Subject: Research participants needed: Play a new game today!

This is a request for volunteers to participate in a fun doctoral
research study.


THE RESEARCH:
I am a PhD student in the Communications and Information Science
program at the University of Hawaii.  My dissertation work is in
the field of interactive narrative.  That means I'm trying to get
a computer to generate a new story in response to a human who is
playing the role of a character in that story.

I have developed a text-based prototype game in order to explore
a particular approach to this problem.  But now I need some live
players to help me evaluate it!


THE GAME: "Demeter: Blood in the Sky"
In an alternate 1923, you are one of seven passengers aboard the
Zeppelin-class airship, Demeter.  Your flight across the Atlantic
is pleasantly routine... until a gruesome dawn suddenly changes
everything.


THE STUDY:
Anyone can play!  You can participate online from any computer
with a Java plugin installed (which you probably already have).

You'll answer a short survey about your gaming and computing
background, and then play though a text-based game twice,
answering another short survey after each game session.
I need each participant to play twice because I am comparing
two different versions of the game.

The full study will take about 90 to 120 minutes to complete.

To get started, click this link:
http://tinker2.zach.tomaszewski.name/cgi-bin/demeter.py

The study will only run until 15 Feb, so act now!


WHY SHOULD I CARE?
There are so many good reasons for you to participate:

* HELP a desperate hungry grad student finally graduate.
* EXPERIENCE something new: Both a new story and a new way of
  telling stories.
* DISCOVER something old: Text-based adventure games and
  interactive fiction have a 30+ years history and are still
  being produced by a small but active community.  Have you
  ever played one?
* SUPPORT local research in Hawai'i: What goes around, comes
  around.
* RELAX and play a game, because you could probably use a break
  right now anyway.

Yes, you can have all of this and MORE!  Click the link above.


QUESTIONS?
If you have any questions or want to report any problems, you
can contact me at: ztomasze@hawaii.edu


Feel free to forward this email to others you think might be
interested.  Thanks for your time!

--Zach Tomaszewski