Home again, home again: I'm back on Offworld
A quick personal note: ten days and god knows how many hilltops mounted later, I'm officially back on Offworld duty after my San Francisco jaunt, and ready to bring you back up to speed on all the developments that took place in my absence. I'm not even going to pretend that I'm caught up on the tens and tens of thousands of RSS posts accumulated over the past several days, and I'm also resisting the temptation of that "Mark all as read" button, because who knows what magic might lie somewhere in the noisy mix of endlessly re-blogged items that have propagated through the press.
So, three things, the first of which is that today may end up being a day of older news that I think deserves to be re-noted, where tomorrow we should be basically back on track.
And the second: a quick thanks to everyone that made the trip special, Morgan 'Crashfaster' Tucker and the 8bitSF crew for all the hospitality at Sunday night's wicked DNA Lounge show, DocPop for organizing Sunday's pre-show burger-time deluxe at Zeitgeist (though we ended up making it quite late), and Steph Thirion, Tiff Chow, David Hellman, and Ginger Anyhow for all the skimpily Flickr-collected marvelous misadventures.
And finally, specifically for you SF readers: Steph, Tiff and I took a few post-burger/pre-show hours on Sunday to start picking away at the first layers of local Alternate Reality epic The Jejune Institute, which, if you haven't yet experienced, like, do not pass go, etc. and carve out two or three hours as soon as possible to take part in its induction ceremony.
Under penalty of I don't even know what, I won't delve in to what you will find once you get there, but will only say that turning up to its 580 California St, Suite #1607 offices will start you on a journey that you will not regret.
Right, so, on with it.
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Doctor Popular
#1 – 10:00 AM September 1, 2009
Dude, I'm so glad you did the Jejune thing. It's such a fun experience.
Tiff Chow
#2 – 10:12 AM September 1, 2009
Come back soon, Brandonnn!
jennfrank
#3 – 4:19 PM September 1, 2009
DocPop is trying to sound supportive, but when I got back from the Jejune Institute he was like, "Well it isn't that fun." Brandon! Did you think it was too 'accessible'?
Brandon Boyer
#4 – 4:30 PM September 1, 2009
If what you're asking me is what I think you're asking me, I thought it was just accessible enough for your average schmo to come in off the street -- having seen one of the fliers scattered around town -- and be intrigued/fascinated enough to continually move forward to the end of the exercise.
We actually hit a snag when one of the locations we were meant to access was closed for the day/weekend (a forewarning for all you would-be mid-Sunday Jejuners), but persevered just long enough to stumble on the trail again ourselves.
I do think only the hardcorest of the hardcore will actually continue to sniff out further evidence/clues (I was sent an SMS the next morning with more radio/text-console instructions), but for even a tourist with a dollar + tax to spare, there sort of isn't any better way you should kill a few hours in the city.
StephThirion
#5 – 5:57 PM September 1, 2009
I wish they had some sort of multiplayer thing, where a team would have to split up at some point. I basically spent the whole game racing to solve at least one step before Brandon or Tiff did, and ridiculously failed. But then, had I gone by myself, I'd have definitely ended up catching a plane to find next clue at the Lincoln Memorial, Washington DC.
crashfaster
#6 – 6:45 PM September 1, 2009
SF <3's you. hope too see you out here again soon.
jennfrank
#7 – 7:43 AM September 2, 2009
I will say, then, that part two is much less accessible, extremely clever, and that I hated to move away from SF before I'd finished. Also, the last time I saw my cult CD (no, really) was during GDC.
Doctor Popular
#8 – 11:26 PM September 2, 2009
To be clear, I absolutely love the Jejune Institute. The game design is creative and I enjoy the "world" within the game. I didn't care for the ending of the first big segment of the game, and didn't bother to play the online version at all.
teflon
#9 – 7:01 AM September 6, 2009
To those offering their commentary on the Jejune Institute, I suggest you refrain lest you ruin the experience for others. When my sister took me, I literally had NO IDEA what this was about and had a wonderfully paranoid time at a price that can't be beat in SF's economy. I recognize the need to talk about such an unusual experience, but frankly your commentary isn't adding any significant color to the discussion, and in fact is giving away a bit too much about the project for a newb. C'mon, really, people?