SyFy Channel's throwing out a hail mary into the Internet and TV with their upcoming show, "Defiance," since it has one foot on screen and the other in your gaming rig. The channel is partnering up with Trion Worlds, who specialize in crafting gigantic worlds for MMORPG, to release a tie-in game for 360, Playstation 3 and PC gaming.
The series is set 35 years in the future when an alien ship has crashed into Earth and radically transformed the world into a weird mash-up of foreign flauna and, based on gameplay footage, angry red prickly spheres filled with teeth. The show is set in Defiance, formerly St. Louis, while the game primarily takes place in San Francisco. Players are essentially roguish hunters, engaging in quests that become influenced by what happens each week on the show with planned interaction among the actor's characters and players, like The Matrix MMORPG attempted.
That was fine for a property like The Matrix, which encouraged the audience to adopt online avatars, but the folks at SyFy and Trion are aiming to have certain "large" battles effect the TV universe as well. That would truly be breaking new ground for audience interactivity, but could it amount to something more than a last-minute CGI newsflash or pre-recorded audio of one of two outcomes?
The CGI look of "Defiance," both show and game, isn't that jarring considering it's the format SyFy tends to favor, such as their now canceled Sanctuary, but it certainly eases an audience into a game-like world. It'll be interesting to see if casual viewers are prompted into online battle each week, just to be that more immersed than sitting on Twitter or reading a live-blog. There's no set date, but we do fondly remember the last time a cable network tried to partner with a gaming client. Didn't end too well.
via Topless Robot, Blastr