About us
We are a team of undergraduates from the National University of Singapore currently developing an alternate reality game (ARG) as our project for NM4882A - Topics in Media Design: Playable Worlds.
Disclaimer
All characters appearing in the game and events happening during the game are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, or real events is purely coincidental.
Team Members
Lim Fang Wei Benedict - Game Producer
Seow Jianqiang Jeremy - Game Designer
You Ying Dan - Game Prototyper
Lim Kang Ming Kenny - Game Tester and Programmer
Influences and Inspirations
Sigma: Origins is an alternate reality game (ARG) which places players in a extraordinary yet realistic scenario. Once the game has begun, players are kept immersed in the game because ludic borders are not clearly defined. The play space in this game is both in the physical realm, as well as the cyberspace. Being set in the real world, Sigma Origins is about having an immersive game with an emphasis on the unique aspect of ARGs which is “this is not a game”. Inspiration was drawn from the puzzles and the realistic interactions that were used in mainstream popular ARGs such as I Love Bees and Why So Serious (videos under links), albeit on a much smaller scale.
Brief Introduction of the Game
The concept of the game is to experience the gamification of everyday life, where the phenomenon is exaggerated to show the potential problems of an increased disconnection from the real world and an increased affiliation to a game world. The game is also a social critique of the Singaporean education system which breeds a generation of paper chasers who place excessive emphasis on letter grades.
The game is about a group of hardcore gamers who submitted a project for a course they are taking in the National University of Singapore. Being gamers themselves, they had a lot of pride in the game they made and fully expected it to ace the grading criteria. On the side, the group was tinkering with the concept of making an Improvised Explosive Device (IED).
The problem comes when the grades for their project were returned and they did not fare as well as expected. With a IED on hand as well as the haunting thought of the poor grades which they have received, one of the members of Sigma Guild decided to make use of the IED to invoke an explosive retribution. Realizing that the guild members would land themselves in trouble for creating an IED, they flee the scene. Thankfully, one of the members is remorseful and left clues to the location of the IED. Players take on the role of a Cobra (Chemical, Ordinance, Biological, and Radioactive (Defense) Agent) and attempt to stop the deranged students before anyone suffers.
The game makes use of the ticking clock to give the game an inherent dramatic tension that naturally follows a dramatic arc. Conflict is naturally resolved as players get to defuse the bomb over a 3-stage mini-game. The game focuses on puzzles that help players piece together a bigger picture of the current happenings.. The game makes use of online social media to convey the full story across to the players. Widely used channels such as Facebook and Twitter are used to give characteristics to characters who do not exist in the real world.
