Kickstarter

Hello Everyone!

My name is Steve MacMartin and I am the head writer here at IDGI.  Fans of our A.R.G. have been speaking to me for the past three years as I’ve written for pretty much every character in the game.  I thought a logical first update for me would be to discuss our approach to storytelling, and how our Alternate Reality Game relates to the overall story of Consortium.  We have received a-lot of emails and comments regarding such things.  Some of the big/repeating questions are:

• What could you possibly have planned for 21 games?
• Who or what is the villain/enemy of the game?
• How about writing a document that describes the overall story arc of the game – to at least give a hint of what your writers can do?

First and foremost, let me start by repeating our mantra: the story of Consortium revolves around an extremely deep-seeded mystery and is too complex to simply point and say: “our game is about THIS!”  This is one of our greatest weapons to ensure the ~6 hour experience of Consortium is as unique and unpredictable as possible.  This is also why the story write up, here on KS, is mostly geared toward setting up the WHOs and WHEREs, and not so much the specific WHATs.  We want players to feel like they are actually exploring an alternate universe, as themselves, and have absolutely NO idea what is coming next.  Much like many movies tend to give everything away in their trailers (we hate that!), Consortium would be ruined if we talked too much about the specific “narrative thread” of the story.  We hope to hook people on the IDEA of the game world we have created, and on the very notion of being the physical puppet master of another human being.  It definitely helps to know some history on this alternate Earth + its characters (and this is precisely where our A.R.G. comes into play) but this is not vital to still enjoy what CONSORTIUM has to offer.

So... if you’re looking for examples of our writing team’s ability and want to at least get a feeling for the thematic/mood elements of our game and its characters, please refer to our A.R.G.  The A.R.G. is not just for show and flash – it’s an integral part to the story and lore that makeup our entire game!  Keep in mind that everything from the Corporate Blog to the Experience Space Scene is entirely IN-GAME.  So if you email a character, such as Vidal Desertch, then you can expect an in-game reply.  This Kickstarter campaign is the ONLY element of Consortium and/or its A.R.G. that is ‘out of game.’ 

Essentials of our A.R.G. include:

• Audio blogs.
• Audio puzzles.
• Alternate world/future News Articles and Mission Reports all about countless elements/characters in our story.
• Regular puzzles/riddles/hidden secrets that are what A.R.G.’s normally comprise of.
• Hand-written journals also with secret codes and puzzles hidden within.
• Hidden dialing coordinates (find them all to dial into an entirely different time/place!).
• An entire “internal Worldview Industries” e-mail program, packed with over a hundred email correspondences between characters.
• A *MASSIVE* in-game forum between the public and characters of our game.
• A fun/trippy “arcade-style” game called the Greenberg Device, with 21 unique levels of play.
• Once you reach the 93-99% complete mark (according to the in-game progress bar), you can access the "King-Made Question Bot."  Simply put, you can directly ask this BOT questions about anything at all, and it will reply to the best of its ability.  It has just recently been given a huge overhaul and is jam-packed with easter eggs and other fun stuff to discover.

I guess that's it for now!  Stay tuned for more updates, as I know Greg has some more game play videos planned for you!  If you have any further/specific questions about story or the A.R.G... please do not hesitate to throw me an email at: steve@interdimensionalgames.com