April Alternatives, Part 1

EA Announces New Viral Campaign For Unannounced Game

After consulting with the CDC, EA executives have given the OK to lace copies of their game with biological elements that, when inhaled or absorbed through the skin, will exhibit localized gene mutations.

The promotion is part of a campaign designed to get people talking about upcoming titles without EA having to officially announce anything. Imagine waking up one morning with the C&C logo on your butt or a hairy Kilrathi on your chest!

While the promotion ties in with the launch of a new title in one of EA's most storied franchises, they are remaining silent on just what that franchise might be. When asked to comment, EA's head of product development said "You'll just have to wait and see what happens when you get "tagged" [ED=Their new buzz word for this process]. But he warns that speculation should still be kept to a minimum since they've also been working on a few red herrings.

We asked to see any info on possible side effects of this promotion and were briefly shown some indecipherable notes out of a clinical study, but were assured that it meant that nobody could expect to die from this. EA's community relations officer said "You can expect no ill effects whatsoever, and any changes brought on by the viral agents will dissipate over time and you'll never be able to tell there had ever been anything there."

She continued, "In fact, the worst thing to come from this was that, as part of the clinical study, we offered to promote an indy game put out by a Christian group for free, if they would opt to be a part of the case study. Everything went great, except that one of the artists included a rendition of Christ into the pile of suggested assets to use. We were pretty embarassed to have to tell the hundreds who had gathered to see the Face that had grown on a subjects belly that the face on the puppy was really a man-made miracle. You see, the dog tore up the package and had ruined the disk. No one thought anything of it until it started getting media attention."

Making the Game: Mission G3

Mission G3 is the third in the G'mar series, the attack on the first Kraken ship-killer. You'll notice there are all sorts of references to this being the 'first half' of the mission -- and we'll find out what that means... tomorrow.

These updates are thanks to John "Captain Johnny" Guentzel, who provided several CD image archives of material used by the Wing Commander Prophecy development team!

Mission G3 Download (27 kb) Date: April 23, 1997 Project: Wing Commander Prophecy Donated By: John Guentzel Pages: 8