Games

Well, ain't this grand? Episode 6 of Inanimate Alice, "The Last Gas Station", has received an Honourable Mention in the Electronic Literature Organisation's 2016 Robert Coover Prize: "The Robert Coover Award for a Work of Electronic Literature is an award given for the best work of electronic literature of any length or genre. Bestowed by the Electronic Literature Organization and funded through a generous donation from supporters and members of the ELO, this $1000 annual prize aims to recognize creative excellence.

Firstly, I need to offer a sincere and abject apology for bastardising adapting the phrase All Quiet On the Western Front for the title above, but given the contents of this better-late-then-never-catchup on all things MBDish, it certainly fits. Second up, this: PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO PLUTO.

It's certainly been a rollercoastery week [or dozen] here at MBD Headquarters, with "The Dead Tower" about to blast across the Electronic Literature stratosphere via the impending release of the Third Volume of the Electronic Literature Collection, our + Dreaming Methods' Transmedia/VR Project "Pluto" getting much Tumblr love after winning their 2015 International Award, and last [but in no way least] "

Can a game help you write a meaningful story with others? Academic discussion of collaborative story-writing games usually contains reference to Surrealist game Exquisite Corpse, known to many as Consequences. In it, a game rule prohibits players, writing in turn, from reading most of the story written before their contribution. This rule promotes a fragmented form of narrative which, although often inventive and entertaining, does not often fulfill the normal requirements of a story.

It's been a long time coming, and now the beta release of Episode 6 of the born-digital series Inanimate Alice is so close we can almost taste it. Ian Harper, the Series Producer [with whom I'm currently in the midst of cooking up an exciting new Inanimate Alice Storyverse co-production] has this to say about "