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There's a popular belief among gamers in the US that the traditional adventure genre is dead, despite the fact that companies like LucasArts continue to produce quality adventure games and that sales of such games are doing better than ever in Europe. According to Neil Young, vice president of Oregon-based developer Anim-X, the adventure genre in the US isn't dead; it just needs to be reinvented. To that end, his company, in conjunction with Electronic Arts, recently announced the development of Majestic, a nontraditional adventure game that hopes to capitalize on another American myth: the conspiracy theory.
The game is named after the Majestic Documents, a series of recently "uncovered" papers that reveal the existence of a group of people called the Majestic-12, which was originally formed by President Harry S. Truman in 1947 to investigate and recover downed UFOs on American soil. It's really the stuff of fantasy and X-Files scripts, but it is admittedly intriguing. But unlike other games that have focused on this subject matter - like Deus Ex for example - Majestic isn't so much a game as it is an experience. That is, there's no physical game to buy from a store. In fact, when it launches next March, Majestic will consist of a simple download no larger than 1MB in size. So what is Majestic? Put simply, it's a suspense/thriller adventure game that's played both on- and offline wherein you are the main character. Think of it as the movie The Game meets the Internet. In addition to dealing with each other, Majestic's characters will also interact with you, and soon after you've installed the small download on your hard drive, these characters will appear to have come to life. "We'll go to any length to suspend your disbelief," explains Young. "The game will reach out of the computer and connect with you personally." Majestic makes use of not only your computer and the Internet to progress its story along but also devices and utilities like your fax machine, phone, e-mail account, and even AOL's Instant Messenger (AIM) chat service. The game's characters will use all these devices to interact directly with you, which means that you can expect to get e-mails, Instant Messages, faxes, and even phone calls from the characters in Majestic as the game progresses.
Anim-X has gone to great extremes to bring Majestic and its characters to life. Hundreds of phone numbers from all over the United States have been purchased, phony Web sites have been erected, and even dummy corporations have been founded as part of the company's elaborate and living set. While neither EA nor Anim-X is ready to talk about the game's plot just yet, it's clear that Majestic will involve a story about some far-reaching government conspiracy to cover up a series of events that it doesn't want the public to know about. Beyond that, little else is known about the game's plot, other than the fact that Majestic is episodic, with new installments releasing every 30 days. According to Electronic Arts, Anim-X is currently three months ahead of schedule on production of these episodes, so when you play the first installment, up to three others will already be in the can.
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