Shadow Government

Crawling out of the flophouse
I saw the mayor stealing my junk
I doth protest, citizens arrest!
Now my body's in his trunk. 
Where's the Shadow Government when you need it?
                                                                               -TMBG

Here it is! It's here! Playmatics has teamed with the Millenium Institute to create Shadow Government, a game based off of real world economics, sustainability, and other data that will allow players to play the whole world as a game. TechCrunch article here.

Playmatics is super smart -- but like Dr. Evil found out, conquering the world with $1M is a lot harder than it used to be!

Manipulating the Planet for the Sake of a Good Game

A new article from Popular Science about geoengineering projects to help facilitate sporting events. Remote controlled clouds, weather control, and (seriously) monkey guards, all brought to bear to make games more enjoyable.

IntoNow and Pepsi

That's right! Whenever an ad comes on for Pepsi Max, the first 50,000 people who tag it using the IntoNow app get a free Pepsi Max! Check out the Mashable article, and enjoy this deliciously aspartame rich, double-caffeinated introduction to the televised portion of the Gamepocalypse! Special thanks to Matthew Copeland for the tip!

World of World of Warcraft World under construction!

In my Visions of the Gamepocalypse talk last year, I predicted the coming of a LARPing theme park which I jokingly called World of World of Warcraft World (WoWoWW). And it looks like something of the sort seems to be happening! A park in China called "Joyland" will have a mix of Warcraft and Starcraft elements. When it will open is unclear. What is clear, though, is that a major amusement park BASED ON A VIDEOGAME is being built right now. Two tickets to the Gamepocalypse, please!

A Toothbrush Moment

This year at GDC, just one year after I delivered my famous "toothbrush talk", Brian Krejcarek has now presented me with a functioning Green Goose points-giving toothbrush! There was some dispute over whose idea it really was...

Actually, that's just us trying out the toy swords he has on the same system! +5 points for toothbrushing, +5 points for eviscerating your enemies. Neat! Thanks to Floyd Mueller for the photos! :)

Green Goose

Points for toothbrushing? That's crazy talk!

What I love about Green Goose is how incredibly flexible the system is. And Brian Krejcarek is super smart!

Greenopolis and Oceanopolis

Waste Managment (you know, the garbage truck company) owns a company called Greenopolis (a recycling company) that has launched a Facebook game called Oceanopolis. It's, you know, a game about recycling. But here's the part where they drive their hybrid car into the Gamepocalypse: If you do real world recycling at Greenopolis recycling kiosks, you earn points for Oceanopolis, which you can then cash in for real life pizzas from Domino's, which generates pizza box waste to be hauled away by Waste Management! See? You recycle, and everyone gets richer! Except you.

Ten bonus Gamepocalypse points if you can say "Greenopolis Gamepocalypse" five times fast.