On Sunday, Lord Arux and I played Accomplice, the live action mystery game complete with on-the-spot puzzle solving, interaction with professional actors posing as characters in the story, and surprises that only the streets of Hollywood can give with its touristy, kitschy shenanigans.

Unfortunately, I can’t say very much at all about what exactly happened, as that would spoil it for anyone who wanted to play. So I won’t.

However, I can say that, while the puzzles and clues were a bit on the easy side for Lord Arux and myself, the acting was top notch and really entertaining every moment of the way, plus we got free beer. (Okay, I got free beer. I drank Lord Arux’s beer, even the awful Coors Light.) Afterward I got to chat for a few seconds with Tom Salamon, who is one of the writers. Really nice, very interesting fellow. He originally created the show in New York with his sister, who’s a psychotherapist. I find it interesting that their approach is damned similar to Dead Earth’s games: not geared toward gamers but more of a theatrical experience. To that end, this is a great quote:

As far as we’re concerned, an interesting and involving experience can be designed in an apartment complex with a certain amount of creativity. It’s not about seeing the sites for us, it’s about creating an escapist experience that can immerse people in our world for a few hours and get involved in a story outside of their own.

Which is precisely what Dead Earth did.

I’m dying to talk about a major synchronicity that happened at the end, but that’s just not going to happen with anyone who hasn’t played already. Los Angelenos, consider your bottoms booted to the ticket box. I don’t know if it’s still on, but I hear that, if you enter “shutter” in the discount code, you get 50% off.

Now go help Nikki Desmond!