Transmedia is the next step up from
multimedia in a world where bigger is better. The key difference
between the two is that, while the aspects of a multimedia approach
can be digested independently of each other, transmedia tells one
story across multiple mediums. While multimedia has existed in some
form for decades, perhaps centuries, the rise of consumerism and,
eventually, the internet expanded it and gave birth to transmedia
story telling. It made sense from a consumerist stand point, because
it essentially spreads the possible fan base to multiple medium,
allowing more profits, and the rise of the internet and digital
technology allowed to spread even faster and cheaper. The rise of
digital technology itself has also lead to the creation of new story
telling mediums as well, further expanding the possible reach of
transmedia. A good place to look for examples of transmedia
storytelling is with video games.
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| Official Artwork of Halo 2 Bungie and Microsoft |
A medium created through the spread of
digital technology, video games lend them selves to the possibility
of transmedia storytelling, through books, web series and ARGs. Halo,
a popular game series, is a good example of transmedia storytelling.
The I Love Bees ARG
campaign to help promote the release of Halo 2 in
2004 involved a fake website
that had been hacked, leaving strange messages on the website. Though
the ARG was created for the purpose of marketing the game, it also
doubled as a small story that explained events that would occur in
Halo 2, ostensibly
acting as a short prequel. The Halo franchise
has also had several books that expanded on reoccurring characters
and back story in the series. More recently, the franchise had a five
episode web series produced by famed Hollywood director Ridley Scott
in 2014, called Halo:Nightfall,
which introduces a character of importance in the latest game in the
series, Halo 5, which
came out last month.
 |
| I Love Bees ARG 42 Entertainment |
While
Halo started as a
video game and then became a transmedia product, there are now
franchises that start life as one. Defiance
is a franchise conceived as a television series and a video game at
the same time. The TV series ran for three season while the game, a
persistent massively multiplayer online(MMO) game continues to run.
Though not yet released, Quantum
Break
is a similar product, it is both an upcoming video game and digital
television series, but it takes it one step further by having events
in the live action series be influenced by the actions of the player
in the video game.
The
world of video games is a perfect place for this sort of transmedia
experimentation to exist because it encourages exploration, a feature
unique to video games in the world of media and storytelling. In a
way, it expands the playground of a game. The I
Love Bees
ARG cited above is a perfect example of this because of the mystery
behind it during it's launch. Fans of the game where given a few
clues and told to figure it out, which they did. Further
investigation rewarded fans with a small story that lead into a
bigger when Halo
2
was released. In the case of I
Love Bees,
participation in the ARG meant a deeper connection to both the
franchise and the fan base as the mystery behind it forced fans to
come together and decipher it, making them active participants in the
franchise.
 |
| Defiance TV Show cast SyFy |
 |
| Defiance Video Game poster Trion Worlds |
The
idea of having a choice of what will happen in storytelling as a
participants is pretty much exclusive to video games. In a movie, TV
series or book, when a character makes a choice, the audience is
passive in the story. With video games, the audience becomes an
active participant in the story, and in some games, can determine the
outcome of a story. A video game series based on the Walking
Dead
franchise is famous for having the story of the game be determined by
the player, by having the player make choices that changes events in
the story. Making the player an active participant in the story is an
incredibly powerful way of involving you audience, one that no other
medium can match. This is why Quantum
Break is
an interesting development.
Quantum
Break, though
it hasn't come out yet, is an interesting example of a transmedia
product because nothing like it has ever been done before and it will
be interesting to see how it turns out. Though the game and the
series will follow different sets of characters, the game encourages
players to watch the series to see the effects of their choices in
the game. The players having invested themselves in the game, will
want to see the fruit of their efforts in the series.
Transmedia
is still a developing idea that holds much promise, not just for
video games but all media. Recently, the film The
Martian had
a series of web shorts that introduce the film's characters and acts
as a prequel to the film's story. One of the most profitable
franchises in the world, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, is one big
stories stretching across films, television and comic books.
Transmedia is here to stay and it will be interesting to see how it
develops in the world that just keep getting more restless for good
entertainment.
Bibliography
Transmedia
101. YouTube.
One 3 Productions, 24 June 2011. Web.
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HvJbY9hUgbc>.
Shachtman,
Noah. "Sci-Fi Fans Are Called Into an Alternate Reality."
N.p., n.d. Web.
<http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/04/technology/circuits/scifi-fans-are-called-into-an-alternate-reality.html>.
Making
of Defiance Part I: A Transmedia Revolution. SyFy
<http://www.syfy.com/defiance/videos/making-of-defiance-part-i-a-transmedia-revolution>
Souppouris,
Aaron. "Xbox One-exclusive 'Quantum Break' Aims to Blend TV with
Gaming for a 'revolutionary Entertainment Experience'" The
Verge.
N.p., 21 May 2013. Web. 18 Nov. 2015.
<http://www.theverge.com/2013/5/21/4351412/xbox-one-quantum-break-game>.
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