MUTO a wall-painted animation by BLU from blu on Vimeo.

Now a new innovation using video game technology helps to fuel our world. IBM and Repsol are using a microchip meant for video game consoles to process data from geological surveys and search for oil deposits. The Cell processor in the PlayStation 3 game console allows for rapid detailed 3D imaging is helping to render seismic images of underground maps. The 3D imaging of the Cell processor has recently be found useful in medical research and imaging.

Not only has The Cell been helping with 3D imaging, but the Wii has new amazing applications for visual display, presentations, and teaching.

So what is next for video game technology? Perhaps genetic manipulation via a game controller? Or physicals online with the wii? One day soon we may all go to our offices and power up our Xbox for work. Here’s to the future of video games in our lives.

/Kirsten

While we might not be itching to repeat “Number Nine” into a microphone for points any time soon, the prospect of rocking out to “Hard Days Night” or “Hey Jude” tickles us pink.

Listen to the interview on NPR

The free version of the creature creator is surprisingly deep; however the upgraded version is highly suggested. At $9.95 for considerably more options, it is a very good deal. And so easy to use:

Vote on your favorites.

Create your own.

International Front creature creation:

Wii Fit: Your Living Room Decor is NOT SAFE

As reported in the in the British newspaper The Telegraph, the Wii Fit has unleashed a reign of destruction in the U.K., not seen since perhaps the introduction of the Razor scooter on September 4, 1996. From Newcastle to Brighton, British living rooms are being destroyed by the trashing about of errant limbs and hips, to the tune of 20 million pounds. While no loss of life is directly reported in the article, one can assume that injuries have be amassed by that amount of carnage are not insignificant (and related injuries from spilled tea, broken monocles, and dented top hats), and surely some of those injuries were fatal.

How will Nintendo weather this media storm?

This is the second safety debacle since the introduction of the Wii, the first being the December 15, 2006 recall of wrist straps that would break under heavy use (a problem exasperated by the introduction of WarioWare: Smooth Moves, which prompts players to deliberately drop the controller). Nintendo ultimately replaced over 2 million straps under a recall administered by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. However, as this problem has nothing to do with hardware failure and is really a ‘user error’ issue, we suspect Nintendo’s response will be “Let’s all just simmer down now.”

Fortunately, the wave of destruction doesn’t appear to extend beyond the coasts of England. It has been difficult to attribute this specifically to small U.K. living rooms (reported in the article to be on average just 21 sq. ft.) or a general lack of dexterity demonstrated by British casual gamers.

You’ve been warned. Stay alert. And watch out for the coffee table - those corners are sharp.

We see games like Halo 3, GTA IV and LEGO Indiana Jones jump to the top of sales shortly after release as these highly anticipated titles deserve but are then quickly replaced in sales by yet another Nintendo release.

However, looking at time usage on game systems, Xbox and PlayStation systems almost always trounce their Nintendo counterparts. According to Nelsen, gamers are playing on their Xbox 100% and Playstation 50% more than Nintendo consoles. If people are playing the games released for Microsoft and Sony systems with more fervor and dedicate more of their time to these systems, why is Nintendo still leading the pack in sales?

The reason Nintendo is able to retain top positioning over months of sales despite this lower engagement level is perhaps somewhat obvious. It doesn’t follow that because a game offers 100 hours of in depth gameplay that more people will be drawn to it. Quite the opposite is true, with low engagement trouncing more complex games in week by week sales. Nintendo’s move away from the core gamer to the casual is filling the needs of a wider population. New games that promise to help individuals to improve themselves (such as Brain Age or Wii Fit) and heighten interaction with others (Wii Play and Mario Kart Wii) are leading the field in this new era of gaming.

Not that Nintendo takes all the glory of this new breed of game. Guitar Hero and Rock Band have done their part to appeal to a wider audience of player while still resonating with that core group that we as an industry have spent so much time pursuing.

A game-play sweet spot somewhere between casual and core that is executed well and has well established player feedback and awards systems is game industry pay dirt. Assuming of course that you have any sort of budget for advertising…

So where is the next hot game coming from then? Shall we continue to look at daring innovators (Rockstar and Nintendo) to lead the way? Or will we dare to innovate ourselves?

Things to remember about the next dynamo game you make:

1. Access Granted - Make it accessible to a wide audience: no extreme violence or sex, controls that easy to use and gameplay that anyone can understand

2. Bit sized pieces – Make it easy to pick up AND put down

3. How Deep – offer complexity and depth for longer gameplay

4. Good Job! – create a system of accomplishments that reward your players

Not sure what dynamo decided that DiCaprio shared even a passing resemblance with Bushnell but we don’t see it…

Well, maybe a little…

If only it were that easy.

Malcolm Gladwell talks about the creation of social epidemics and what makes them work in his novel The Tipping Point. In his book, Gladwell Talks about those rules that are crucial to a successful social epidemic. The Three Rules are “The Law of the Few”, “The Stickiness Factor”, and “The Power of Context”

It took Gladwell a novel to explain all of these factors, but I will briefly touch on these three rules and their relation to viral videos.

Viral videos are being investigated by many marketing professionals as a cheap and effective way to spread their message to the masses. However, it can be a delicate balance to create a video that will catch your audience’s attention and resonate with them enough that they want to share it.

Take a look on YouTube… millions of videos… 150k new uploaded per day. So what will make your video get more visibility than the hottest new Music Video or Celebrity blooper? Or your hardest competition; a gay unicorn?

Context:

First, you need to make sure that your viral video resonates with your audience. The Believe campaign for Halo 3 spoke in the language of its audience and the message had context. With over 8 million views on YouTube, the ad spoke to an audience that was foaming at the mouth for the last installment of the story. The video also spoke to the humanity of Master Chief and gave a wider audience the opportunity to engage with the brand. Microsoft debuted the Halo 3 Believe campaign at just the right time and in the right forum to have context for its audience.

Sticky:

It needs to be memorable. Easily said but not so easily done. The Tipping Point author says that stickiness may go against conventional wisdom. Sticky videos are easy to understand, easily recallable, and rewatchable, not racy or complex. Gladwell illustrated stickiness through the success of children’s shows Sesame Street and Blue’s Clues. But when talking about a video on the internet competing against millions, the same principals apply. Look at the current political campaign to see how Barack Obama has created a sticky message that had relevance and over 13 million views on YouTube, helping to grow support and create a campaign comprising of $5 and $10 contributions that broke records for campaign fundraising. “Yes We Can”, is a message easy to understand, remember, and repeat.

The Few:

A few people can make a world of difference. Gladwell identifies these movers and shakers in a social epidemic as the connectors, mavens, and salesmen. Connectors are the people who bring us together, Mavens are those who have specialized knowledge, and Salesmen are those with exceptional charisma who can persuade others. For any viral campaign (even a small budget video] harnessing these individuals is critical to your success. 2K Games understood this with the release of BioShock. By involving the game community in the development and marketing of the game, they created a grassroots movement that spread virally among their audience. Have a video that you want spread virally? Don’t just throw it on YouTube… distribute it to those bloggers and experts of gaming that the audience trusts. Let them know how important they are to you and if you give them a sticky product with context they will help it to spread.

Even though a viral video can be seen as a cheap solution to marketing your game, it does take quite a bit of work to deliver a video that will work with your audience and find the tools for it to spread properly. There are no guarantees and no results without continued work. Your infection in the public consciousness may not last long unless you keep up your attacks.

Told around campfires and in village squares, the telling of the stories weren’t exactly a quiet dialog either. More of the opposite in fact! The storytelling tradition engaged and included the audience in each telling, depended on it in some cases, to move the story forward. The effectiveness of the telling was in part determined by the audience placing themselves into the story and the ability of the teller to rope in the audience. When Oedipus realizes his mother’s identity, the audience - themselves participants in the story - feel his shock and dismay. These narratives were collective, orally transmitted… you know, ‘viral’ and ‘interactive.’

The development of the printing press changed this - now stories were fixed in time and context, and each reader received the same unchanged narrative regardless of her distance from the author. Books replaced living, breathing storytellers as vessels of the story, and solo reading replaced community-based interactive storytelling.

Words are supposed to make concepts tangible, but for me the word “interactive” is the least useful, most confusing word I have to deal with on a day-to-day basis. As an interactive agency, what does International Front do, really? Interactivity is a broad concept that’s often reduced to a discussion of tools and capabilities… do we use flash and xml and soap and ajax?

Sure… but these questions don’t mean we ‘get it.’

Interactive storytelling is about transforming the narrative to include the audience in the telling, allowing them to tell you how the story ends, if they think your brand should be the hero or the villain, and how they see themselves in relation to it. Interactive storytelling is using any and all the tools available - viral tools, search strategy, ARGs, mobile development, UI/UA, data collection/modeling/interpretation, application development - to empower your players and exchange the book for the campfire.

/Ron