Buried from MadPea Games launches tomorrow and at last night’s blogger preview Kiana Writer, Axiomatic Clarity and Kess Crystal explained some of the story concepts, the work that has gone into the game and a bit about MadPea Games too.
First of all, let’s take a look at the story concept :
BURIED is a story of a writer for self-help books, Lily Morano, who gets interested in geocaching.
She spends the summer on her island writing and researching until she finds C-Me.C-Me is a highly secret organization providing interactive geocaching and is invite only.
The C-Me capsules contain cameras and record the treasure hunters, allowing them to leave messages for each other.Lily receives the app and starts the hunt. However, she realizes that something sinister is going on and gets involved into something big and evil..
The game begins when Lily has been missing for two weeks. Her husband is offering a $500 000 reward for the one to find her as the Police has been completely useless with their search.
Equipped with their tablets, the players will find Lily’s hidden ‘Lilypad’ and learn about C-Me and start a search through the grid to discover a thrilling story.
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BURIED is happening at the current time and date.
The game is described by MadPea as an interactive adventure and there’s a lot of detail regarding the game in a blog post from MadPea :
We all know, however, that there will be more to this … much more. A story, a HUD to help us carry out the adventure, objects to interact with for clues, hints, and tools to use to find our answers of the day. We’ll also get sent all around the grid in search of clues to further the story, and get closer to solving the mystery.
This is a grid wide interactive adventure, it’s more than a simple hunt, you’re going to have to work for rewards in this game, although there will be a group inworld which will aid people to share hints, tips and troubleshooting.
Buried is the first Madpea game of 2015 but as some regular users of Second Life will know, MadPea Games are not new to Second Life, they have been making games since 2008 and they have created over 60 games in Second Life. Kiana Writer pondered why more people don’t make interactive games in Second Life. The reasons will be wide and varied. The one main sticking point is tier, but another issue is likely to be that game developers and creators are not even aware that Second Life can be used for interactive adventures.
A discussion with Madpea Games may encourage game developers to think differently. Whereas the number of islands in Second Life have been shrinking, MadPea Games have actually been steadily growing since 2008. In other words, there are areas of growth within Second Life.
The game itself uses new features such as experience keys where possible. The reason why they are used where possible is because experience keys are not yet grid wide and Buried will take hardy players to many different regions during the course of the game. Therefore in some areas players may well receive prompts regarding teleportation despite having already agreed to this. Consistency is a challenge when it comes to a game like this but MadPea work hard to try and ensure the best results possible are achieved.
The starting sim is extremely well designed. Axiomatic Clarity created the sim and took into account usability to make sure people don’t get lost in the woods. Ax is mostly a photographer but has experience as a designer.
MadPea games mean the use of a HUD to follow the game to its end and make progress. Kiana Writer, as her name suggests, writes the stories, other people help bring her story to life. The design of the game itself involved around 20 people. That will include designers, scripters, etc.
One of the things MadPea do well is involving the wider Second Life community in their games. This means they get support from creators when launching a game. Over 20 brands are listed on the blog post regarding vendors who will have a link to Buried.
Whereas games like this are difficult to bring to life and require a big team effort, their presence in Second Life adds more depth to the virtual world. I’d be happy to see more companies engaging but I fully understand why it’s difficult for many to embark on ventures such as this.
Buried opens tomorrow, February 1st at 12 noon SLT.