Game Club Beyond Good & Evil: Discussion One

OK boys and girls time to kick off the first Game Club discussion about Beyond Good & Evil. Hit the jump to join the chat which will be hosted on CoveritLive. As was the case with original Game Club, you'll need to take turns commenting or asking questions. I will be moderating all comments on the chat program. Please keep your comments on topic only. I'll also leave comments live on Kotaku for those of you who want to talk more generally about the game.

Keep in mind we are only talking about what's taken place through the end of the Black Isle Mines section of the game.

The First Assignment

Game Club Beyond Good & Evil: The First Assignment

Alright, as promised today we're kicking off the rejuvenated Game Club with a group play through of fan favorite of Beyond Good & Evil. If you're interested in playing through a game along side a group of friends and then discussing the deeper meaning of the game and its plot, don't forget to hop in.

We will be meeting weekly, on Monday's at 9:30 p.m. Eastern, though this month with the holiday and E3, is going to have an odd schedule. I'm pretty sure it will be easy to get through the game in four meetings. So let's plan on our first meeting to start on July 7 at 9:30 p.m. Eastern. Just come to the site and look for the Game Club Beyond Good & Evil Discussion post.

In this first assignment for Beyond Good & Evil you'll need to complete the the Black Isle Mines section of the game. Make sure you don't play past that point because I'd like us all to be on the same page, so to speak. After playing through the chunk, try to think up some interesting questions and discussion topics. I will have a list of my own, but I'm hoping we can all ask each other interesting things to discuss.

The game is available for the Xbox (not backwards compatible) PS2, Gamecube and the PC via Steam and Gametap.

Hit the jump for the Game Club rules.

Return of the Game Club

It's been more than a year since I first floated the idea for an Oprah-esque Game Club to quite a lot of support. Heck, I've even had people email me about forming local Game Club chapters for physical meet-ups, including one developer. Since that time we had a beta of sorts and played Mr. Robot together. And then things got quiet... too quiet.

Have no fear though, I didn't forget you Game Clubbers, in fact I was working behind the scenes to line up some changes to the club to make it a bit easier for more people to participate and to bring in someone who can help kick off what I hope will become each month's new game. (More to come on that soon, I hope)

Today I can announce that we will be bringing Game Club back starting July 1. Our first title? To kick things off on the right foot we're going with Kotaku pick Beyond Good & Evil.

Now don't jump the gun and start playing it now, if you haven't already. The whole idea of Game Club is for it to be a shared experience. Expect more details coming out over the next couple of weeks as I finalize everything, but until then here are the Game Club's rules.

Mr. Robot: The Final Discussion

Game Club Reminder

Don't forget. Our last meeting for the Mr. Robot edition of Game Club is Thursday. This time around you'll need to complete the game, which really shouldn't take that much longer if you've been keeping up.

Feel free to make any suggestions about formatting for Game Club here. Our next meeting isn't till Thursday night so we have time. Also, if you missed the first or second meetings, you can still jump into the discussion over in the transcript we posted from the event.

Don't forget. Our last meeting for the Mr. Robot edition of Game Club is next Thursday. This time around you'll need to complete the game, which really shouldn't take that much longer if you've been keeping up.

Feel free to make any suggestions about formatting for Game Club here. Our next meeting isn't till Thursday night so we have time. Also, if you missed the first or second meetings, you can still jump into the discussion over in the transcript we posted from the event.

First Discussion
Second Discussion

Mr. Robot Discussion Number Two

OK, time to kick off discussion number two for Mr. Robot. Hit up the link below to join in the campfire. Remember this time around we are discussing the game up to the end of the cryo room. MTV's Stephen Totilo was kind enough to drop by to help in the discussion. So get your questions ready and hop on the link. If the room is full please follow along here, I'll be keeping an eye on the discussion and trying to post questions from here into the room.

Campfire

Game Club Meeting Tonight

Don't forget. We meet again to discuss assignment two of Mr. Robot. This time around you're supposed to play through the Cryo level and return once more to the holo deck. This section should take about two hours, it seems. Much better than the 11 or so it took to complete that first section.

Feel free to make any suggestions about formatting for Game Club here. Our next meeting isn't till Thursday night so we have time. Also, if you missed the first meeting, you can still jump into the discussion over in the transcript we posted from the event.

Mr. Robot Discussion

Mr. Robot Discussion

This is it. The first discussion meeting for Game Club's Mr. Robot.

If you haven't been following along we've decided to play through the indie PC game Mr. Robot as a group. To join in you can either try to enter our campfire or just hit the jump and follow along with the discussion going on in there. We will be updating this post as the discussion unfolds. Feel free to talk about the game in the comments, but please try to keep to the rules.

Which are these:

Once in the room, I think I'm going to use another IM system to let people IM me to either raise their hands, digitally speaking. I'll tell people in the IM when they can talk in the campfire room. The idea here is that we don't want a few dozen people all trying to talk about the game at the same time. So, I hope we can get someone to ask an intelligent question and then take turns discussing it. Remember this is a work in progress so we'll make tweaks to the mechanics of how this works as we proceed.

A cardinal rule will be that there will be no off-topic talking, no trolling, no flame wars, no fan-boyism in the campfire chat or the person will be kicked out. We're all intelligent people, I don't see why we can't act like we are when gathered together online.

In general the idea is for people to discuss the current video game in a thoughtful and meaningful way. Why we won't totally disallow discussion of things like graphics and play mechanics, those particular topics should really be brought up in a way that addresses the deeper meaning and ideas presented in the game.

Hit the jump for the discussion and the link to join the campfire group.

The Game Club

Wow, it's like college all over again. I was up till 3:30 this morning cramming for our Mr. Robot Game Club, I suspect I wasn't the only one. Having nearly played through the first assignment, I can attest that there is no way in hell this is an eight hour game. Which is a good thing. My wife, suspicious that she may have married a lackluster gamer, is suspicious that perhaps I just suck at Mr. Robot, but I'm assuming those of you playing along have noticed that the game is much longer than we originally thought.... someone... anyone?

Oh, I noticed some questions about where to stop. I've included the above screenshot of the hub room to help you out. Remember you're going to want to play through the intro, which ends at the hub room, and then through the Storage level until you get back to the hub room. Yes, that takes foreverrrrrrrrrr. The last two levels, which we will break up into separate assignments, are through those two other doors. Don't go through them, not yet.

We will be meeting tonight at 9:30 p.m. Eastern. Just come to the site and look for the Game Club Mr Robot Discussion post. And bring smarty-pants questions and an open, thoughtful mind.

Don't forget: This is the first week of Game Club. If you're interested in playing through a game along side a group of friends and then discussing the deeper meaning of the game and its plot, don't forget to hop in.

It's definitely not too late to catch up. Just read through the rules and the first assignment for Mr. Robot and then use our 40 percent discount code (found in the Rules entry) to pick up the game and do your assignment by this Thursday. See you then.

Game Club [Kotaku]

The First Assignment

OK, we've picked the game. We've give you the discount code. We've told you the rules. Now it's time for the first game assignment for Game Club: Mr. Robot.

We will be meeting weekly, on Thursday's at 9:30 p.m. Eastern. I'm pretty sure it will be easy to get through the game in three meetings. So let's plan on our first meeting to start on August 2 at 9:30 p.m. Eastern. Just come to the site and look for the Game Club Mr Robot Discussion post.

Mr Robot has an intro and three areas: storage zone, cryobenics and the Mindcore. You'll need to play through the intro and the storage zone area, and then back to the hub room by next Thursday. Make sure you don't play past that point because I'd like us all to be on the same page, so to speak. After playing through the chunk, try to think up some interesting questions and discussion topics. I will have a list of my own, but I'm hoping we can all ask each other interesting things to discuss.

Oh, if you had trouble with your order, the Moonpod folks said it should be fine by tomorrow.

The Rules

Now that we know what game we'll be playing (Mr. Robot), it's time to discuss rules for the Game Club. I'll skip the first one since I'm sure you all know what it is.

Hit the jump for a rambling set of non-numbered rules, that if numbered would start with number two.

Alright, you got me, I've been dragging my feet. This is sort of how I made my way through college: waiting till the last minute to actually finish what I started. But hey, I graduated, so happy ending right?

Since this is such a new idea, at least for Kotaku, I've decided the best thing to do is to follow in the ageless tradition of video games and hold a Game Club beta to work out the kinks. Really that just gives me an excuse to make a whole bunch of mistakes and then say it was a "work in progress."