The Ultimate Search for Bourne: A new genre of game?

Last year, Google hosted a cross-promotional alternate reality game (ARG) for the Da Vinci Code movie. I played the game and quite enjoyed the various puzzles. I didn’t qualify as a finalist, though, at least in part because of an irritating scheduling conflict. In fact, the nature of the game and its popularity meant that only those dedicated fans with very flexible schedules really had a chance.

This year’s game is the Ultimate Search for Bourne, a tie-in with The Bourne Ultimatum. I liked the first two movies well enough. (Actually, come to think of it, I slept through part of the second, and I’m not sure I’ve ever got the plot straightened out.)

The game looks fun, too. As far as I can tell, you can’t really do anything today except look at the site and take a stab at understanding the gameplay. When the first real briefings becomes available, you should be able to use clues in it to find a place on a map where you can catch a glimpse of Jason Bourne through a surveillance camera. And I guess, if you choose the right camera (or cameras), you “win” for that day.

The prizes aren’t very important to me, though I can’t deny that I’d say no to an iPhone if someone decided to give me one just for playing a game.

What does matter to me is that there’s a chance this game will capture a little something of the spy genre, in an armchair sort of way. (Not real spying, of course.)

I can’t think of any truly great spy video games (Am I wrong? If so, please tell me. I’d love to try them out), but perhaps, if this game is a success, some daring and innovative game house could build on it to develop a sort of internet-based, global, massively-multiplayer version of “Assassin.” A top-notch game development crew could make this very, very fun.

EA ran Majestic. Supposedly, you would sign up and get phone calls, e-mails, and even faxes! And these would lead you to clues in a conspiracy game. It didn’t last, maybe because the price didn’t seem justified by the execution.

The Lost Experience did something similar. Unfortunately, it did it at a time when Lost basically sucked, so I didn’t pay much attention. Plus, the “game” wasn’t very fun and did require you to buy too much stuff, or much off other geeks on the internet who were willing to spend their money. So I didn’t participate.

Technology is better now, and we understand it better, too. Even if a game like the one I’m imagining would be heavily driven by advertising, it’d be fun. And if it weren’t—for example, if you had to buy a box in the game store just as you do with World of Warcraft and to pay a modest monthly fee—it just might become a success that would drawn the attention of people who don’t call themselves gamers.

What would make such a game work? A truly great ARG needs to use not just e-mail and phones, but the tools developed for multi-player FPS games and MMORPGs. A quick brainstorm turns up:

• A console website (or separately executed program, though that may eliminate some markeshare) as the single source of access
• Daily challenges (like the Google game) to find something online, succeed at a particular action goal, or achieve some other end; if there are real prizes, they could be tied to this
• Constantly available content, consisting mostly of the same sorts of things that make up the daily challenges, but tied to in-game rewards only (character advancement, revelation of plot, the chance to actually affect the ongoing plot, etc.)
• Action-based mini-games (building on FPS games, presumably)
• Puzzle-based mini-games with a spy feel to them (decoding messages, for example, or hacking a computer)
• The daily challenges add up to an ongoing narrative
• Rewards in the form of mini-episodes (three minutes?) of an ongoing spy drama tied to the game
• A strong community tool, to allow users to share stories
• Challenges unique to each player, so they can’t be “spoiled”
• The ability to group into a “cell” for team missions, where each participant must complete a certain challenge live, and all will be rewarded together
• Possibly ways to develop your character down different paths, so that, for instance, one cell member might disarm traps in the action mini-games while the other does the sharpshooting, while in appropriate puzzle games characters could have “clues” that make resolution of difficult, timed bits easier
• PVP in the form of competition with other players or cells on mutually exclusive goals, such that one cell might be trying to protect an ambassador’s life while the other is trying to assassinate her
• Possibly the ability to control a team of NPCs, at least in certain mini-games (like map-based games, where agent placement determines success)
• Possibly real prizes from sponsors (if the game is 1/10 as successful as something like WoW, daily giveaways of geeky, spy-like prizes from companies interested in the free advertising, branded with the game so that winners can boast about their success, might not actually ruin the game)
• An opportunity to delve into roleplaying while playing, with story-choices, text and voice chat, avatars, and so on

Okay, it’s all just a bunch of crazy ideas, at this point, poorly drafted and dumped on the page. But I think there’s real potential for a tremendously fun, successful game. Not long ago, I bemoaned the fact that all new games really seem to be new coats of paint on old games. A well-designed internet spy ARG—with daily challenges, demands that reach outside the game (like finding translations, locations, and so on)—could fit the bill.

In fact, I think after I hit “Publish,” I’ll draft an e-mail to an old friend of mine who’s a writer for several video game companies (some of which have spy themes), to see if what he thinks about the viability of this idea.

4 comments July 16th, 2007