Arrogance: the pitch

Jacob and I essentially created Probably Entertainment over lunch one day by talking about what a real-time strategy game would be like if it were based on things that really exist.  Today.  Farmers or athletes or wild animals or ents.  

See, we lost the "really exist" thing pretty quickly.  A lot of other stuff fell away, but it's all for the best.  

The game concept really took off when we pondered the resources players would gather.  Gold? Lame as hell. Oil?  Also blah.  Cardboard?  It's got a lot of utility, but it's a little flimsy on cool factor, y'know?  

All bullshit aside, what do you really need to fight a war?  

Take away the technology, take away the money, take away the propaganda.  

You need two things.  

One: something to kill your enemy.  

Two: the ego to think you can.  To think the horrors of war are worth it.  To commit war crimes, you gotta think you're right.  You only win by thinking you should.

This charming little game never quite developed a name, but I refer to it as Arrogance because, well. It wouldn't be as great as it is if not for all that arrogance.  

In the coming weeks and months and perpetuity, I'll give you bits of the game.  I still love the world, and I still work on the game whenever I need something really ridiculous to dive into.  This first tidbit is how we'd imagined pitching the game.  If you enjoy it, let us know.  

Like John Lennon said: Imagine… 

Imagine two sports teams with such bitter rivalries that they ignite World War III.

Imagine department stores turned gangs, murdering for market share.

Imagine that bears can talk.

Stop imagining: this is Arrogance, the absurd real-time strategy game.

Liquid arrogance seeps from the ground—and consuming it drives even timid folk to pursue manic power fantasies.  You’re freshly addicted.  The world crumbles because you lead any of five unlikely but awesome factions in their grab for global domination.  Superhuman athletes train for Super Brawl Sunday vs. swarms of minimum-wage workers armed with minimum-wage weaponry.  Zealots of the Über-Faith smite criminals whose schemes plunge the art of war to new depths.  Bears talk.

In REAL GAMEPLAY defensive linemen repel chainsaw-wielding manslaughterers as grizzly trebearchets hurl bee hives into the fray.  You can ACTUALLY MAKE baseball players hit home runs with the heads of choir members singing hymns of annihilation.  THRIFTLESSLY, your robber barons toss fiery wads of cash at one-armed lepers, only to gasp as bipolar bears hug all the happiness money can buy from their lungs.  IF YOU’RE LUCKY, corrupt referees will cry foul play as your clouds of guilt choke them with their own sins.  IN TIER THREE your venture capital ships spearhead legions of sales clerks, clashing with bears that conjure earthquakes, blizzards, and rage lightning.

And please recall that those bears can ACTUALLY TALK.

To YOU.

Stop imagining these epic situations and mourning John Lennon. 

Even he would play this game. 

Drink some Arrogance today.