand each other properly and reconcile their differences. However, it's very easy to say the wrong thing and get kicked out of the appartment. Not only that; if they decide to split up, you lose as well.
The artistic style of the game is fairly basic, and you kinda feel it's been designed more by scientists than designers. But that doesn't detract from the novelty of how unique the game is.
The temptation to ask the characters inappropriate questions is a strong one, but if you persevere it's really fun, and pretty difficult too. It's great to have a snapshot of what the future of gaming could look like, done in something pretty basic like Flash.
Game website: http://www.interactivestory.net/
Gameplay demonstration: http://youtube.com/watch?v=GmuLV9eMTkg
The basic premise is as follows; you're a long-time friend of a married couple, and they've invited you over for dinner. As the evening progresses however, they start arguing about their marriage, and your objective is to make them understand each other properly and reconcile their differences. However, it's very easy to say the wrong thing and get kicked out of the appartment. Not only that; if they decide to split up, you lose as well.
The artistic style of the game is fairly basic, and you kinda feel it's been designed more by scientists than designers. But that doesn't detract from the novelty of how unique the game is.
The temptation to ask the characters inappropriate questions is a strong one, but if you persevere it's really fun, and pretty difficult too. It's great to have a snapshot of what the future of gaming could look like, done in something pretty basic like Flash.
Game website: http://www.interactivestory.net/
Gameplay demonstration: http://youtube.com/watch?v=GmuLV9eMTkg
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