EA.COM DEBUTS
MAJESTIC AT DEMO 2001FIRST INTERACTIVE SUSPENSE
THRILLER FOR THE WIRED GENERATION
EA.comsm,
an online interactive entertainment destination
and a business division of Electronic Arts
(NASDAQ: ERTS), shattered conventional
interactive entertainment concepts today by
unveiling a new online experience called Majestic
at The DEMO 2001 Conference. The
Internet-based game places players in the center
of a powerful suspense thriller where the lines
of reality are quickly blurred. It is a
groundbreaking form of interactive online
entertainment that interacts with players via
e-mail, instant messaging, voicemail, fax and the
Internet. Unlike any online gaming experience to
date, Majestic decides when it is time to
engage and summons players to their PCs.
Launching in Spring 2001 on EA.com, Majestic
will recast online gaming as it is known today.
"Majestic
changes the game for online interactive
entertainment, and I'm very pleased EA.com is
using DEMO to unleash this thriller on the
world," said Chris Shipley, Executive
Producer of The DEMO Conferences. "This game
will do for online entertainment what the
Sopranos did for HBO."
Majestic
deftly presents a suspense thriller with
conspiracy sensibilities involving covert
government agencies, menacing fugitives and the
finest qualities the Internet has developed. The
player is placed at the very center of an
exhilarating, multi-tiered story that involves a
game company whose top new product appears to
interfere with the agenda of a mysterious
high-powered, top-secret political organization.
Majestic?: It
Plays You?
The phone rings,
it’s a woman and she’s hysterical.
Someone is trying to break down her door. Why is
this happening to her? Why is she calling you?
Perhaps it has something to do with the fax she
sent to you last week. You get the fax and head
for your computer to start searching the Internet
for clues. You want to help this woman,
you’ve chatted with her, received emails
from her, you’ve even seen her homepage, in
fact she called you just last week and left a
message sharing some of her fears about
what’s been happening to her. Now, she needs
your help. But as you begin your search,
it’s clear that this document is more
sinister than you first thought and before you
know it, it seems that someone is now on your
trail; an ominous Instant Message pops up warning
you to back off --- "If you know what’s
good for you."
"Majestic
is the first online entertainment experience.
It’s a blend of storytelling, gameplay and
communications, it blurs the lines between fact
and fiction to create a more compelling and
engaging experience that unfolds at an
unpredictable real-time, real world pace,"
said Neil Young, vice president and executive in
charge of production at EA. "Majestic
is for the generation who grew up with
interactivity, but grew out of playing games. As
I aged I realized that playing games was as
acceptable to me as reading a book, or watching
TV, but what was stopping me from enjoying
interactive entertainment was that I no longer
had six hours a night to invest in playing. Majestic
is for my generation, it’s moving, powerful
interactive entertainment built specifically
around the strengths of the Internet."
Majestic
is much more experienced than played. As
it’s episodic in nature, it is not a typical
type of game that a player can sit down and
simply play through to the end. Majestic
progresses at its own pace, if a character says
he will get back to you tomorrow; players have to
wait until tomorrow to receive a phone call, fax
or e-mail.
Majestic
also keeps playing even after a player has shut
down his computer. The game may send the player a
hard-copy fax while he is in the middle of a
conference room meeting or e-mail him at the
office to see how he is doing.
Majestic
also has an uncanny ability to learn about a
player by observing the way he plays and later
customizing story elements for that particular
player.
Helping bring Majestic
to life are two dedicated teams. The content
production team includes production managers,
writers, directors, web developers and content
engineers. This team has created hundreds of web
sites that figure into the storyline for Majestic,
including some very realistic news sites that
will always carry the most up-to-date headline
news, but hidden among the real news stories will
be one or more stories tied into the fiction of
the game. Should someone searching the Web come
across a Majestic created website, they
would be unable to distinguish the site from any
authentic site.
Majestic
also requires a technology team that is comprised
of both client and server engineers. The team
engaged in a Rapid Application Development
Strategy enabling them to implement new features
and improvements in response to learning during
test cycles while simultaneously completing tasks
to meet the live date objectives.
Majestic
will be part of a subscription-based bundle
available on EA.com in Spring 2001.
About EA.com
EA.com,
headquartered in Redwood City, California, is a
new business division of Electronic Arts (NASDAQ:
ERTS), the world's largest interactive
entertainment software company. Under an
agreement with America Online, Inc. (AOL), the
world's leading interactive services company,
EA.com will provide exclusive games programming
for the AOL Games channel, AOL.COM, Netscape.com,
ICQ.com, CompuServe, in addition to the EA.com
home site. The relationship between EA.com and
AOL has created a leading online gaming
community and provides several services,
including the ability to download and play games,
find online opponents, obtain game related
information and join chat rooms to discuss games.
Electronic Arts created a new Electronic Arts
Class B Common Stock that tracks the performance
of EA.com.
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