| Title: So You Wanna Be a Rock Star?
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Millions of American kids dream of being rock stars at some point in their lives.
Even me, and I'm a geek. (To give you an idea of how much a geek, my sweetie and I
recently figured out that when we were both 16, we were within two blocks
of each other--but I was at the Battleground playing Dungeons & Dragons,
and she was at CBGBs listening to the Ramones. One of us was hip, and it
sure wasn't me.)
How about a game in which you put together a band, have your characters practice guitar skills, plead with club owners to let you play, grovel to major-label A&R reps to try to get signed, and tour America in a drug-induced haze trying to get your band to the top of the charts? Make a deal with HMV, the largest record chain on the planet, and commission music from Kristin Hersh and Smashing Pumpkins and 311.... |
| Title: Christ & Conquer
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There are more Evangelicals in this country than you
can shake a hymnal at. And there are more outlets for Christian products
than you can believe. So how
about this?
The Final Days are upon us, the Anti-Christ is marshalling his forces in the East while plagues and earthquakes sweep the earth, as foretold in Revelations. You command the armies of God in the final struggle between Good and Evil, fighting to establish the Kingdom of God. I come with a sword, saith the Lord. In other words, it's a real-time strategy game but with a twist: in addition to modern armies, you field the Angelic Host, while your opponent can call up demons.... Sell it through Zondervans--the largest Christian retail chain--and a slew of other potential accounts as well. |
| Title: Fry Raider
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Let's not forget the fast-food chains. Golden arches on every street corner
in the nation. Big potential market, there. Of course, it's a pretty
young market: teens and below, and that means a different game style than
you'd adopt for the traditional PC games market. Think Mario Brothers and
Sonic the Hedgehog: side-moving jump-and-grab games with cute characters
and villains.
That part's easy: McDonald's already has the cute characters and villains: picture little Ronald leaping over the Swamp of the Deep Fat Fryers to collect little hamburgers and fries, facing the Hamburglar "boss" at the end of the level. It's a console title, of course. Or we could do this. The current schoolyard craze is the Digimon: they're like Tamagotchis, only the little digital pet has two electric contacts on the outside. You can press yours up against the Digimon of your friend, and your pets fight each other. So the pet is more than a solo activity; you can do stuff with other people. How about a PC version? You train your pet at home, feeding it Mcdonald's food, then go onto the internet to have it play with other kids' pets in a "virtual dog run"...or maybe we let them fight, although McD's probably won't go for something that edgy. They get "relationship marketing" out of it, too--scads of customers visiting them on the internet daily, to whom they can pipe special offers and promotions. |
More hot Hit Hunter titles....
© Copyright 1998 by Greg Costikyan.