Vampires

In my review of Grey Ranks, I expressed my feeling that the game was capable of creating, in players, the kind of emotional response we associate with art of power; that playing the game can be a worthwhile and important experience, but that this kind of experience cannot reasonably be classifed as "fun." My phrasing was "fuck fun." Coincidentally -- or perhaps not coincidentally, since I believe Gijsbers is attempting to get at something similar -- the rules to his game Vampires says that it "transcends fun." (Gijsbers also created Fate, The Baron, and Stalin's Story).

So a game I designed with Steve Meretzky launched today. It's a "social network" game, developed by You Plus, and is currently available on MySpace. A Facebook version is now live will follow later.

Dracula Twins is a charming little sidescroller in which you play either Drac or Dracana, the twin children of Count Dracula, it seems. Graphics are cute and cartoony--apparently, vampires are the good guys. There's a little comic-book intro (a nasty vampire-hunter has got hold of old Dad, and you have to fight your way through various environments to rescue Pater), but of course, story isn't really the point of a sidescroller.