Virtual Relationship Counseling

Grand Text Auto points us to an interesting article in the latest issue of the Atlantic Monthly about the game Façade. The Atlantic story is subscriber-only, and the Atlantic has blocked bugmenot (er ah not that we endorse using bugmenot to get free login info.) And Façade isn't exactly new--the NYTimes did a piece on it about it a year and a half ago. But the Atlantic piece is excellent; it's worth buying a hard copy of the mag for, or flipping thru at a newsstand. And there's a nice interview with the author Jonathan Rauch about the piece that is free online.

If you haven't played Facade, you really should. If you have played it only a couple of times, try it again. The latest version seems to be debugged a bit, and it's a free download for PCs and Macs now. The game is supposedly a dry run for a much deeper and more involved version called the Party. Even in this limited beta form, it's offers some unique forms of interactivity that every gamer should experience.Here's a description of the interactive story from the developer's FAQ:

In Façade, you, the player, using your own name and gender, play the character of a longtime friend of Grace and Trip, an attractive and materially successful couple in their early thirties. During an evening get-together at their apartment that quickly turns ugly, you become entangled in the high-conflict dissolution of Grace and Trip’s marriage. No one is safe as the accusations fly, sides are taken and irreversible decisions are forced to be made. By the end of this intense one-act play you will have changed the course of Grace and Trip’s lives – motivating you to re-play the drama to find out how your interaction could make things turn out differently the next time.